Meet the garden animals!

Various libraries in August
Free
Booking required

From snails to snakes, we’ll be learning about some animals you might find in the garden at this exciting animal encounter session! Observe, explore and even hold the animals with expert help from an experienced handler.

The animals featured in this event include:

Corn snake
White's Tree Frog
Cockroaches
Millipedes
Snails
Tarantula
Scorpion
Stick Insects and
Gerbils

This event is free but booking is essential. Please click the 'Register for event' button to secure your space. You do not need to be a library member to take part.

Suitable for children aged 4+. All children must be accompanied by an appropriate adult. Adults do not need to book a separate ticket for themselves.

This event is held in collaboration with Zoolab (find out more about their work here) and is part of our celebrations for this year's Summer Reading Challenge! To join the challenge, 'Story Garden', sign up online here (from 5th July 2025), or pop into your local library to find out more.

Ashdown Forest Wildlife Crafts

This summer come and join our friends from Ashdown Forest for an afternoon of fun activities and stories that will help you find out more about the plants and animals that live there.

Suitable for ages 4 and over. Children under 8 must be accompanied by a responsible adult. Booking is essential.

Darwin's Cleaner

Eastbourne Library
Wednesday 17 September
7pm to 8:15pm

Darwin's Cleaner is a new one woman play (written and directed by Saskia Wesnigk) which has been purposefully designed as a "theatre in unusual places piece". The play debuts at the Brighton Fringe festival in May and explores multiple areas including history, the impact of Charles Darwin, questions around status, the roles of women and hidden voices in history.

Margaret Sullivan The Black Flower Seller revealing the identity

Hastings Library

24 September

2 to 3pm

'Revealing the Identity of the Black Flower Seller’ was part of the 'African Caribbean Seaside Memories' exhibition at Hastings Museum & Art Gallery, curated by Lorna Hamilton-Brown RCA MBE of WE OUT HERE.

Claudine Eccleston, an independent researcher and founder of Playing the Race Card, is responsible for naming and uncovering the story of the Black Flower Seller who traded in St Leonards in the 1900s, bringing to light a significant but largely forgotten part of local history.