The Curve Fashion Festival Announces Cancellation

The Curve Fashion Festival has announced it will not take place in 2021.

The owner of Europe’s largest annual plus size fashion event, which usually takes place in Liverpool, also declared that plans for a future event are uncertain.

The team announced via their Instagram account that the festival, originally planned to take place on 25^th September 2021 at Exhibition Centre Liverpool, now won’t go ahead.

The statement reads:

“UPDATE – EVENT CANCELLED

As many of you are aware, we have been full steam ahead with planning the September event with a great mainstage line-up & strong customer ticket sales. Unfortunately, retailer sign-ups has not been as expected. Within the last 4 weeks, many of the confirmed retailers decided they could no longer be part of this year’s event. Many have made redundancies in their companies, staff changes or a shift in their approach to their curve ranges. Whilst this is saddening, we completely understand & have seen the effect first-hand Covid has had on the retail industry.

We have looked at so many alternatives, however, this is the most responsible option. We have no real guidance on how long the retail industry will take to recover or simply for the teams/brands to get back to a position where their brand message aligns back with The Curve Fashion Festival.

We know this will be a huge disappointment to many, as it is to us. But we hope this isn’t a goodbye, and more of a see you soon.”

The team clarified that all ticketholders will be reimbursed.

Their sixth event was delayed three times, from November 2020 to March 2021 and then to September 2021, before the decision was made to cancel it altogether.

Debz, one of the event’s past attendees, said: “As a plus-size blogger who has attended The Curve Fashion Festival a number of times – including the very first one I was sad to see the event cancelled. It’s a big social event in the plus size calendar so a shame not to see it go ahead. However, I have no doubt the team come back bigger and better next year and I’m excited to see what that looks like.”

In previous years the event has featured fashion stalls and catwalk features from online retailers such as Pretty Little Thing, boohoo and Simply Be, as well as high street favourites such as New Look, River Island and Marks & Spencer.

Plus size personalities and celebrities such as Gemma Collins, Eddie Hall and Tess Holliday have all featured on The Curve Fashion Festival stage in previous years.

In an Instagram live video owner The Curve Fashion Festival founder and owner and team member Hollie Burgess addressed the situation, citing change in the apparel industry’s landscape following the Covid-19 pandemic.

Zoe said that The Curve Fashion Festival had grow from 400 attendees in 2015 to 4,000 in 2019, when the most recent event took place.

Although the team ruled out plans for a 2022 event, Zoe added: “We’ll see where we both are career-wise for 2023.”

Zoe Ellis is the owner of Palm, a cocktail bar based in Chester.