The celebration of Black LGBTQIA+ culture and joy will take place at The Colour Factory
BY ELLA GAUCI, IMAGE PROVIDED
Get ready to celebrate Black queer joy this autumn with UK Black Pride (UKBP) at Blacktober Fest 2026. This event will bring together Black LGBTQIA+ communities on 16 October at The Colour Factory, London. UK Black Pride is the world’s largest Pride celebration for LGBTQIA+ people of African, Asian, Caribbean, Latin American and Middle Eastern descent.
Taking place during Black History Month, Blacktober Fest promises an evening of music, performance, dancing, culture and community. It will offer a beautiful space of connection for all Black queer communities.
Lady Phyll, CEO and co-founder of UK Black Pride, said: “Black History Month gives us an important moment to honour and reflect on our histories, but our Blackness does not begin in October and it does not disappear when October ends. Our communities, our culture, our resistance and our joy exist every single day of the year. Blacktober Fest is about bringing our people together in that spirit.”
Blacktober Fest follows UKBP’s decision to pause its flagship Pride celebration in 2026 as part of an intentional period of rest and reflection. UKBP has continued to create opportunities of connection through events like Blacktober Fest throughout the year. Speaking on this, Lady Phyll added, “We made the intentional decision to pause our main Pride celebration this year so that we could rest, reflect, reset and rebuild. But a pause was never an absence. We are still here, still organising and still creating the spaces our communities need and deserve.”
“This gathering will be unmistakably UK Black Pride: joyful, political, unapologetically Black and queer, and deeply rooted in community,” she continued. “It is more than a celebration. It is about investing in our artists, our creatives, our organisations and one another. We are not only looking back at the histories that shaped us. We are celebrating who we are now and building the Black queer futures we deserve.”
Featuring community organisations and independent stallholders, Blacktober Fest will help attendees discover new ways to support Black-led creativity. Tickets are available now.
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