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The rural tour is a taster event for the main Piazza Italia event in Horsham taking place on Easter Weekend and there will be up to 23 ‘bellisima’ cars and bikes expected to include Ferraris, Lamborghinis, Alfa Romeos, Maseratis, an original Fiat 500, two original Minis in ‘Italian Job’ livery, plus Ducatti motorbikes and classic Italian scooters: it will be a real festival of noise and colour!
Needless to say Henfield will be pulling out all the stops to create a ‘favoloso’ Italian feel in the village. The high street shops will be taking part in an Italian themed window display competition in the week running up to the event and many shops and businesses will be opening on the Sunday afternoon itself including: Taste Deli, Café des Ami, Full of Beans and Henfield Furnishings, Corner Weighs, Stokes, Henfield Antiques, River Rose and Village Care.
The White Hart will be offering an Italian themed menu all weekend and Hartleys will be offering Italian wine tasting!
On the day itself there will be a celebration of all things Italian in the Henfield Hall car park including: a taster of a traditional Italian market with authentic Italian food bought to us by Simon Faro; a selection of hot street food from Rushfields; freshly made pizza from the Pizza Oven; and Italian ice cream from Gelato Gemelli. The Steyning Cadets Brass Band will be providing the musical entertainment between 1pm and 2pm. There will also be a display of classic/sports cars kindly brought along by local enthusiasts. The Henfield Hall car park will be closed to cars on the day so the organisers would like to encourage residents to walk into the village if possible.
And of course there will be the cars! The tour will start in Horsham and go to Billingshurst, Pulborough, Storrington and Steyning before finally arriving in Henfield (they are obviously saving the best for last!) The cars are scheduled to arrive in the Henfield car park at around 2.15pm where they will stay for about half an hour for allow members of the public to enjoy them before leaving at approximately 2.45pm to return to Horsham: no doubt they will be making a very noisy entrance and exit! If anyone would like to join the day with their own vintage or supercar they are very welcome – please contact the organisers to find out more (details below).
The Piazza Italia tour is shaping up to be an ‘evento straordinario’. A huge amount of work has been put into creating a wonderful experience for residents and visitors alike and we look forward to seeing you all there!
Sarah Butler
If you would like to be involved in Henfield Piazza Italia please contact Carol Eastwood at Henfield Community Partnership - cmeastwood@hotmail.com
