FINAL preparations are being made for a 10-day celebration of Oxford’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities.

The seventh Oxford Pride festival will be the first to be extended beyond a one-day event.

Oxford Pride chairman Mazz Image said there would be about 30 events, all themed around flower power and the 1969 New York Stonewall Rebellion – regarded as the birth of the modern gay rights movement.

Ms Image said: “It’s excellent, everything has come together and we’ve got everyone running around doing the last minute things.

“Oxford Pride has mainly been a one-day fair event in Oxpens but last year we introduced a street parade for the first time and an art exhibition.

“This year we’ve extended it much further to a 10-day festival of events, produced mainly by local community groups.”

The festival will be launched with the unveiling of a new Oxford Pride mural at the Oxford Castle complex on Friday.

There will also be an opportunity to add names and stories to the Pride History Wall.

A Peace, Love and Flower Power party at the Coven, Oxpens Road, will start at 10.30pm that night.

On Saturday, there will be a ‘Queer is Folk’ local folk, acoustic and singer songwriter event at the Brewery Gayte, St Thomas Street.

The rest of the week will be a mixture of displays on Queer Oxfordshire, book talks and walks celebrating Queer Oxford.

The main festival event takes place on Saturday, June 6, with the Oxford Pride Parade, starting at St Michael at the Northgate at 11am.

The parade will be followed by a full day’s party on Oxpens Field.

Ms Image said: “We are producing events to bring the community together with an opportunity to celebrate the diversity of people and groups in Oxford.

“I hope people will come along and enjoy the different events during the festival, whether it’s talking about sex in a workshop or dressing up in flower power or coming on some lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender history walks.”

Up to 5,000 people attended last year’s event and Ms Image said with the broader reach of the festival she hoped that figure could rise to 7,000.

She said: “We are also hoping it generates more people coming to Oxford for some of the festival events, which will give them another reason to come and enjoy this beautiful city.”

A full programme of events is available at oxfordpride.org.uk fbardsley@oxfordmail.co.uk