Irish Redhead Convention 2015: 21-23 August

The “luck of the Irish” is an old mining saying used to describe the good fortune of Irish gold miners in the 19th century. But we like to think it’s in the red hair of 10% of the country’s inhabitants that shows where Ireland really struck gold. They’re so gold, they’re ginger.

Celebrating the country’s good luck is the Irish Redhead Convention, a whacky, ginger-loving festival of everything to do with red hair, taking place on 21-23 August 2015.

The Irish Redhead Convention actually started as a joke in organisers’ Joleen and Denis Cronin’s family pub, but six years later, it now attracts thousands of redheads from all over the world, who travel to Crosshaven, Cork (sweetly renamed REDhaven) for a weekend of ginger fun, frolics and freckles.

Everything from carrot tossing, ginger speed-dating, freckle counting, group photoshoots, a redhead parade, cinema screenings, certificates of genuine foxiness and the coronation of the Redhead King and Queen will take place at the family-friendly event, which also raises money for the Irish Cancer Society.

This year’s programme of events include a screening of Redheads Anonymous, a seminar from Jacky Colliss Harvey, the author of Red: A History of the Redhead, and a ginger-packed discussion panel from those in the redhead biz, including Tristan Rodgers, publisher of MC1R magazine, Joleen Cronin from the Irish Redhead Convention, and Emma Kelly, Ginger Parrot’s very own editor (hurrah!).

We also can’t forget to mention the all-important Foxygen music stage, reserved just for gingers (sorry, not sorry). This year’s red-haired performers include Ginger Nutz, The Baby Cheeses, the Crosshaven Ukuladies, and headliner, Irish jazz and blues singer Mary Coughlan.