Margate, creativity’s been flowing here for some time.

I discovered Margate three summers ago while I was carrying out weekend expeditions to different beach towns in the South-East. It’s passed the test of the return. It has water and sky as far as the eye can see, art and food and the possibility to stare into the distance for hours, a delight and a bare necessity of life in my book.

My favourite place will forever be the beach behind Turner Contemporary, empty early morning at the weekend, a simple and secluded corner where the only thing that matters is the sand you put your towel on and the blue that surrounds you from all sides.

I credit the beach in Margate for calming my brain be it summer or winter. Storm Darragh and I met there to square things off last December. She brought the rain and the wind; the wrath that roiled the sea was entirely mine.

There’s more than beaches and full skies in Margate. There’s a family-run restaurant I visit whenever I’m there and there’s harbour-side Sargasso, where I’ve still not managed to get a table (SOS – send help). There are galleries in the Old Town that I have shopped at and antique places where I intend to do so in the future.

There’s a creative scene in Margate even if it does not come through in the same way it does in Shoreditch and Soho. It’s more implied, understated, and covert and perhaps you need to be in with the locals to find it, but you can feel it because there’s no way you can live this close to the sea and not be creative.

There’s a sense of the creative scene we expect in Shoreditch and Soho bubbling up in the open here too, though. There are a couple of vintage shops up high up High Street giving strong graphic design vibes and I’ve serendipitously crossed paths with some agencies in the area, even though for me Margate has always been a place away from work, so I’ve not actively sought to be professionally involved in the area.

Recently, however, I had the chance to scope out the UK Creative Festival which took place in Margate earlier this month, an opportunity for the industry to gather for two days of conversation, talks and workshops. It was a departure from my usual incursions which made me think of this town and others like it and the role they play as essential extensions of the creative industry body here in the UK.

While it’s known that creative businesses thrive in London and the South-East, I’ve come to look at micro towns and burghs and agencies and shops away from the ‘Big City’ as places that add flava and spice and all things nice to our industry. Because it’s important to have a well-defined cord like London but it’s the little arteries and veins that keep things in circulation and guarantee the health of our whole system.

It was good to see this London cord in Margate in a way also in recognition of the strides Thanet has made in developing its creative scene over the past decade. It served as a reminder that creativity and ideas come from everywhere and that you need to keep your eyes open to watch them take shape and flight, good, refreshing wisdom from people who have shaped the industry as it is today. What I wish I had the chance to do more of (but this is down to me as I rushed back to London and could not be in Margate for two days) was meet the creatives, the designers and the studios that reside in the area, see their craft and hear their stories to the tune of “This is us in our home and this is what we do and how we do it here”.

We need events like the UK Creative Festival to bring the industry and the conversation to places other than London just as much as we need to hear from other perspectives directly in the Big City. I’ve recently interacted with creatives in Brighton, Manchester and Belfast. Their viewpoints matter because they’re born out of a different way of getting things done and problem-solve and I think that by listening to them the creative body becomes richer, more resilient and savvier as a whole.

I’ll for sure return to Margate and maybe make it my mission to meet some of the studios when I’m there. What I would also love to see are creatives and studios from the area – and beyond invited to showcase their craft and their perspectives over here in London Town, because in a healthy body creative, circulation goes both ways.

I’d invite you to do the same – head out to Margate and discover the creative scene this summer. You also have my permission to book out Sargasso for the next fifteen hundred years if you can but please stay away from my beach.