The Twelfth: Belfast women say celebrations are generations in the making

BBC News

11-07-2025

The Twelfth has been celebrated by Stacey Graham's family for generations.Ms Graham, from the Shankill Road in Belfast, was part of an all-woman band playing accordions and drums on the road on Friday."My family members were members of the Orange Order for many, many years," she told BBC News NI."My kids now, they get involved in the parade, my kids would be out volunteering around the different cultural events."So for us it's that sort of warm, welcoming, family atmosphere."
Friday was a day of festivities, with the Greater Shankill Community Festival taking place."The Shankill's usually buzzing," Ms Graham said."It would start off during the day with barbeques, Lambeg drummers, highland dancers, just bringing the community together to get the atmosphere up and running.""It finishes off about seven o'clock with a parade on the Shankill."It's quite apt this year that the theme we're running with is bonfires, to showcase that bonfires are a real positive community cultural expression."
Julie Davidson from the ACT Initiative - a community group based on the Shankill - said preparations had been taking place for weeks."I run a women's programme in the ACT Initiative and we have been meeting for six to eight weeks," she said."We would make a lot of costumes for all the festivals that would go on on the Shankill.""The whole community turns out."Like Stacey Graham, Ms Davidson said she had been brought up with the Twelfth."I have enjoyed the Twelfth from I was born on the Shankill Road in 1970," she said."It's always been a big day to the community, to my family, to me."
The Woodvale Festival has been taking place all week in Woodvale Park in west Belfast and Friday was family fun day.That brought a fun fair to the park and a street party in Twaddell Avenue.On the road, visitors to the area were offered free tours of the historic west Belfast Queen Elizabeth II Orange Hall from William Humphrey, who is a former Democratic Unionist Party assembly member and chairman of the Orange hall.He said the Twelfth attracted people to the area."We've got people from across the United Kingdom who are here to take part in tomorrow's procession, but we've also got people right across the world," he said."I was speaking to someone only moments ago who's travelled all the way from California to witness the Twelfth.""The Twelfth of July is a huge community and cultural event."At the back of the Orange Hall children were getting some face paint and temporary tattoos, while their families got some shade from the hot sun.
With the annual Twelfth celebrations though, came controversy around some bonfires.There have been concerns over asbestos at a bonfire in south Belfast.Meanwhile, a contentious bonfire in County Tyrone, with an effigy of refugees in a boat on top of it, is being investigated as a hate incident by police.For Ms Graham, the controversy should not overshadow the Twelfth."There's a frustration for me because the controversy around bonfires is often unwarranted," she said."I feel that there are people that would use anything to try and demonise Orange or loyalist or unionist culture.""For us, it's important for people to see events like this to showcase that we are so much more than the negative stereotypes and the demonization that some people try to put upon our community."