The ever-popular Monmouth Lantern Parade will be returning for its fifth year on Saturday December 3.

Kicking off the build up to Christmas in the town, the Lantern Parade will bring families, individuals and community groups together for a procession on Monnow Street, illuminated by brilliantly creative willow framed lanterns of all shapes and sizes.

The free to attend event is being organised through a collaboration between committed community volunteers and officers and councillors from Monmouth Town Council.

The procession is due to begin at 6pm with a gathering on the old Monnow Bridge before parading to Agincourt Square at 6.30pm.

Local schools and groups will take turns with professional bands to entertain the crowd throughout the evening until a 9pm finish.

Street entertainers will make an appearance as in previous years and Rotary Monmouth has been hard at work negotiating with Father Christmas’s elves to make sure he can attend to lead the parade again this year.

The theme for this year’s event will be announced in the coming weeks, as will arrangements for lantern making workshops in the town for those who would like to share ideas or just need a little more space to make their creations.

The organisers are always happy to hear from people with a little time to spare to help the event go from strength to strength.

Volunteer roles include helping with the workshops, distributing posters and assisting on the night itself.

The event was first held in its current form in 2017 and has gone from strength to strength since then.

This year sees a change from the usual Friday to a Saturday parade, with the aim of ensuring younger children are well rested before the evening without a tiring school day beforehand.

Previous events have been well attended with around 2000 people taking part, and the organisers hope that this will be another bumper year, bringing a much-needed lift to the town.