Meet the Giants


The GiANT Collection

If you know of other GiANTS not shown, or can add or correct any information, please email rob@thegiants.org.uk.

Queen Elizabeth II - The GiANTS

The first of 60 GiANT Queens, to be paraded around Chester on June 4th, 2012 to celebrate the real Queen Elizabeth's Diamond Jubilee. The other GiANT Queens are being produced by Community Groups and Social Enterprises from around Cheshire and Warrington. Full details of this project and how you can get involved are on the Partner Project page. (Select from the Menu Bar above)

 

Father Yule - The GiANTS

Father Yule is our version of Father Christmas here at GiANTS HQ. He was created out of popular demand for a seasonal character. So we decided to look back at the traditions of St Nicholas, and the original legend rather than the modern interpretations we see all around us. Lucy made the head and hands etc. and Sam the luxurious costume. Already he's been seen at the switch on of the Chester lights, Sainsbury's at Upton on the Wirral and a Christmas fair in Kelsall. He's certainly got a busy time ahead of him over the next few weeks.

Venetia - The GiANTS

What a nice surprise to have Pam Bradley from CWAC turn up at the Giant HQ with a bags and bundles of material for us to use, This material has been recycled from THE TREE WRAPPING project so if you were wondering what happened to all that lovely material well look no further, our fantastically talented seamstress Sam Jones has turned all that bright fun looking material into one of our most colourful GiANTS yet.

Our Venetian GiANT has already had some fame She has been out singing with and supporting the Deaf Choir Group at the Town hall and as she has been a big supporter of the White Ribbon Campaign a group that support the Elimination of Violence against Women. She was also out and about with this group for their international day and walked around Chester City. If you or any groups you know would like to have a GiANT for your events please don’t hesitate to contact Pamela Drew on 07786 225552 and she can organize this for you.

Muirlin- Muir

Muir Housing is a non-profit organisation that works closely with communities in order to improve their area. They provide homes to rent, house shares, and sheltered accomodation to those who need it. In thier roster, they have over 4,700 properties available. They work in several cities in the UK, hiring over 150 people. Thier head office is in Chester. 

Like Muir Housing, their giant, Muirlin, is a big advocate of green living. Said John Bellis, chief executive; ''Our giant will be wearing a cloak of Muir's corporate colours, purple and green, to symbolise our dedication to working in an environmentally sustainable way, this is something that has a serious message behind it but has also been a lot of fun for staff and residents who have been involved in the project.'' Stitched onto the cloak will be some designs for the 'house of the future', as envisaged by the residents and children of Gorse Hill, Blacon, one of Muir's supported housing schemes, and also where Chester the Giant City hold it's very own drum and dance workshops for the parade. Muir is a group that has benefitted Chester Giants and the local community extensively, John Bellis said ''Our headquarters is based in Chester, and we have many properties in and around the city, so we wanted to show our support for what is guaranteed to be a spectacular local event.''

Muir Housing have also worked closely with their own people, Giant Muirlin's name was chosen by Helen Brown and Alison Vaughn, who work in the Finance Department at Muir Group. Muir staff and their families will also be showing their support by accompanying Muirlin through Chester on the day of the parade.

Lupus- BiG Storage

Big storage is a company that provides it's storage service to a vast array of people. Over the five years since its inception, it has become a trusted and vouched for name by a multitude of businesses across the North West, but they also offer services for domestic needs at affordable prices, for both business' and individuals. Representing BiG Storage in this year's Giant carnival is a familiar face to some in Chester, the charismatic BiG Lupus, who recently caused a stir by appearing, seemingly out of nowhere and adopting the nobel position of Chester FC mascot. BiG Storage recently entered a deal to provide funding and sponsorship, and are one of the Patrons to Chester Football Club. Lupus appears at a fresh new time for Chester FC, the aptly named, 'pheonix club', 'which is in the process of reforming itself. With the loyal determination of Chester City fans, the new Chester FC club, Lupus the Wolf and Big Storage 2011, may just be the year of Chester FC.

Brendon Oldfield of BiG storage says, " We make every effort to support our local community, including local sports teams, charities and community groups, and we are proud to be a supporter of Chester the Giant City."

Joy- Chapter 

Chapter, a Chester based charity, has been working to improve the life of adults needing guidence with money, employment and mental health issues since 1991. After opening their youth programme three years ago they have turned the lives of many young people around, putting them onto the right track for success. They work on a close personal level with a vast array of young adults aged up to 25, helping them find employment, deal with social issues and introduce them to new hobbies, at no cost to the person.

Representing them is 'Joy', summoning visions of Spring, she has surrounded herself by all things natural, her dress is made up of blue sky and grass, she adds a new-born freshness to the Chester Giants parade. Her costume is garnished with rainbows and grass. The butterflies, matching the company's logo, represent the idea of change, emerging from their cocoons and starting anew. She is holding a vase in one hand, pouring water, denoting passage of time. 

One Young Adult Project worker says of this; ''Many people who have seen our design ask us if it's Mother Earth, but we at Chapter see her more as Daughter Earth. She's something new. That's what our organisation is about. It's about change. New Chapters''.

Cheshire Young Carers

 Cheshire Young carers is a charity organisation that provides over 150 young adults who are looking after parents with mental difficulties, disabilities or addictions a respite from their constant responsibility. They offer young carers support sessions three to four times a week, giving carer's opportunities to meet many other young people in their situation. 

In these support sessions, support workers help to develop a young person's skills and talents, from cooking to sport sessions and also offer meetings on a one-to-one basis if required. 

Their Giant has been designed and created by their support workers and young carers in their group alike. It is made up of two halves. On one side of the costume there are clocks, each, you may notice, with a different time. This is to illustrate that many young carers live a very regimented lifestyle, pictured next to each clock is one thing a carer would be doing at that time, collating together to form a montage of moments in the everyday lives of these people.

On the otherside are pictures representing many of the activities a young carer can do: a German flag from a recent trip to Germany organised by CYC, a cake from their cooking class. All these things are to illuminate the selfless work a young carer does, but overall, how that makes them feel, stressing the importance of organisations such as Cheshire Young Carers.

It is their first year entering a Giant into this festival, and their response so far has certainly been a positive one. Becky of Cheshire Young Carers says, "It's been a great opportunity. The young people have really enjoyed working on the Giant, we'd like to thanks everyone involve in the festival for all the material and time they have given us."

Prince William and Catherine Middleton- Forrest Fine Arts

Beggining in 2004, Joseph and Daniel Forrest studied at the Merseyside Forum for Sculpture, Painting and Allied Crafts, a company that was carried on from Herbert Tyson Smith's Sculpture Studio, which features a great deal of buildings around Liverpool famous for their architectural design on their list of achievements.

The Forrest Brothers came out of training in 2007, with experiance in a multitude of different crafts and skills including: oil and fresco painting, clay modeling and plaster casting, stone carving, architectural embellishment, lettering, gold leaf and gilding, restoration work are only a few of the skills accredited to the pair.

Forming their business in 2008, the pair have been contracted for numerous jobs, including interior design for Vodka Revolution bars in London and Cardiff, and have also created pieces for schools, private buyers and public exhibition over their short, but lucrative career. They also offer workshops and tutoring schemes to schools and community groups.

The Forrest Brothers were contacted by Chester the Giant City, in order to craft a very special shipment that will be used as a star attraction in Chester the Giant City 2011. In honour of Prince William and Kate Middleton's marriage, The Forrest Brothers built the five foot heads of two giants in the forms of the bride and groom, which will be exhibitioned to the public on 12th June 2011. These giants have travelled up and down the Country during the wedding's festivities, and are finally making their return to the North- West for their final showings, so don't miss out on seeing them!

Joshua- The Joshua Tree

The Joshua Tree are a new and unique charity based in Northwich, Cheshire, with a real story behind them. In 2003 just one week into his school life, founders David and Lynda Hill's son was diagnosed with Leukaemia. After completing his treatment in 2007, David and Lynda found themselves spurred into action and, with a lot of determination, and a lot of hard work, they set up The Joshua Tree. The Joshua Tree is currently fund-raising for a couple of projects that will be built soon. One building will house a support centre for children and families of children diagnosed with cancer and other illnesses.

The building will also serve as a holiday home, of a very high standard, totally exclusive to families with a member suffering from any Immune suppressed illness, who, due to this are often unable to take a holiday, travel or even go to the cinema. This holiday home will be a clean and uncontaminated place for children with weakened immune systems, where they can relax with their loved ones, without worrying about catching anything.

Their Giant is based on their name-sake Joshua. They are both flame-haired young men, but one is 14 foot tall. the Giant will wear green and yellow, the company's colours and his costumer will be adorned with the company branding and logo, and will match their website design. 

Community fundraser at the Joshua Tree, Rachel Thomas, said, " We are absolutely delighted to be taking part in Chester city of Giants this Year. The Joshua Tree is a Cheshire based charity, with a great supporter base in and around Northwich. However by taking part in such a large event, we hope the charity will become more widely known." 

King Henry VllI- The King's School Chester

The King's School Chester is one of the city's oldest establishments. Founded in 1541 in what is now Chester Cathedral, The King's School is a co-eduction independant school, catering for ages 7-18. It has become renowned over its' lengthy career for a high standard of education, with over 50% achieving at least one 'A' grade in A-levels, they also boast a large number of pupils going top Universities after leaving the School.

The Giant that they have representing them is their old-time benefactor King Henry VllI, who founded the school himself in 1541. This is also in honour of the junior schools' birthday this year, celebrating 100 years. Giant Henry Vll was built completely by a dedicated team of King's School students and teachers. The Giant is very personally involved with the school, not just for his part in founding it, but the very cloak he is wearing is made from the 50 year old curtains that were hanging in the King's School assembly hall.

The majority of the materials used in building the Giant were recycled by the children and their parents. Vicky Titmuss of King's School, says of this, "We are very excited to be involved in our first Giants' Parade. King's is the oldest school in Chester. To honour 470 years of history, we have decided to make our Giant King Henry VllI who founded the School. We have a team of junior and senior pupils, helped by teachers, involved in making Henry in workshops over two weekends."

Henry will also be attending the 100th Birthday Party of the Junior School, shortly after his royal march through Chester.

 

 

Wolves' Supporter- The Warrington Wolves Charitable Foundation

The Warrington Wolves Charitable Foundation building a stronger community through sport. Taking time out of their busy schedule of leading the Rugby Super League, team Warrington Wolves have shown their dedication to the Cheshire area even futher by building us a Giant. Estalished in 1879, and with a loyal fan-base, not just specific to Cheshire, Warrington Wolves are one of Cheshire's better known sports teams.

Their Giant is being built by one of their subsidiary companies, The Warrington Wolves' Foundation, a charity organisation that does alot for the Warrington Community with a particular focus on youth outreach work, offering sports classes, health advice, extra curricular activities and some social-care work.

The Giant that they have created is of course, a 14 foot Warrington Wolves supporter, sporting the teams' current team-shirt. The lower part of his costume is put together by a series of squares, each square asigned to a different group of young trustees, for ages 12-19, representing a different area of Warrington. They will each design a scene, logo or picture to be included on the costume, covering  situation or issue that is important to those young people.

"The Wolves' Charitable Foundation is delighted and excited to be taking part in this 'Giant' project! The model has generated much interest and we already have a team of young people, of all ages and abilities who have been meeting on a regular basis, to ensure that it's ready in time for what promises to be a fantastic day at the parade next month, and for future events in Warrington." Natalie Hargreaves, Fundraising and Development Manager, Warrington Wolves' Foundation.

Queen's Park High School- Seven Giant Heads

Queens Park High School has been providing top-quality education for 100 years now, in fact, 2011 is their 100th birthday, and what better way to celebrate than a Parade! It specialises in visual arts, catering for almost 1000 boys and girls aged 11-18. They are well known around Chester for their annual plays, of very high standards, in previous years taking on such ambitious projects as ‘We Will Rock You!’, ‘Hairspray’ and ‘The Wizard of Oz’.

 Notable alumini from Queens Park High include comedian Russ Abbot, famous activist Mary Whitehouse, and Keith Harris, ventriloquist of Orville the Duck.

 Queens Park High School participated in last years’ Giant Parade, drafting in some of their sixth form students to build seven Giant Heads, which we liked so much, we have asked to use them again this year, and Queens Park kindly obliged.

The Library Group- Libby

Chester library provides many opportunities for people of all ages to come in and participate in a variety of activities. This is the first year the library has participated in the Carnival of Giants yet staff believed it was a chance to involve the community in a project which would inspire creativity and teamwork. Staff at the Library settled on naming her Libby and her outfit was designed by Zoe, Senior Library Assistant. The monthly Knitting and Crochet Club handmade a colourful scarf for her out of donated wool and then, two Easter craft sessions were set up for children to help make the hat. To add colour and texture, the children cut up old ties and recycled newspapers and with adult supervision created a wonderful accessory for Libby. CDs were used for the earrings and then the children were asked to pick out their favourite book, the cover of which was photocopied and then sewn onto the dress as decoration to prove Libby really is, a Library Giant.

 Libby, the library’s resident giant says of this, “Hi, I’m Libby the Library Giant. With the help of some friends I now have a beautiful new hat and scarf to wear to the Carnival of Giants. It’s my first time at the parade and knowing my dress is nicely decorated makes me all the more excited. My hat is big, colourful and wonderfully made out of lots of recycled material. This, combined with my hand crocheted scarf and CD earrings; I am a completely unique Chester Giant.”

 

 Save the Family- Madame Butterfly

‘Save the Family’ are a group who do exactly what their name-sake suggests. Poverty is an issue that can rip apart a family, and in recent times, more and more families have become homeless, and more and more children are being sent through the care system rather than having a typical family life. Save the Family provide homeless families with a strong support system, they can offer emergency accomodation and information, advices an even tutoring sessions on how to tackle personal debt, improve social skills, and many other issues. Their success rate is at a collossal 75%, and they currently offer housing at Cotton Hall Farm, Chester. At the moment they are collecting donations in order to complete an expansion programme so that they can offer more housing to more of those who need it at one time.

Their Giant is Madame Butterfly, a very beautiful woman, instantly recognisable, due to her name and design, you will certainly recognise her when you see her. She adds another splash of colour and a little ‘bling’ to the Carnival. It was designed by a group of 4 young people involved with Save the Family’s youth group ‘Include Us’, aged between 12 and 19, over the span of two days.

Lindsay Evans, outreach worker for ‘Include Us’ says, ‘We work with Young People aged 11 - 25 who live at Save the Family or have experienced homelessness and now live in the community…All of the Young People involved in the project have immense talent and bright futures. The Young People are a credit to the Youth Project and I can’t wait to exhibit 'Madame Butterfly' off in the Carnival and show case all of the Young Peoples hard work.

Kindly, Save the Family also took great care of two of our other Giants, improving both of their costumes and giving them a little fix up. The two Giants were our giant Jester and Bob Marley, who have been affectionately named ‘Bill and Bob’.

 

 St. Clare's Catholic Primary School- The Lache Giant

St. Clare’s school creates a happy and supportive environment for children to play, learn in equal measures, but most of all, St Clare’s provides a place where children can enjoy their learning. Catering for 130 pupils, they have an extensive and dedicated network of staff and support workers to ensure that learning and growing up in St. Clare’s is structured, safe and an over-all positive experience.

The Giant that they are building will be in conjunction with Lache Primary School. This partnership is an unusual and particularly good-natured, given that the two schools front doors are on the same road, a matter of meters from each other. Lache Primary School, which caters for over 200 pupils, and is known for quality coverage of numeracy and literacy skills in particular. The school is a very active one, offering after-school clubs, and keeping a very close relationship with parents, to the point where in some classes, Parents are welcome to ‘Stay and Play’.

Their giant will be named ‘The Lache Giant’, (after the area, not the school). Being a joint venture, the Giant has two faces, one designed by St. Clare’s, the other by Lache Primary.On the costume are the hand prints of every student in both school to represent the union of two organisations, pulling together to make a difference to their community, to give the children a collective responsibility, but most of all, The Chester Giants Festival being a family event, to make sure that the children have fun.

 

 Upton-by-Chester High School- Manga

Upton by Chester High School caters for over 1,500 students aged 11-18. Since opening in 1968, it has become one of the more in-demand and over-subscribed schools in the Chester area. The Humanities college is known for its excellent facilities for Drama, Dance and Music, as well as a wealth of extra-curricular activites, concerts and productions, making it an exciting and very interactive learning experience.

Although specialising in Humanities subjects, the school also offers a fantastic range of sports facilities, a large gymnasium and sports field as well as several all-weather pitches. It is little surprise then that when it comes to competing in sport competitions and tournaments, Upton-by-Chester High School has made quite a name for itself, particularly in the field of Cricket, Cross-country, Hockey and Rugby. Their dedication to education ensures that all students leave the school as well-rounded individuals, with an array of skills, talents and, of course, knowledge, that covers a spectrum of subjects.

The Giant they have built for us was designed by their students and is called simply ‘Manga’, based on the popular Japanese art-form, keeping things a little more contemporary in this historical event.

 

  Oxfam

Oxfam is certainly one of the leading British Charities in the world. Working for regeneration on a global scale, Oxfam has got bases in almost every city in the UK, and has done out-reach work to almost every country.They work to provide people living in poorer countries with the means to support and sustain their families, rather than relying on handouts that only serve as short-term solutions.

Oxfam, a tour-de-force of an ally for any non-profit organisation, are no stranger to attending and planning carnivals and have helped us with quite a few Giants, eight to be exact. They are in the image of several world leaders including, Germany’s Angela Merkel, Russia’s Dmitri Medvedev, and, everyone’s favourite Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, as well as some far more familiar faces along the way. Want to see who they are? ‘Calm down, dear’ and find out on Sunday 12th June.

 Mbollou

An African drumming, sustainability-loving education and environmental group intent on building relationships between the UK and the Gambia, encouraging communities to support eachother, not only locally, but on an international scale.

Mbollou is a group that is all about community and pulling together, the belief that one person can make an impact, but one determined group are capable of achieving any goal. Their focus on people requires them to work with individuals in English and Gambian groups to identify their specific everyday issues and give them practical and long-term solutions, and the means to enact them, improving lives, internationally.

For more information on Mbollou, you can find them on various social networking sites, Tumblr, Facebook, Twitter and also youtube. If you have the time, this unique group are certainly worth looking up. 

 Japanese Mums and Tots Group

Japanese Mums & Tots Group meets every Tuesday afternoon 1 -3pm at St. Mary's Church Hall, Handbridge, Chester. It caters to Pre-school children and their parents and provides a Japanese language environment to mingle, relax and play. Their message fits in perfectly to our own, the importance of communities pulling and sticking together to offer their own personal talents and skills to better the community.

The Giant that has been built by their group is a magnificent Japanese woman in a kimono, which we at The Chester Giants Festival are particularly fond of. Strengthening international links has become a great priority to the Giants, particularly due to Chester recently becoming the international capital of Giant-making, so we are grateful to Japanese Mums and Tots for helping us present more of a multi-cultural and family friendly event.

If you would like to attend one of the groups, just turn up! Or you could contact them through their facebook page, just type ‘Japanese Mums and Tots’ in the search bar.

Zoological Gardens Chester

Chester Zoo is one of the largest zoological gardens in the UK, at 111 acres.

A registered charity, Chester Zoo receives no government funding, which doesn’t stop it from being the most-visited wildlife attraction in Britain. In 2007, it was visited by more than 1.3 million people and listed by Forbes as one of the best fifteen zoos in the world. The Zoo has been open for over 80 years and is the best known tourist attraction in Chester, and has even had its own Television programme ‘Zoo Days’, which was filmed out and about at Chester Zoo.

With such a well-respected name, we at the Giants Company are pleased to be working with Chester Zoo. The Giant they have designed for the parade is a Zoo Keeper, in charge of towering over the Carnival and making sure everyone stays in line!