Cornwall’s foremost annual festival of surprises settles into the ancient St Germans estate once more this week.

From the time it started as a literary festival in 2003, Port Eliot had its mind on other things too and is now equally obsessed by music, words, food, fashion, flowers, science, walking, water and wildlife, influencing plenty of events in the intervening thirteen years.

This year will see Kim Gordon, Dawn French, Gloria Steinem. Ryley Walker, Bo Ningen, Bruce Robinson, Michael Morpurgo, Imarhan, Sara Pascoe, Noel Fielding, Beth Orton, James Acaster, Nina Stibbe, Ali Smith, Andrew Weatherall, Barbara Hulanicki, Stephen Jones, Matty Bovan, Nathan Outlaw, Blanche Vaughan, Sally Clarke, Madeleine Shaw, Peter Gordon, Claire Ptak on the bill, among many others.

Port Eliot Festival runs from 28-31 July 2016. Some weekend and day tickets are still available.

The full line-up can be found on www.porteliotfestival.com

Here is a tiny snapshot of the weekend in prospect:

Thursday 28 July

3.30pm - Mathew Clayton - co-author of 2015’s journey around the British Isles, Lundy, Rockall, Dogger, Fair Isle: A Celebration of the Islands Around Britain, will give a talk entitled ‘Kling Klang: The History of the Cowbell’.

9.30pm - The Magnetic North have recently released their new album, Prospect of Skelmersdale, a musical reflection on a 1960s new town outside Liverpool, exploring the magic and mythology that can be found in the most unexpected places.

10pm - Wurlitza create live soundtracks to silent movies. This year, they’re accompanying AE Dupont’s beautiful tale of 1920’s London, Piccadilly, evoking an air of jazz sophistication.

Friday 29 July

12.30pm Chris Donald - The founder of the untouchable Viz comic. Alongside publisher John Brown he will tell the story of how they created the world’s best-selling adult comic ever.

3pm - One of Britain’s best-loved writers for children, Michael Morpurgo, reveals the inspiration behind his bestselling novels, including War Horse, Private Peaceful and his latest, An Eagle in the Snow, the story of the man who could have stopped World War Two before it began.

4pm - Jesse Armstrong - British comedy writer, notably together with Sam Bain for Peep Show and The Thick of It and with Chris Morris for Four Lions.

6pm - Gloria Steinem - One of the most influential feminists of the 20th and 21st centuries will be in free-ranging conversation with Port Eliot founder Catherine St Germans, taking in early family car journeys across America, and life on the road as a journalist and activist and on the campaign trail with the likes of Robert Kennedy and Hillary Clinton.

7pm - Dawn French has appeared in some of this country’s most celebrated shows, including French and Saunders, The Comic Strip Presents and The Vicar of Dibley. The author of a bestselling memoir and the novels A Tiny Bit Marvellous, Oh Dear Silvia, and last year’s According to YES, she’ll be in conversation with Miranda Sawyer.

9pm - Michael Chapman - Endlessly influential folk-jazz-blues singer-songwriter and guitarist, who began on the Cornish folk circuit in the late ‘60s and, 50 years and 40 albums later, is still deeply loved and criminally under-rated.

10pm - The remarkable, sometimes rowdy, Illinois guitarist and singer, Ryley Walker and his band will suit Port Eliot to a T and set the audience adrift in the best possible way.

10pm - Beth Orton has been one of the most beguiling voices in music for the past two decades. Her new album, Kidsticks, strikes a dynamic balance between the earthly, personal touches of her recent work and the pulsating, electronic flourishes of her early career.

Saturday 30 July

10am - Nina Stibbe’s story of her arrival in London to work as a nanny for the children of London Review of Books editor Mary-Kay Wilmers and her ex-husband, Stephen Frears, was brought to television by Nick Hornby in the BBC series, Love, Nina. Now, Nina comes to Port Eliot to discuss her new book, Paradise Lodge.

10am - David Bowie - The Sonification is a collaboration between Dr Alexis Kirke of Plymouth University and sonic pioneer and Heaven 17 member, Martyn Ware. The pair have composed new

sound pieces based on the data of David Bowie’s musical life, right up to Blackstar. A scientific tribute to one of the very best.

11am - Clare Waight Keller is Creative Director of Chloé and oversees all aspects of the Chloé universe, from ready-to-wear to accessories, fragrance, and the See by Chloé collection. Her career includes a wealth of experience with the likes of Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren, Gucci and Pringle.

12.30pm - Beloved songwriter Darren Hayman will take the Port Eliot audience on a journey to the fifty-four ‘Thankful Villages’ of Britain – each a place to which every soldier returned home alive from World War One. Darren’s new LP includes a song, tune or spoken word insight into each.

1pm - Trevithick! is a biographical comedy that will bring joy to your heart. Telling the story of local hero Richard Trevithick, who revolutionised the use of steam, it bursts with music, comedy and facts. Directed by Kneehigh’s Theatre’s Simon Harvey, it stars Kernow King and Mary Woodvine.

2.30pm - Songwriter and guitarist, Brix Smith Start, is best known for her work with The Fall. In recent years she has worked as a TV presenter and in fashion. She will be in conversation with Stephen Duffy, singer and songwriter of The Lilac Time.

3pm & 5pm - Geoff Dyer - Author of Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi and three previous novels, as well as nine non-fiction books. Dyer has won the Somerset Maugham Prize, the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction.

4pm - Ali Smith - Scottish novelist, winner of numerous prizes, including the Baileys Prize and the Goldsmiths Prize for How to be Both, which was also shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize.

5.30pm - Down to earth and disarmingly insightful stand-up, writer and actress, Sara Pascoe, whose first book, Animal: How a Woman Is Made, explores the female body and psyche.

6pm - Kim Gordon of Sonic Youth will perform a dance piece deconstructing male guitar heroics before staying on stage for a chat.

6.30pm - Ben Watt & Bernard Butler. Ben Watt spent sixteen years as songwriter-performer-producer with Tracey Thorn in Everything But The Girl. Bernard Butler is best known for his Suede glories and his collaboration with David McAlmont. The pair will perform in the beautiful Church.

6.30pm - Comedy one-off, Noel Fielding, presents his watercolour paintings - among them The Lonely Prince (with giant Owl), Jurgen Klinsmann (it was very windy) and My Little Pony.

7pm - Amber Arcades is the moniker of Dutch musician Annelotte de Graaf, who crafts floating pop melodies over a mixture of insistent drums, cutting guitars and fuzzed-out organs.

8pm - Bill Ryder Jones - Multi-instrumentalist, producer and composer, whose remarkable latest LP, West Kirby County Primary (released towards the end of 2015) has been praised to the skies.

10.30pm - Young, six-piece southern Algerian band Imarhan blends Tuareg music, jazz, funk and rock. An energetic proposition that is in the running to be the finest thing all weekend.

11pm - Bo Ningen. Spectacular Japanese noise rock blasters, whose records make you jump and whose live shows make your jaw drop as you forget where you are and lose control of your limbs.

Sunday 31 July

12 noon - Wyl Menmuir lives on the north coast of Cornwall. His first novel, The Many, is an unsettling tale set on the Cornish coast that explores the devastation that hits when the foundations on which we rely are swept away.

12 noon - A Sunday afternoon invitation to delve into the continuing mystery of Jack the Ripper, in the company of screenwriter, director, author of The Peculiar Memories of Thomas Penman and creator of Withnail & I, Bruce Robinson.

4pm - Nathan Outlaw - One of the most exciting chefs in Britain today, holder of two Michelin stars for his Restaurant Nathan Outlaw, now at Port Isaac, which was acclaimed as the best restaurant in Cornwall by Michelin.

4pm and 5.30pm - Alexander Masters - Author and homeless worker, whose Stuart: a Life Backwards, was a Sunday Times bestseller, winner of the Guardian First Book Award and was recently adapted by Alexander for a BBC film.

5pm - Philip Norman is the bestselling biographer of the likes of John Lennon, Elton John, and Mick Jagger. In 2013, Sir Paul McCartney granted him ‘tacit approval’ as his biographer. It was, Norman says, ‘the biggest surprise of my career’. He’ll be in conversation with Will Hodgkinson, chief rock and pop critic of The Times.

5.30pm - The Story Collider. True, personal stories with a science twist, delivered by storytellers plucked from the festival line up. Some are heart-breaking; some are hilarious. They’re all true, and, in one way or another, about science.

6.30pm - Isy Suttie – Comedian, actress and writer, whose first book, The Actual One, has just been published.

7.15pm - Black Peaches is the new project of Rob Smoughton, best known as a long-time member of Hot Chip and Scritti Politti. A midway point between the swamp and the tropics, Black Peaches’ music is gloriously loose-limbed a psychotropic stew of country boogie, spiritual jazz and funk.

9.30pm - Side Stepper from Bogotá, Colombia, are pioneers of electronic dance music. Their new work is inspired by the tradition of the dance bands - the ‘orquestas’ from Colombia, Haiti, Trinidad, Cuba and Africa - that existed before the electronic revolution in the ‘80s and ‘90s.

The Port Eliot atmosphere is special; there is no green room or exclusive VIP priority area. And if any businesses are involved, it’s because they bring something special with them; so, award-winning, Michelin Bib Gourmand restaurant, Polpo will build an authentic Venetian bàcaro on the exterior of the house and turn the 800-year-old Still Room into a production kitchen. The orangery will become a Comins Tea House, fashion maison, Chloé, will bring installations and performances, Cornish clothiers, Seasalt, will host workshops and laidback clothing company, hush, will show films in the evening. Devon’s Oyster Shack will bring fresh-off-the-boat seafood and the likes of The Shellfish Pig, Sipsmith Gin, fine wine merchants Le Vignoble and Skinner’s Brewery will all be there, along with fine Hawaiian burger and sandwich grill Kua’aina. At the edge of the site, under Brunel’s viaduct, is the (south) western Black Cow Saloon, and back at the top of the hill, the rum bar, Dead Man’s Fingers. And The Original Muck Boot Company will host the Great Outdoors programme

The Wardrobe Department and Theatre of Fashion are Britain’s garden hot-beds of future ideas in fashion and beauty. This unique participation-event is where the most exciting creative people stage happenings, hands-on making sessions and involve festival-goers in free-form inspiration the world follows – next year. This is the place for meeting the best talent- and to discover your own inner designer/illustrator/makeup artist/model/future fashion thinker. This year’s line-up includes, among many others: Chloé, Barbara Hulanicki, Stephen Jones, Matty Bovan, Rottingdean Bazaar’s James Thesus Buck and Luke Brooks, Damien Cuypers, Ed Marler, Matthew Josephs, Molly Goddard, Piers Atkinson, Sarah Mower, Alexander Fury and Sandy Powell.

You could call Port Eliot a food festival; if you felt like it, you could ignore all of the music, books, fashion and wildlife and treat it as a magnificent celebration of food and drink. When it launched in 2003, Port Eliot was the first UK festival to present high quality food as standard throughout. Now, building on the launch of the Flower and Fodder stage in 2014, Port Eliot confirms its best ever food line-up, featuring: Nathan Outlaw, Blanche Vaughan, Sally Clarke, Madeleine Shaw, Alastair Little, Peter Gordon, Claire Ptak and many more.

New features this year include a programme of workshops, demonstrations and practical skills sessions that has doubled in size, after an overwhelming amount of interest last year. Late night

astronomy walks and talks, natural silk dyeing, botanical illustration classes, diorama making, Campfire cooking, survival skills, overnight campout for kids, headdress making, vintage swimming cap design, cider and cheese pairing, wild cocktail making, herbal first aid, yarn bombing, block printing, sound arts workshops, calligraphy and the Grand Port Eliot Clothes Swap will all be waiting in the Workshop Barn. Continuing the theme of doing rather than talking, Hole & Corner magazine will present its own stage in partnership with Plymouth University.

Lark’s Haven is a newly created corner of quiet, where people suffering from a night at the front of the Park Stage or throwing shapes in the Boogie Round can find a forgiving hot tub with their name on, or a sauna, yoga or meditation class to prepare them for another night on the tiles.

The most startlingly unusual room in the House at Port Eliot, the Round Room, will become the festival’s first science lab. Experiments, lectures and debates will fill the room; an all-too-rare opportunity to chew over astronomy, bio-hacking, the science of sleep and memory or food science.

Port Eliot’s top night spot, the Boogie Round, hidden behind a laurel hedge somewhere deep in the middle of the woodland site and home to many a DJ after dark and all night long.

Encountered in a century-old Rhododendron garden, The Hullabaloo is a feast of entertainment, workshops and activities for children, conjured up by the inventive Rogue Theatre. The Idler Academy brings you old school savvy for the new world. Its talks and workshops focus on the classical liberal arts and practical skills in a gentle quest to help people lead more fulfilled lives.

Perhaps the most relaxed setting all weekend, but especially after dark is Caught By The River, down alongside the Tiddy. It’s a living outpost of the online gathering place for all who treasure wildlife, nature, writing, reading, great music and undiscovered heroes (not to mention good beer). Caught By The River is one of the defining treats of the festival.