Mansfield Central Library wins Best Family Welcome Award

After shortlisting was announced back in January, the wait was finally over as colleagues from MishMash Productions headed to the awards ceremony in Leeds last night. With nominations in two categories; Best Family Welcome and Best Family Event, the team were delighted to come away with one of the awards, which are judged and awarded by an expert panel of family arts leaders.

Mansfield Central Library, and MishMash Productions won the award for their warm welcome to visitors of SMILE, a performance based on the book Augustus and His Smile written and illustrated by Catherine Rayner, and which toured Nottinghamshire libraries in October 2017.

The Best Family Welcome award is recognition of the engaging and family friendly Smile production and the care taken by Inspire, MishMash and partners to welcome new audiences into libraries to experience this magical musical performance. 

Staff at Mansfield Central Library, which is already signed up to the Family Arts Standards, pledging their commitment to creating a friendly, welcoming atmosphere for families at all our events, enjoyed welcoming under 5s and their families to the library to take part in this musical adventure which was developed in association with Nottingham Library Service with support from Nottingham Music Service, Nottinghamshire Music Hub and Nottingham Lakeside Arts. 

Smile was also nominated for the Best Family Event award.

Peter Gaw, Inspire’s Chief Executive commented, “Welcoming families is at the heart of Inspire – we do it every day across all our libraries. I’m extremely proud that the Mansfield team have received this recognition – but also of the great team work across Inspire with MishMash productions to bring this amazing show to Nottinghamshire libraries.”

Councillor John Cottee, Chairman of Nottinghamshire County Council's Communities & Place Committee said, “This is wonderful recognition of the work Inspire do for children and families in Nottinghamshire. I am especially delighted for the hard-working team at Mansfield Library who now have an award to add to the Family Arts Standard quality mark.”

Liz Muge, Creative producer for MishMash Productions commented, “We are delighted that both the excellent partnership approach and extraordinary creative team have been recognised this way.”