StAnza uses a number of both historic and contemporary venues around the historic town centre of St Andrews, with our festival hub at the Byre theatre on Abbey Street. Other spaces range from an award-winning contemporary music venue to an atmospheric medieval undercroft, a yurt, and a former seat of the old Scottish Parliament! Details of some of the key venues that we use are below.
Accessibility & Inclusion at StAnza
The StAnza team works hard with its partners, stakeholders, volunteers and audiences to ensure the festival is a safe and welcoming place; a place where people can come together as themselves and share their love for poetry. We are continually seeking to improve upon the accessibility of the festival in the broadest possible sense.
We define inclusion as creating spaces and environments in which individuals can participate fully, safe in the expectation that their dignity and humanity will not be undermined by the circumstances or by others.
If you click on the venues below, you’ll find detailed information about accessibility at each site. In addition, the festival offers:
- BSL interpretation for headline events;
- an extensive and low-cost programme of digital events – including livestreams – for those unable to join us in person;
- auto-generated captions for all livestreamed events;
- a series of free-to-attend events, and a pay-what-you-can pricing structure starting at just £5.00;
- a free ticketing scheme, supported by St Andrews Settlement Trust, that sees us distribute up to 200 tickets per year to festival events for service users of local community organisations.
We also operate a code of conduct and safer spaces policy, along with a number of other policies and statements, that are designed to ensure that our festival and events are safe and welcoming, particularly for those who face marginalisation in broader society. You can read our current policies here, as well as finding information about how to provide feedback or request a policy review.
But we want to do more. So in 2026 we will be working with an access consultant to undertake an accessibility and inclusion review of the festival and to help us put together a bespoke plan for StAnza, which we will then seek funding to implement.
If you have thoughts, comments or questions about accessibility at the festival or our other events, we want to hear from you. Please get in touch by emailing stanza@stanzapoetry.org.
