Tea and Memories: The Friends of Carnforth Library Launch Capturing Carnforth: Our Town Through Time

The Friends of Carnforth Library hosted afternoon tea for residents of the Carnforth district, launching an ambitious project to discover how the town has changed over the last 100 years. Calling upon the research of local people, and their cherished photographs and memories, “Capturing Carnforth” will create a photographic and cartographic archive of Carnforth’s town centre in 2025.

The “Capturing Carnforth” steering group are organising photographs of present-day shops and their owners, to create a montage of images street by street. New photographs replicating old pictures of Carnforth from the same viewpoint will show what has changed. They will also be creating a map of Carnforth town centre showing the locations of businesses past and present. Volunteers will be encouraged to research written and online sources of information about Carnforth businesses in local archives.

With activities for local children, to create a colourful display in the Library, and a series of events to encourage the people of Carnforth to find out more about their fascinating town, “Capturing Carnforth” will culminate in an exhibition in Summer 2026, to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the opening of the library.

The Friends of Carnforth Library is a group of volunteers who came together in September 2024 to promote Carnforth Library’s place within our community. FoCL’s objectives are to sponsor entertaining and interesting events and activities for library users, to raise funds to enhance library services, and to promote the use of the library service across all segments of our community.

Capturing Carnforth Steering Group member, Lesley Sutcliffe, said of the project launch, “We were really pleased with the response to our launch event and the library was buzzing with enthusiasm for our project. We will be keeping in touch with the people who came to tell us their stories, and also reaching out to local groups for their help."

For further information, contact: Friends of Carnforth Library

[email protected] or visit

Carnforth Library, 65A Lancaster Rd, Carnforth LA5 9DZ