Haunting the heart of the Liberties

The Liberties is set for a spooky fright night festival with ‘The Liberties Haunt Festival’ coming to the Dublin 8 area on Halloween night. 

The Liberties Haunt Festival promo: Image courtesy of Dublin City Council

The Liberties Haunt Festival will take place at Thomas Court beside St Catherine’s Graveyard in the heart of the Liberties, Co. Dublin on 31st October. 

The community led event in association with Dublin City Council will run from 5pm to 8pm on Halloween night, and it is open to people of all ages to attend. 

Joe Salam, founder of Joined Up and co-founder of Make Place, Joe Salam, is the main man behind the event’s production. 

“I have been running events like this for the last ten years, mainly Halloween-themed trying to bring communities together,” Salam said. 

Salam has been working on events in disadvantaged areas in 2014, starting in Smithfield. “The event was a great success, and you could sense at the time it was the start of something special in the area,” he said. 

The event in Smithfield motivated Joe to expand these types of events out in the Dublin 7/8 area, where The Liberties Haunt was created. 

“The Liberties Haunt has been running since 2019, and it has been going from strength to strength each year,” Salam said. 

The event is completely free to attend, with sweets and fizzy drinks free of charge. 

The event will have everything for all ages such as carnival games, live music, and fun competitions such as dance-offs. 

“The Victorian style carnival games will include games such as huck a duck, shoot the can and much more,” said Salam. 

“There will be live performances from acts such as a belly-dance group drawn from the Ukrainian community in Dublin 8”, he added. 

Alcohol is prohibited at the family-friendly event and there will be Garda presence all night. 

“It is a great event for the community, and it makes our jobs a lot easier on Halloween night,”, a Garda spokesperson told The Liberty. 

Salam and his organisation Joined Up have started to reach out to the local community of The Liberties in search of young people’s ideas on how to improve the festival. 

“We have started to ask the young people in the area for their inspiration on how the event should look because ultimately it is their night,” said Salam. 

“In terms of funding, we want money going into events like this rather than repairing our communities after acts of anti-social behaviour on Halloween.” 

In the future, Salam said, “the event might go into a more than one day event. We have big plans for the future as we want to keep evolving and bringing better to the community.”  

For more information visit Joined Up or Dublin City Council.