History and visions

H.C. Andersen Festivals is based on a strong collaboration between private companies, culture- and educational institutions as well as the municipality of Odense. H.C. Andersen Festivals was held for the first time in 2013 and was established by several businesspeople with the vision of putting Odense on the map through a big and diverse cultural event. The association behind H.C. Andersen Festivals started out with 26 members and today has more than 50 private and public member companies. Today the festival has more than 160 sponsors and backers where 46 of these are association members.

Together with passionate people from the culture- and educational field they actively work for the vision of the festival: To increase the knowledge about Odense nationally and internationally through the world of H.C. Andersen. The first time the festival was held it had about 260 activities in the festival program and today offers more than 500 cultural activities for all age groups in the course of 8 days. The festival is inspired by the world of H.C. Andersen through the central concepts, which are formulated by H.C. Andersen Centret and especially professor Johs. Nørregaard Frandsen, University of Southern Denmark.