Your guide to the Steampunk Festival in Lincoln, England

Every August steampunks from around the world descend on the English cathedral city of Lincoln to party like it’s 1899.

The Asylum Steampunk Festival in Lincoln is billed as the biggest and longest running steampunk festival in the world. 

Every August Bank Holiday weekend the city’s atmospheric Cathedral Quarter is overrun with people who look like they have stepped out of Victorian times by way of Doc’s workshop in Back to the Future.

There’s a market, of course, selling copper corsets, leather waistcoats and bespoke top hats, as well as the obligatory goggles, festooned with cogs and gears and other industrial-age paraphernalia.

But there are other events worth checking out too.

There’s a Great Exhibition where steampunks get to display all manner of fantastical creations.

There’s a costume competition and parade where participants gad about in their most splendid and eye-catching outfit.

And an ‘Illicit Market’ where all the good stuff is sold.

It’s the steampunk-themed sporting events that attract the biggest crowds.

The ‘Wacky Races’, for example, sees competitors race human and mechanically powered vehicles around the ‘Banjo’ in Lincoln Castle.

Keep an eye out for the Tea Duelling. Held according to strict international rules, two participants face off dunking biscuits in cups of specially-prepared tea.

The dunker who dunks their biscuit longest, without it disintegrating, is the winner.

Mostly though, the festival is just an excuse for people to dress up and wander around the cobbled streets of Lincoln, partying like it’s 1899.

And what’s wrong with that?

Official website: asylumsteampunk.co.uk