Norwich Chocolate Festival fortnight calls for change

Lynn Lockwood, Founder of the Norwich Chocolate Festival

Norwich Chocolate Festival fortnight starts this Saturday — a city-wide celebration with a difference. Festival Founder Lynn Lockwood explains more

When Lynn Lockwood talks about chocolate, she isn’t talking about a guilty pleasure. She’s talking about dignity, power, and connection — and about a movement beginning in Norwich. From Saturday, Norwich Chocolate Festival Fortnight will turn the city into a hub for thoughtful discussion, film, flavour and creativity. The festival marks the public launch of Join the Chocolution, Lynn’s growing movement to re-centre cocoa-growing communities within the story of chocolate and build a truly responsible future for the industry.

Aligned with the United Nations International Day for the Eradication of Poverty (17 October) — whose 2025 theme focuses on “Ending social and institutional maltreatment by ensuring respect and effective support for families” — the festival seeks to ground big conversations about chocolate in global questions of justice, family, and human rights.

“Chocolate connects us all,” Lynn says. “But those connections have been hidden for too long. This is about seeing and hearing the people behind what we enjoy — and learning how change really happens.”

After nearly 15 years working inside the chocolate industry, Lynn began to see what most consumers never do — an unequal system where farmers remain marginalised while marketing promises suggest progress. Those experiences led her back to her earlier work alongside people living in poverty and exclusion, reconnecting her with the language of human rights and social justice.

Now studying for a Master’s in Creative Practice, Lynn is using the festival as part of a research-led experiment in building community through creative practice.

“This is about testing how storytelling, film, and shared experience can bring people together across distances,” she explains. “My research is helping me explore how creative practice can empower consumers to see themselves as part of the system — and part of the solution.”

David Briceño, a third-generation cocoa farmer and agronomist from Huila, Colombia

The fortnight’s anchor is the Cocoa Summit at The Forum, bringing together international voices — from David Briceño, a third-generation cocoa farmer and agronomist from Huila, Colombia, to Bright Debrah Adjei from Ghana — alongside human-rights advocates and filmmakers. Together, they’ll explore lived experience, industry power, and how consumers and governments alike can help build a more Responsible future for chocolate.

That evening, Swiss filmmaker Philippe Stalder joins Norwich audiences for a screening of his documentary Reclaiming Cocoa, followed by an open Q&A with David and Bright. Two nights later, the follow-up screening of The Chocolate Warwill link Norwich to Washington DC, Denmark and Ghana for a live discussion with investigative filmmaker Miki Mistrati and human-rights lawyer Terrence Collingsworth.

The festival’s Saturday at Carrow House brings chocolate learning to life through interactive workshops for families and grown-ups, exploring origins, flavour, value and responsibility. A mini market and café pop-up will run alongside, offering small-batch bars and ingredients to complement the learning experiences rather than act as a conventional trade fair.

To ensure accessibility, concession tickets are available, and community support is encouraged to help sustain these dialogues long beyond October.

“We need the city’s help to get this conversation started,” Lynn says. “Norwich has such a strong spirit of creativity and conscience — it’s the perfect place to imagine something better together.”

The fortnight closes with Lenny & the Last Rolo at the Walnut Tree Shades, starring the incomparable Steve Furst as his larger-than-life alter-ego Lenny Beige. Blending music, satire and showmanship, Furst brings humour and heart to an evening that celebrates Norwich’s link to the invention of the Rolo while keeping the festival’s deeper themes — dignity and respect — in view. Adding rhythm to reflection, DJ Vincent 1000 will keep the energy high with a genre-defying set to round off the festival in true Norwich style.

For Lynn, the fortnight is not an end point but a beginning — a living experiment in creative community-building and collective responsibility.

“People living in poverty are the experts on poverty,” she reflects. “They’re already working hard to improve their lives. Our task is to listen, respect, and act in solidarity — so the future of chocolate is shaped with them, not for them.”

The Norwich Chocolate Festival runs from Saturday October 18 to 30, 2025. The full programme — including the Launch Reception at St Giles House Hotel, the Cocoa Summit, both film screenings, workshops, and the cabaret finale — plus ticket links and membership details for Join the Chocolution, can be found at jointhechocolution.org.