Business Enquirer Issue 117 | Sziget Festival | September 2023

DID YOU MAKE THE MOST INCLUSIVE FESTIVAL OF SUMMER ‘23?

SZIGET FESTIVAL

Sziget Festival, Budapest, Thursday 10th AugustTuesday 15th August 2023

Did You Make the Most Inclusive Festival of Summer ‘23?

SZIGET FESTIVAL PROJECT

DIRECTED BY: CHARLOTTE ROPE

ARTICLE

WRITTEN BY: LAURA WATLING

Europe’s popular Sziget festival returned 2023 with yet another phenomenal line up.

Designed to be one of the world’s most inclusive and sustainably-minded festivals, Sziget enabled revellers to party without the guilt - but it couldn’t guarantee no hangover!

With a line-up of world class acts spanning six jam-packed days, Sziget offered more than just music. The festival also featured yoga, break-dancing shows, theatre performances, a funfair, and even sport!

Importantly, the festival also came with sustainability credentials to blow other festivals out of the water!

The Line Up

With musical heavyweights such as Prince, Justin Beiber, Snoop Dogg, and Arctic Monkeys having graced the Sziget stage in the past, Sziget 2023 didn’t disappoint.

Headlining the festival this year was Florence + The Machine (Thursday), Imagine Dragons (Friday), David Guetta (Saturday), Mumford & Sons (Sunday), Lorde and Macklemore (Monday), and Billie Eilish (Tuesday).

Sziget Festival, which is located on Budapest’s Óbuda-Island, is the perfect festival for eclectic music lovers, allowing you to visit with a group that has a diverse taste.

This year, acts spanned genres and continents, from YUNGBLUD to Diplo, Sven Väth to Shlømo, the festival’s roster of acts was a busy one, with 80 performers gracing the main stages over the six days.

For 2023, Sziget was expecting up to 80,000 festival-goers, so visitors may have needed a breather from the hustle and bustle of the Mainstage dedicated to Dan, FreeDome presented by Mastercard, and the Samsung Party Arena.

Thinking of everything, ticket holders had the opportunity to get some downtime over at the ArtZone, the daytime venue which offered a range of creative and interactive programmes, enabling active relaxation. Visitors were able to meet some of the most interesting people in the Hungarian art scene, as well as explore installations from students, designers, and galleries from across Hungary.

For a more light-touch musical experience, festival-goers could visit the Light Stage. Designed as a chill-out zone, the Light Stage offered live music from emerging musicians. Preparing guests for the main stages, this area came with its own bar and smoothie corner.

And for those seeking a bit of culture over the six days, Cirque du Sziget showcased unique performances from jugglers, equilibrists, acrobats and more, from countries such as Canada, Morocco, Australia and Argentina.

If watching all of the breathtaking performances made visitors want to give it a go themselves, they could head over to the Global Village, which offered workshops in world music. From Eastern Europe to South America and Asia to Africa, there really was an experience for everyone!

On The Island

Whilst it sounds like it could have been an exhausting six days, Sziget Festival paid careful attention to its accommodation offering.

Basic camping came as standard, but ticket holders had the opportunity to upgrade their stay to one of several onesite camping options.

Siesta Camping offered shady camping spots, whilst Park Camping was close to the entrance for those not wanting to carry their luggage too far!

For those wanting to stay somewhere Instagrammable, Sziget Ville and Podpadopolis offered a range of photoshoot-worthy glamping options. Sziget Festival spans the 108-hectare Óbudai-sziget, which translates to Old Buda Island. The largest Danubian island in Budapest, the tree-filled location even has its own beach!

Off The Island

It’s unlikely that Sziget ticket holders found themselves bored over the six-day experience. However, for those taking the time to travel across the world to Hungary, it would have been remiss to not take a trip to wider Budapest.

For the sixth time, Sziget festival enabled visitors to take the festival to the river Danube on its Sziget

Cruisin Boat Party!

The elegant pleasure-boat sailed past all the sights along the Danube, including Parliament, and the world-famous panorama of Budapest. The changing views were made more breathtaking by the accompanying music from the likes of Joris Delacroix, Bart Skils, and James Zabiela.

Whilst visiting Budapest, Sziget Festival also recommended a few other sites to visit during your stay.

As passed on its boat cruise, the Hungarian Parliament building is one of the most iconic buildings in Budapest. Whilst it offers its own breathtaking sight

with its neo-gothic architecture, it also gives stunning views of the city.

Visitors to Budapest can also check out the UNESCO World Heritage Site - Buda Castle, explore Budapest’s Jewish Quarter, featuring a number of synagogues, museums, and restaurants, and even do some relaxing at the thermal baths!

A Guilt-Free Stay

Under the umbrella of its Love Revolution initiative, Sziget Festival is on a mission to ensure its event is one of the most green festivals on the planet.

“The Love Revolution is our way of celebrating that, together, we can achieve sustainable development and environmental awareness in our daily lives,” says the festival’s website.

For 2023, Sziget Festival implemented several sustainable measures to ensure it can be the greenest festival possible.

Guests could participate in small changes to their day-to-day to improve their individual footprint as part of the bigger picture. That included using reusable water bottles to fill up at DRINKiQ water taps, only using straws at bars on request, and utilising one of the 30,000 pocket ashtrays which will be handed out on site.

Sziget worked with vendors on larger scale initiatives, including encouraging all food vendors to voluntarily comply with a baseline of sustainability measures, such as providing vegetarian and vegan options, reducing or eliminating red meat, as well as utilising environmentally friendly cleaning products, and monitoring and reducing food waste.

In addition, all caterers were required to buy fruit and vegetables that were seasonally available in Hungary from a centralised food retailer that exclusively sells local and domestic in-season produce.

The festival also had several recycling initiatives in place, including Re-Cup, which aims to reduce the amount of plastic cups going to landfill. There was also the Collective Composting Lab, which was the recipient of the European Innovation Award in 2019. It was planned that the humus material collected from compostable plates from three of Sziget Festivals diners would be used during the recultivation of Óbuda Island.

To ensure Sziget’s sustainable initiatives are measured, it partnered with Green Deal Circular Festivals, which helped to strengthen its data provision systems, as well as work with third party vendors to provide data on energy, waste and raw material usage.

To find out more about Sziget Festival, the Love Revolution visit: www.szigetfestival.com