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Welcome to the Ministry of Steampunk (MoS) website.

If you are new to the site, start here or if you are a regular visitor, check out the noticeboard below for the latest information.

Noticeboard

NOTICEBOARD

The Hulloween Steampunk Festival daytime and evening programmes are now live on the Hulloween pages.

We still have a few more features to add, but you will find the majority of the planned events on the website now, including the links to buy tickets to the screening of Nosferatu on Friday night and the Hulloween Ball on Saturday night.

FINAL PRE-ASYLUM ASYLUM TIMETABLE UPDATE

The timetable has been updated today (Wednesday 23 August). The only change is an additional feature 'Gadgets by Rodney' at 13:30 to 14:30 in the County Assembly Rooms on Friday.

Early tomorrow morning the MoS team will be travelling to Lincoln and setting up for the event. It is unlikely there will be further website updates now until after the event. Any important updates will be posted on our Welcome to the Asylum page on Facebook.

Safe travels, have a brilliant time and we look forward to seeing you at the Asylum!

The MoS team.

ASYLUM TIMETABLE UPDATE

If you have been to the Asylum before you will know that it is impossible to fit in everything you would like to do - because with so much fabulousness on offer there are usually several features running at the same time. We have therefore been looking at ways to make it easier for everyone to keep abreast of what is going on in order to help you make the most of your weekend.

The full Asylum timetable is now up on the website. We continue to tinker with fine details from time to time to reflect (for example) our contributors' availability, and up to the start of the event will be updating the individual pages that you can access under the Asylum tab above.

The current incarnation of the Asylum daytime planner can now be downloaded as a PDF using the button below. You will see that the first page of the document indicates the date of creation.

The other buttons enable you to download the full timetible as either a PDF or a Word document. We will keep all of these documents updated as best we can prior to the start of Asylum.

DAILY PLANNER AS PDF

FULL TIMETABLE AS PDF

FULL TIMETABLE AS WORD DOCUMENT

JUST SEVEN DAYS TO GO!!!

The Asylum is now just 7 days away. We minions at the Ministry of Steampunk are working as hard as we can to get everything ready for what we hope will be the best Asylum yet.

Thank you to everyone who has bought wristbands and evening ticket events and merchandise, because you are the people who make this whole enterprise possible.

We will update the event programme pages on the website to reflect any changes as the days go by. We will also continue to post updates on Welcome to the Asylum, our Facebook events page.

Stay splendid. Be awesome. Keep calm. Enjoy the anticipation. Come and have a fabulous time at the very best event we can create.

With much love to everyone from all of the MoS.

ASYLUM INTRODUCING ACTS ANNOUNCED

If you head over to the Saturday Evening Events page here you will find details of all the exciting acts who will be performing at our first ever 'Asylum Introducing' event at the Asylum.

ASYLUM XIII DAYTIME PROGRAMME IS NOW LIVE!

The main overview of the daytime programme for Aslyum XIII is now live and can be found on the relevant pages under the tab for The Asylum.

As of 25 July, the main outline of the daytime programme is complete, but we have yet to confirm the details of the Makers Thread at the Heritage Centre in the castle. We will add this as soon as we can.

We will also shortly be adding detail to the programme, to describe each feature individually, but this all takes time and whilst we are working on this we hope you will find the information here helpful.

Our plan is to update the timetable of events here on the web as the event approaches. You will always find the current 'definitive' version here, rather than in old Facebook posts which could be out of date.

You can jump to the individual daytime programmes using the buttons below.

ASYLUM EVENING TICKET UPDATE

Tickets to the Advance Guard on Thursday and the Dead Dog Party on Monday evening are both now sold out. Several other evening events are also close to selling out. Further details of all the events still on sale (and how to book tickets) can be found here.

For the first time at Asylum XIII, you do not need a wristband to attend events at The Drill on Friday (the DecoDance), Saturday (The Burlesque show) or Sunday (The Major's Soirée).

The Drill location is shown here; it's slightly closer to the castle than the Engine Shed.

We held several events there last year, so the venue will already be known to many, and we're delighted to be back again in 2023.

Why no requirement for wristbands? Well of course we would like everyone to buy a wristband (as this helps us fund the free festival as well as the 'perks' that come with purchasing a wristband), but we appreciate that this is not possible for everyone and this is our first step to developing a truly collaborative 'Fringe' festival around the Asylum.

Tickets are therefore available direct from the Drill's website and whilst we initially had some teething problems with passwords etc., that does now all seem to be sorted out and tickets are now easy to purchase.

ASYLUM XIII EVENING EVENTS AT 'THE DRILL'

As well as having a bar, The Drill serves food, so you can always get a bite to eat at The Drill if you find yourself running short of time between the daytime and evening events.

You can read more about each event through the Asylum evening pages on this website, or you can jump straight to The Drill's ticketing pages by clicking on the images above.

ASYLUM ON THE BACK COVER OF 'QUANTUM' COMIC

Word of The Asylum continues to spread - check out the full page advert for The Asylum on the back cover of issue #2 of the amazing Quantum comic anthology by Time Bomb Comics - in stores now. You might just spot one or two people you recognise...

ASYLUM BGU ACCOMMODATION LINK

If you are still looking for accomodation for the Asylum this year, BGU still have some rooms available which you can book here.

ASYLUM TEA PARTIES AND SUPPER CLUBS

Bookings are now live for the Mad Hatter's Tea Parties on Friday, the Tea Parties with Frenchy & the Punk together with Victor & the Bully on Saturday afternoon and the new 'Supper Clubs' which will run Thursday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday evenings from 6 PM to 8 PM at the County Assembly Rooms. Further details and how to book tickets can be found here.

THE H.G.WELLS AWARD

Congratulations to Andrew Prudom who won the first H.G. Wells award at The Town That Never Was for his Time-Travel themed diorama "What Had Happened in Surrey".

For further details about Andrew's winning entry and information about this year's Great Exhibition at the Asylum Steampunk Festival check out the Great Exhibition page under the Feautures tab above.

NEW FRIDAY EVENING EVENT ADDED TO ASYLUM

Come and join Dr Corvus Marconi in The Blue Room on Friday night for a very special séance experience; full details are up on the 'Asylum Friday Evening' page and numbers are strictly limited for this show, so don't leave it too late if you are interested in finding more about this very 'spiritual' event!

ASYLUM INTRODUCING

The Ministry are always on the lookout for new artists to perform at our events and so this year at the Asylum we have added a new evening event which we have called 'Asylum Introducing'. We are inviting applications from artists who have never played at the Asylum before and will be putting together an evening of entertainment to take place at the Assembly Rooms on Saturday evening, hosted by Asylum veterans The Cogkneys.

If you are interested in performing please head over to the 'Performing/ Contributing' page under the 'Get Involved' tab of the website where you will find the application form.

If you know of an act who you think would be suitable please let them know about this, so they can fill in the form themselves.

We hope to feature multiple bands/performers during the evening, so prioroty will be given to smaller ensembles not requiring lengthy set-up time or complex audio facilities.

Members of the audience will vote for the best act of the evening who will be invited to play at The Major's Soiree at Asylum XIV in 2024.

ASYLUM EVENING TICKETS

ASYLUM EVENING EVENT TICKETS

Tickets for the evening events at The Asylum are now on sale. The system for buying tickets has changed slightly this year so please begin by reading through the information on the overview page first and then check out the separate pages for Thursday through to Monday evenings.

We are hoping to add some ticketed tea party events shortly. When they are available they will be announced here and on our Facebook page Welcome to the Asylum.

ASYLUM MERCHANDISE

This year is Asylum 13, so we have decided to embrace the number 13 in our merchandise and publicity for the event. There is a species of Cicada that has a 13 year life cycle, so we have incorporated a Cicada into a number of designs for our medals, pins, patches and T-shirts for Asylum 13. We have already revealed a couple of the designs on our facebook page and here is another.

ASYLUM WRISTBANDS AND MERCHANDISE

You can order medals, pins, patches and T-shirts as well as weekend and day wristbands through the link below and collect them at the Advance Guard on Thursday evening or at Event Control over the weekend.

THE TOWN THAT NEVER WAS

The dates for our next event 'The Town That Never Was' (24-25 June 2023) at the fabulous Blists Hill Victorian Town have been on the MoS website ever since 'The Asylum' last August.

More news about this year's event will be unveiled in the coming weeks, but meanwhile here is a sneak preview of this year's Facebook banner for the event.

Will there be the usual 'optional theme' this year? It's funny you should ask, but there is a subtle clue in the image. This year our theme is going to be 'Time Travel'.

It is of course the case that everyone walking the streets of this Victorian Town is time travelling in one way or another, but this year we are inviting you to take the Time Travel element of the occasion a little further - should you feel so inclined.

THE LEWIS CARROLL AWARD

Massive congratulations to Alice Prudom who won the first Lewis Carroll award at the Steampunk Fairytal weekend for her mixed media creation 'Alice in Steamland'. Alice is now the proud owner of the first of the new MoS Medals for Creativity.

Full details will be added to the MoS 'Medals and Pins' section of the website shortly.

BELVOIR CASTLE STEAMPUNK FAIRYTALE WEEKEND

Did you come to the Steampunk Fairytale weekend at Belvoir? If so thank you very much; it was brilliant to see so many smiling faces and fabulous outfits.

We have now added a selection of images to the gallery section of the website which you can access here.

ASYLUM WRISTBANDS AND COLLECTABLES

Asylum 2023 Wristbands and Collectables are now on sale - checkout the asylum page under the 'events' tab or click here.

About the Mos

The Ministry of Steampunk is a voluntary organisation who host Steampunk and alternative history events, including creating and hosting the Asylum Steampunk Festival in Lincoln since 2009.

Steph Steam drinking tea [Steph Steam]_edited.jpg

We are a somewhat amorphous organisation with various offices and bureaux that cover some of the myriad aspects of Steampunk and the wider anachronistic creative scene.

We make no attempt to define Steampunk but instead strive to create opportunities where Steampunks can gather together and share their imaginations, creativity and friendship.

The Ministry's new website has been a while in the making, so why not find somewhere comfy to sit with a nice cup of tea and take a look around - follow the menus for information about our upcoming events, the Ministry itself, the various ways you can get involved and information on all manner of subjects from illicit markets to photography and weapons to tea duelling!