In May 2024, the Festival’s Artistic Director and CEO, Emma Smith, and the Liverpool Irish Famine Trail’s History Research Group leader, John Maguire, teamed up with c.15 walkers to bring a pair of bronze shoes from Strokestown to Liverpool. ❤️📍🔱

Walking along the National Famine Way and helping to forge a new Global Irish Famine Way, the shoes are the official emblem of the Strokestown National Famine Museum, Estate and Way. 

Whilst on their pilgrimage, Emma and John created a series of daily postcards. They took photos and wrote daily messages, to document their journey. Presented in this exhibit are the nine post card fronts and backs. These have been enlarged, reproduced and transcribed, detailing the walkers’ experiences, feelings and events. 

Shown in Northern Lights, where the Festival has an office, these post cards document 220km walked nine-days and the full journey of the bronze shoes coming to Liverpool. In time, the shoes will find a permanent home. Right now – just like the 1,490 migrants forced from Strokestown in 1847 — their forever home is yet to be found. Visitors interested in seeing the shoes up close, and learning more about the Liverpool Irish Famine Trail, should visit the Revealing Trails exhibition (see listing). 

This is a self-guided exhibit. The work has been funded by The National Lottery Heritage Fund.

The exhibition is on the wall opposite Ryde Café‘s as you walk towards the entrance to the Royal Standard gallery (5 Mann Street, L8 5AF).