The Sweet Fantastic Project

An especially sweet treat awaits you at the Regional Cultural Centre, Letterkenny this month. 'The Sweet Fantastic' is the Regional Cultural Centre's delicious new exhibition, celebrating 80 years of the famous Oatfield Sweet Factory in Letterkenny.
The exhibition has been created by the internationally renowned Redmoon Theatre from Chicago, USA who have brought its teaching artists Angie Tillges and Dave Beupre to Letterkenny to work with local students from Ballyraine NS, Educate Together NS and Illistrin NS.
The Oatfield Sweet Factory has a long tradition of seeking out the purest ingredients for its famous sweets. Using this idea as a spring board for inspiration, Angie and Dave have spent several weeks delivering their unique brand of interactive arts education to the young people involved.
The end result is a truly unique exhibition incorporating whimsical site installations; an extensive transformation of the Regional Cultural Centre's facade and an interactive map to guide visitors on an exploratory expedition.
Admission if free and there will be a range of mouth-watering activities to entertain children and adults alike.
The Sweet Fantastic opened to the public on Saturday and runs to January 31st.
There are other beautiful photos taken by Paul McGuckin, photographer to be seen on his website. Click HERE to see his photos.

Best of the New Year to you all! Hope you enjoyed a wonderful holiday. Dave and I have settled back into a very snowy and cold Chicago. It snowed .38 meters (1 foot 3 inches) this weekend, which was a lot!

We have begun sharing your amazing work, THE SWEET FANTASTIC, with our friends, families, co- workers, and students in Chicago. Your work is a great treat to share! Everyone who sees the photographs are so surprised and inspired by your creativity and hard work on the exhibition. Well done!

I am sure you are getting the same wonderful reactions in Letterkenny and I hope you each have had the opportunity to visit the Regional Cultural Center to share the work with your families and friends. It is so strange to think that the exhibition is still on display way far away over there while Dave and I are way far away over here! We miss you all and we miss the project.

Hope you are all hard at work in your classrooms and are finding time to paint, write, design, build and explore!!! You are an exceptional bunch.

Best-

Angie and Dave

P.S. We brought some Oatfield Sweets back with us and our friends in Chicago agree the Emeralds are the most scrummy!!!!--
Angela Tillges
Neighborhood Arts Program Director

The Beginning
The business began as a wholesale and retail outlet on the Port Road in the town. The McKinney family began to make their own sweets and in August 1927. The first sweets were made on the open coke fire in a shed at the back of the shop. The land on which the factory now stands was purchased in November 1929, the first sod was cut in February 1930. Six people were employed at the time.

The company at the time was known as Mayfield Confectionery but the name was quickly changed as another company in Manchester traded by this name. The company name was changed to Oatfield. The land on which the factory is built was known as Oatfield. The May was dropped and Oat was substituted and hence the name “Oatfield”. The weekly production of confectionery was about 3 tons. Today the company produces approximately 65 tons a week.

Sugar was purchased in the 1930's from Tate & Lyle. Glucose came from Manchester. They were delivered by ship and rail via Derry to Letterkenny railway station. Later, glucose was shipped from Holland to the Letterkenny Port. Today, only Irish sugar and Irish glucose are used. Butter has always been Irish Creamery Butter.

Later
Oatfield premises in LetterkennyBy 1960 Oatfield decided to stop marketing packed sweets made by Cadburys, Rowntree, Urney's Chocolates, Bassetts Licorice Allsorts, Jacobs Biscuits, William and Wood, Ritchies Mints and Milroy Confectionery. The company now began to focus on entirely selling Oatfield sweets. This was a major decision and proved a major success for the company.

Exporting began in 1964. The first sweets were exported to Northern Ireland. The sweets are exported on a world-wide scale which includes countries as far away as the United States,Canada, Hong Kong, Australia, Kuwait, Greece and France to name a few.

Today
Today, the factory employs approx 95 people and up to 65 tonnes of sugar and chocolate confectionery are produced each week. The main production lines are Emerald, Toffees, Eclairs, Boiled sweets. The biggest sellers are Emerald, Colleen Assortment and Orange Chocolate. The factory experiences a constant demand for its products especially at Christmas.

Donegal Creameries PLC purchased the company in February 1999.