Bristol's Festival Scene

Bristol festivals draw huge crowds year on year - from commercially run events like Tokyo World Festival in Eastville park to free (and community minded) events like Trinity Garden Party and St. Paul's carnival. There are a string of multi-venue festivals (in the style of Sonar in Barcelona) around the Stokes Croft area including Simple Things and Rave on Avon. Simple Things has expanded somewhat in the last few years and taken over the city's flagship venue, Colston Hall.

As well as music festivals, Bristol's deep historical connection to street art is celebrated in day events like Upfest. Centred around the recently created (and unofficial) street art district - North Street - you can spend the day watching apartment blocks getting a new lick of paint from head to toe. Truly a festival not to be missed!

Our recent festival recommendations

10 years strong, the Bristol Palestine Film Festival is a celebration of the proud connection between two distant places. It’s maybe your only chance to see these prestigious, boundary pushing shorts, feature lengths, documentaries, plays and comedies from the region’s foremost creative minds. Fedayin: Georges Abdallah's Fight at The Cube.

Buy tickets for festival events in Bristol

WHAT OUR EDITORS SAY

The Future of Festivals Summit returns! Delivered in partnership by Bristol Festivals Network and Bristol City Council, this is a chance for all of us to come together in person and online to ask key questions about our sector, the city and ourselves as a network, plus how we contribute to the future of festivals and live events in the South West.

Words: BCFM’s Pat Hart will host an onstage conversation with Womad Festival co founder and author of 'My Festival Romance' Thomas Brooman (CBE). The conversation will be based around Thomas’s autobiography My Festival Romance, Womad and its many festivals worldwide.

JAKE WILD HALL is one half of Bad Betty Press, the host of Boomerang Club and winner of the PBH 2016 Spirit Of The Free Fringe Award. He has performed on BBC Radio and at festivals and literary events across the UK. He is the author of two pamphlets, Blank and Solomon’s World—longlisted for Best Pamphlet in the 2018 Saboteur Awards. He co-edited anthologies The Dizziness of Freedom and Alter Egos.

David Bramwell is a British writer, performer and Sony-award winning broadcaster for BBC Radio 3 and BBC Radio 4. He is the founder and host of Brighton's spoken word night, the Catalyst Club and author of the No.9 Bus to Utopia, The Haunted Moustache, The Odditorium, The Mysterium. He has spoken and performed at TEDx, The Tate, Sunday Assembly, The Lowry, School of Life, Idler Academy and most UK festivals.