Ta'ra a bit, Bab
BEAR BRUM was born in a hot tub.
In January 2025 Matt, Yogi and Beavis were in the hot tub talking about the year ahead. Matt told Yogi and Beavis about his idea to have a city wide Bear Weekend that Birmingham could be proud of.
Yogi is the real MVP of BEAR BRUM.
He has done everything from reaching out to bars, pulling in friends to help, setting up the spaces, hosting events, doing the door and being an emotional support human for Matt. He also did all of this with a cold, and he had to go to work on the Monday after. Hardest working bear in the city. Please someone give him a job doing this.
Beavis is the heart of BEAR BRUM.
He knows what works as a good time, and how to make people feel welcomed, relaxed and at home.
He drives the party with his infectious energy and joy for life. He is the vibe. He is the moment. WELL DONE.
Isago Fukuda was always our number one pick to do the promo art. His work is incredible.
Matt gave him a brief and he came back to us with a first draft, and that first draft was perfect.
Our guests have fallen in love with his creations and named them Hugo, Jacub and Ozzy.
BEAR BRUM would not have been a success without Isago and that is not hyperbole.
We are a new event and we had to show people we mean business and Isa delivered that for us in buckets.
We love you Isa. Thank you so much.
Speaking of promotion, we owe the world to Buggles who correctly identified we needed help with our social media accounts and then came in and turned everything up to 11. Chris you smashed it every time and you knew what we wanted before we did. You are a super star.
We have also had huge amounts of love and support (both financially and organisationally) from the MIDSBEARS.
Paul, Drew, David, Carl, Graham, Hugh, Sean and James have all worked hard behind the scenes to make the Glow Ball and the Bear Market happen. Thank you gents. We will see you at your next event.
EDEN Bar is our spiritual home. Cal, Garry, Steve and the team do legendary amounts of work to make sure you have the best time in a safe and welcoming space. They always get the assignment and they really go for it. They helped us get established and they've worked with us to keep us on track for the whole event.
I'm being told to hurry it up...
Thank you so much to our supporting bars - The Fountain, The Fox, Missing and The Village.
It's an honour to have the whole Gay Village turn out to support our event and we have only heard good things about all of the events you have put on. What you did with your spaces to put on a show for our guests was amazing.
We are very proud of all of you. Thank you.
For our artists, we want to say a massive thank you to DJ Argyll who DJ'd your welcome event and Yogi's Best Friend Race • Doctor Woof for taking us on a journey through tights and space • Pork Elizabeth Pie for the wonderfully unhinged Bingo and last but not least, the incomparable Donna Trump for closing the weekend with songs about crab paste and ripped testicles. You showed our guests the sheer, raw talent that Birmingham has. Thank you.
DJ Ryan Auld was your DJ for Glow Ball. He took us to another dimension and kept us spinning around until the early hours. You might recognise Ryan's blissful style from his residency at BEEFMINCE in Birmingham. We were so pleased to get him for our event, our local lad did good. If you're doing an event in Brum you should hire him.
DANDY is cool as fuck.
Thank you to Dean, Adam, Adrian and Brendan for bringing DANDY to Birmingham.
You blew our socks off with your mixtape vibes and your amazing DJing. You kept the dance floor full and the guests dancing. The queer joy in the room was real. We love you guys. Please come back to Brum soon x
Thank you to our market stall holders, Mike (Cracked Skull Designs), Kevin (Monster Mash Teas), Paul & Kristian (Bear Belts), Stuart (Bearded Clan), Stuart (Stu's Creation Station), Lee (LeeBB Art), Konstantin (Intuition Sports Massage), Philippe & David (MSTER), Paul Phipps-Williams's Husband (Paul Phipps-Williams Photography), Tommy (Tommy Pang Illustration), Andrew (Moody Bear), Stewie & Graham (Above Avg), Alan (Big Clay Al Ceramics), Eddie (Carousel Candy), Raven (Radioactive Wolves) and Jase & Robert (Briefs and Jocks). Also a big thank you to Drew, David and Paul at MIDSBEARS for organising the event and EDEN for stepping in to give us a new home last minute.
We loved seeing the look of surprise and delight on people's faces as they went into Games, Games, Games at The Village Inn. The eyes wide smile as they turned the corner in the doorway brought us joy. Huge thanks to Jon and the team at The Village Inn. You gave us the perfect playground, and your enthusiasm to put on a great event bowled us over. Also Jon, thank you for being a big strong man and helping us lift the TV's off the wall. Your organisers for this even were Jamie and Gaston (Tonga), they took what could have been a staid and quiet event and poured love into it. They really brought it to life. Also massive thanks to Adam at Sliced N Diced for the huge amounts of support and for bringing all the board games. We hope we got all the pieces back in the boxes properly.
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I also want to thank you.
Thank you for buying a ticket. Thank you for taking a chance on us. Thank you for partying with us. Thank you for making us so happy all weekend. You have shown us there is an appetite for queer life in Birmingham. If we build it you will come. And you will turn the party out and look fucking gorgeous and radiate your truthful, honest, joyful queer selves. You've made Birmingham a better city for being here. I am so proud of you. From the party monsters to the people who had to put aside a lot of anxiety to come and find us, thank you.
We are going to grab a bit of down time now, but once we have had a little rest we have a couple of bits of news for you. We just need to work out some details before we say anything else.
Thank you.
I love you.
Matt x