A HUGELY popular lantern festival has announced it is going virtual for this year’s celebrations.

Ulverston Lantern Festival normally attracts thousands of people to see the procession through the town and firework finale in Ford Park each September.

It was hoped it would still be able to go ahead in some form - but organisers have now decided to make it a virtual event due to safety concerns over Covid-19.

Lantern-makers are being urged to create their lanterns at home and display them outside their houses over the September 19 weekend, when the event was due to take place.

This year’s lantern festival theme is ‘Birds & Bugs’ so the organisers are hoping to see a huge variety of creations with everything from caterpillars, butterflies, dragon flies and ladybirds to sparrows, robins and golden eagles.

Lantern-making kits are now on sale from Appleseeds and the Market Hall from today.

The ‘lanterneers’ are also asked to send photos and videos of their lantern-making and finished creations to chris@trafalgar-pr.co.uk.