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Mar 2023

Community

Dancing through the night to support Harrogate charity

Published: 3 Mar 2023, 11:20 GMT

by Vicky Carr

A town centre cafe in Harrogate will be transformed into a dancehall for one night only this weekend.

Artizan Cafe and Creative Space on Cambridge Road is organising a danceathon to launch its new crowdfunding campaign.

The money raised will help to fund more events for its differently able members.

Liz Cluderay, UK programmes officer for Artizan International, said:

"This event is created by the team at the cafe themselves, which is pretty awesome when you're running a charity.

"They wanted to do something that would involve our members being able to attend as well.

"It's based in the cafe — somewhere our members know and feel comfortable. It's starting at 6pm, so the cafe is closed but it's still an early enough time for our members to be able to attend."

In the run-up to the event this week, the Artizan team arrived at the cafe on Thursday morning to discover the window had been broken during the night.

However, they said the damage will not affect the danceathon, which is going ahead as planned.

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To help keep a steady flow of dancers through the evening, participants are asked to book a time slot for their arrival.

Volunteers and team members from Artizan are preparing to be there into the early hours of Sunday, as long as the dancers want to continue.

Local instructor Colin Frith will lead the dancing for part of the evening, bringing some members of CMF Dance with him.

It is the first big event for Artizan since it opened the cafe last January. Liz said the last 14 months have been more successful than they ever expected:

"It has been incredible. It has far exceeded our expectation.

"Harrogate has welcomed us with open arms. The cafe is really well-attended and people are very supportive of what we're doing here.

"We're managing to reach a lot of disabled adults who we're trying to help. We just need to keep it going."

Artizan is hoping to raise £5,000 through its crowdfunder, and has rewards on offer to supporters. Click here to find out more.

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Dancing through the night to support Harrogate charity

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