Frogmore Events

We offer drop-in craft sessions during school holidays. These paper based projects are arranged for you to achieve a guaranteed result. Often seasonally themed, we lay out all the materials and you work your way around the workstations to create your unique piece of work. What you make you take home with you.

This is ideal for a short school holiday infill. Suitable for ages 4 to 12, adults are welcome to get involved too! Make the mess here, take your artwork home and we clean up!

Dates:

• Drop-in, no booking required. Autumn Half Term, Monday 26th to Friday 30th October between 10am and 12.30pm, Halloween crafting. Decorate a bat £6 and on Tuesday to Thursday at 11am, you can listen to a story from a local author too! Make before the story of after. Priced per project

Each year Frogmore Paper Mill organises a schedule of events which includes family orientated days. These vary each year. Typically, we hold a Wild Frogmore Day which is a celebration of our natural environment, of which we are so proud. Sitting on a rare chalk stream we are treated to a wealth of wildlife and which we do everything we can to protect. Wild Frogmore offers a mix of charity stalls, children’s activities and boat rides.

We offer a regular Heritage Fire Brigade or more recently a working vehicle day in conjunction with Murphy’s Ltd. where families can get close up to the machines and talk to those who drive and care for them. The Heritage Fire brigade was formed by ex-firemen, many of the them mill firemen to preserve a valuable part of paper mill heritage and restore the vehicles.

Dates:

• Wild Frogmore, Saturday 27th June 2026, 11am – 3pm. Entry free.
• Working Vehicle Day Sunday 23rd August 2026 11am – 3pm. Entry fee on door.

Each school holiday we run Storyboats for younger children. This is a gentle 40 minute cruise down the River Gade to where it meets the Grand Union Canal, with wildlife spotting while listening to stories. The books we read a picture books, so the audience can spot the hidden elements and learn about new creatures. Suitable for ages 4 to 8 years, it is the ideal way to fill time between the more costly holiday outings. We feed the waterfowl we encounter and if we are very lucky we see the kingfisher.

We run special themed boats at Halloween and Christmas, with goody bags and an extra special passenger in a red suit at Christmas.

All children must be accompanied by an adult, all passengers must have a ticket. Tickets can be purchased from our website.

Tickets go on sale roughly one month prior to the event.

Dates:

• Easter Storyboats 31st March & 8th April 2026, boats at 11, 13.30, 14.45 £6.00 SOLD OUT
• Whitsun Storyboat 27th & 29th May 2026, boats at 11, 13.30, 14.45 £6.00 SOLD OUT
• Summer Storyboat 24th, 31st July 7, 14, 21, 28 August 2026 boats at 11.30, 13.30, 14.45 £6.00
• Halloween Storyboats 30th October 2026, boats at 13.30, 14.45, 16.00 £9.00 treat bag Tickets on sale 1st October.
• Santa Storyboats 22nd December, boats at 2.30pm and 4pm £12.00 goody bag from Santa. Tickets on sale 1st December

In June and September, we hold Street Food events where a number of delicious food and drink vendors join us on site. With food from around the world and mostly local providers this is an opportunity to take it easy and not cook. We ensure we have everyone one covered with vegetarian and gluten free options. All our vendors provide details of ingredients, if you wish to check for allergy. Street Food Events take place in our riverside, outside classroom, created since the 2022 fire, with pedestrian access via Fourdrinier Way, HP3 9RY.

Dates:

• Street Food 1: Friday 19th June 2026 5.30-10pm free entry
• Street Food 2: Friday 4th September 2026 5.30-10pm free entry

This annual event takes place on the first Sunday in December each year. We pride ourselves on amassing approximately 35 stalls offering of high quality craftwork, from makers around Herts, Beds and Bucks. The Craft Fairs have paused while the new visitor centre is created and will return as soon as we have the clear space to invite the stallholders back in.

Dates:

Christmas Craft Fair: 2027tbc

The Talks Programme commenced pre-Covid and has continued through the warmer months each year since (April to October). Held on a Friday evening at 7pm, talks are delivered by a variety of specialists, mostly local historians, hence they are perfect for those wishing to further their local knowledge. There is a strong paper theme, with talks about the Gade Valley paper mills, John Dickinson, printing and development of the local area. They include human stories, as well as great inventions.

Speakers include:

• Peter Balding: Peter started printing with a John Bull set as a small boy and so began a lifetime love of print and print heritage. As a volunteer Peter formed the letterpress facility at Frogmore 25 years ago and now finds himself rebuilding it post fire in 2026.
• Rowena Haigh: The Frogmore Paper Mill, Collections Officer, has delivered talks on The House of Dickinson, This Women’s Work, a look at women working in the paper mills.
• Michael Stanyon is the person who created the Frogmore Paper Mill archive more than 20 years ago, president of the Hemel Hempstead, Local History and Museum Society and author of many books and articles about paper. If you want to know anything about paper history or the local area, Mike is the person to ask. Currently writing a longer book on the paper mills of Hertfordshire, between giving talks and acting as consultant.
• Roger Yapp:

  Roger Yapp is a local Hertfordshire historian and is Chairman of the Abbots Langley Local History Society, He is recently retired and worked as an IT Programme and Project Manager in the Financial Services industry

Dates:

• 17th April The Dismal Solitude of Torture : Children in the Paper Industry – Rowena Haigh SOLD OUT
• 15th May Paper Curiosities : Unusual Tales About Uses of Paper – Michael Stanyon
• 5th June Poles Apart : Hemel Wartime Polish Codebreakers with a Dickinson link – Roger Yapp
• 18th September A Journey Through Dickinson News – Rowena Haigh
• 16th October The Life and Times of William Caxton – Peter Balding