Forty years after a pub party started it all, Derry prepares for another Halloween.
Derry is putting witches on its walls this October. The Ebrington offers a rather comfortable place to join the celebrations, with dinner overlooking the Foyle and the Peace Bridge leading towards the performances. Forty years after a fancy-dress party in a pub began the city’s Halloween festival, local artists are preparing a disco of the undead on Grand Parade. A midweek hotel stay puts guests within walking distance of the opening nights.
The celebrations run from 28 October to 1 November. Before Saturday’s carnival parade, the Awakening the Walled City Trail turns the historic centre into a performance space for three evenings, from 28–30 October. In Your Space Circus brings local performers together with international talent for Witchy Wonderland.
The Ebrington’s clock tower and former barracks buildings preserve an earlier chapter of Derry’s history. Soldiers once slept and ate in spaces that now house hotel bedrooms. The army left in 2003, and the grounds welcomed the public in 2011, alongside the opening of the Peace Bridge. The hotel opened in June 2023. Guests staying in Ebrington Square now walk freely through a former military site on their way into the city.
The hotel’s head chef Leigh Thurston gives the Oak Room’s menu a distinctly regional character. He pairs Greencastle monkfish with langoustine bisque and chorizo jam, while Lough Foyle mussels arrive with white wine, garlic and sourdough. The restaurant holds two AA Rosettes, but those place names offer the more revealing detail: the kitchen draws on the surrounding waters, which guests can see through the floor-to-ceiling windows.
An Armagh apple tart with cinnamon ice cream continues that regional thread through pudding. Dinner gives guests a chance to encounter the area through its produce as well as its streets. The Corner House Pub & Lounge offers another setting, with leather seating and mahogany accents beside the approach from the bridge. Its menu centres on informal food, including locally sourced steak and fish, and guests can take a table without a reservation.
The Autumn Escape brings an overnight stay in a Classic King room together with full Irish breakfast and £50 dining credit per stay for two people. Guests also receive access to the hydrotherapy pool and thermal suite, with checkout at noon. The offer runs Monday–Thursday, making the festival’s earlier evenings a possibility, subject to availability. The hotel recommends reserving a thermal suite slot ahead of the stay.
For those staying over Halloween itself, the celebrations follow them back across the bridge. After the fireworks on Saturday 31 October, The Ebrington hosts its own Halloween party in the Grand Ballroom. O Hana Band plays from 9pm until 11.30pm, followed by DJ Rory Cooke until 1am. Costumes, dancing and complimentary nibbles carry the evening on indoors. Tickets cost £10 per person, for over-18s, and guests can book through the hotel’s reception team. A bedroom upstairs becomes a particularly appealing prospect at the end of the night.
Derry’s anniversary production still depends on people who live here. Studio 2 is preparing more than 100 performers for its Hocus Pocus contribution to Saturday’s parade. Young participants will make their public debut alongside experienced performers, following workshops in costume making, special-effects makeup and choreography. Visitors encounter the finished spectacle; community arts groups spend weeks developing the skills and performances behind it.
That local involvement extends across the anniversary programme. More than 500 participants had signed up for the parade by September, with artistic director Kevin O’Neill bringing together groups from Derry and further afield. Pipe bands will share the procession with samba bands and Indian drummers.
O’Neill also has a surprise for anyone expecting exclusively ancient folklore. He is bringing back the fashion and music of the 1980s, the decade when Derry’s celebrations began. Among the mythical creatures, the anniversary parade will recall the city’s own first Halloween parties. Some of this year’s ghosts belong to living memory.
