Nominee Summary
"A unique literary experience, consistently well organised thanks to a raft of local cadets and volunteers." Created 15 years ago, Ayrshire's annual Boswell Book Festival is an event of artistic excellence, diversity, inclusivity and originality, exploring biography and memoir for all ages to both a live and an online audience. Located in the rural setting of Dumfries House on the edge of former mining communities, the unique theme is inspired by the great Ayrshire biographer, James Boswell of Auchinleck. With 65 events, including writing workshops, a free Schools’ Day, a children’s festival and outreach events in the local primary schools.
What makes your nominee stand out?
The Boswell Book Festival is an annual hybrid festival staged by The Boswell Trust, a Scottish Charity registered for the advancement of heritage, literary arts and education, and after 15 years is firmly planted in rural Ayrshire. With its unique theme of biography and memoir, which attracts 80% of our audience, an outstanding cultural event of a quality recognized throughout the UK festival scene, with a growing audience, has been created through a seamless partnership with Dumfries House. Numbers watching online continue to build with the entire programme available for those unable to attend in person with a growing global audience reached as well. The challenge throughout for BBF has been finding sufficient funding in this rural area of Scotland to allow ticket prices to be kept affordable to the community in this area of social deprivation and to allow free provision to local schools who enjoy a two-hour visit on Schools' Day, comprising a session with an author, a tour of Dumfries House and a writing workshop in which an actor brings Boswell to life. Knowing that inspiring life stories play a vital role in helping people find meaning in difficult situations it has been seen how the prism of biography, memoir and non-fiction writing serves as a means of self-expression and emotional release. 84% were attracted by the theme of biography and memoir while 80% of the audience were retuning visitors. 91% rated BBF either excellent or very good.
Changes that have been implemented
Increase in both live and online audience size Increased social media interactions Expanding volunteer base including army cadets Enhanced partnership with Dumfries House Tours of James Boswell's ancestral home, Auchinleck House, rarely open to the public, were included in the festival programme in 2025. To reach a growing audiences, the marketing strategy has at its heart the celebration of local community and the festival leverages the goodwill and enthusiasm of local residents, businesses, and organisations to spread the word about the festival. Promoting the festival on a budget requires creativity and strategic thinking that was achieved with targeted online advertising and event-specific ads that boosted visibility, with ads designed to reach audiences based on their demographics, behaviours and interests.
Overcoming challenges
Attracting the major names needed for a successful festival is an ongoing challenge, and Boswell Book Festival relies on a wide network of help from a number of sources ranging from personal contacts, other book festival programmers to friendly publishers and publicists in order to deliver an eclectic programme each year. Annual fund-raising is needed to sustain the festival, and this takes much of the time of the core team to achieve. Car parking provision for the growing numbers of visitors to the festival has to be addressed each year, with record numbers attending the estate over the festival weekend in 2025. Attracting new festival-goers across the age spectrum is always challenging for a festival, but Boswell still successfully attracts many first-time festival attendees through it's diverse programming. A rural festival throws up problems for schools who wish to attend in relation to the cost of the provision of coaches, but due to the high reputation of the Schools' Day programme, over fifteen local schools attended in 2025.
