What if the most memorable Advent calendar contained neither perfume nor whisky nor chocolates, but twenty-five encounters with something far older: the human voice telling stories?
Every December, Advent calendars offer grown-ups an increasingly elaborate assortment of treats: miniature spirits, perfumes, speciality teas, skincare and chocolates. Some are beautiful, some thoughtful. Yet each day can also bring another bottle, box, packet or piece of packaging. For people looking to celebrate more consciously, the pleasure of anticipation can sit uneasily beside the accumulation of things.
What if, instead, there were a story to look forward to?
Winter Fairytales is a digital storytelling Advent calendar created by Angela Halvorsen Bogo, an English storyteller living in Norway. From 1 to 25 December, subscribers receive a new filmed performance of a traditional fairytale or folktale every day. No plastic trays, no little bottles, no individual parcels. The gift is the experience of someone telling a story.
For Angela, storytelling is not a seasonal novelty. In 1990 she met and became apprenticed to one of Scotland’s master storytellers. Since then she has spent more than 35 years travelling, collecting and telling traditional tales, continuing a living art in which stories pass from one person to another.
Most of the tales in Winter Fairytales come from Scotland. Others come from England, Russia, Denmark, Tibet, Nigeria, Romania, Thailand and India, and from Bedouin storytelling traditions. The collection also draws on traditional folktales gathered by the Brothers Grimm. They carry the inventiveness and wisdom of many places, yet share a remarkable capacity to catch the imagination.
Long before streamed entertainment, winter evenings offered time to gather and listen. Stories of unexpected bargains, enchanted journeys, foolish rulers and unlikely heroes provided laughter and suspense, but also room for questions. What is enough? Where does courage come from? Can someone overlooked turn out to be the wisest person in the room?
These are not simply children’s stories. Traditional fairytales have always had layers that adults can savour: humour, darkness, mystery and the uncomfortable truths hidden in apparently simple plots. Winter Fairytales is created principally for adults, while also welcoming older children, around eight and upwards. The same story may awaken different thoughts in different generations.
In a culture where adults are often encouraged to be efficient, rational and continually entertained, a traditional tale makes space for ambiguity. It does not need to explain itself. A bewildering image or an unexpected ending can linger in the imagination, carrying a meaning that changes over time.
Unlike a programme to finish or a task to complete, listening offers a brief permission to do very little. The listener can settle into a chair, make tea and allow the images of the tale to unfold inwardly.
Those who joined Angela’s earlier Winter Tales offerings describe the surprising warmth of that ordinary ritual. One called it “Like a bowl of soup, something to look forward to at the end of the day”. Another recalled “snuggling under blankets every morning with my children”, before school and work began. A listener described opening each new video as a gift, adding that “it felt like Angela was right in my dining room”.
That closeness is central to the experience. A story told directly to the camera can still convey the presence of another human being. It may be shared around a breakfast table, enjoyed as a couple, or welcomed as companionship by someone spending a winter evening alone.
The environmental difference is tangible, though not absolute. Many physical Advent calendars involve packaging, plastic inserts and transport; Winter Fairytales has no plastic calendar, physical wrapping or shipping. Streaming has an environmental footprint of its own, of course. The invitation is less to claim a perfect solution than to consider whether every gift must be another possession.
A story can travel particularly easily between people who live far apart. It can be given to a friend who loves folklore, a relative who has enough things already, or someone who longs for a quieter ritual during a busy season. And unlike a scented candle or a bottle of something special, it becomes a shared experience that might inspire conversation afterwards.
There is another kind of sustainability here: keeping cultural traditions alive. Folktales have crossed languages and borders, changing as storytellers and listeners make them their own. Their richness survives not merely because someone writes them down, but because people continue to tell them and someone makes time to listen.
Winter Fairytales leaves room for that time. A fresh story arrives each day from 1 to 25 December, but all twenty-five performances remain available until 1 March 2027. Listeners can miss a day, return to a favourite, or enjoy the tales long after the Christmas decorations have been put away.
At a season crowded with invitations to buy, a daily story offers a gentler proposition: perhaps the thing we remember most is not what we unwrap, but a voice, a moment of wonder, and the feeling of being together.
Early Bird: €49 until 22 November 2026; €79 thereafter.
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