What would you do, if you could start again?
Shangri-La is a magical place nestled deep in the South East corner of Glastonbury Festival, where it feels like anything can happen.
Ever evolving, in reaction to the social and political landscape, this year Shangri-La creative director, Kaye Dunnings, went one step further with The Wilding, which was a complete reset. The field started again from the ground up with a fresh perspective and a focus on collective joy as an act of resistance.
Shangri-La is a family. A family of hundreds of wildly talented, creative and skilled people, working thousands of hours to produce something beautiful, political and important, that comes alive for just four days, at a festival for 210,000 people.
The technical production, from Robin Collings, centre-pieced by an immersive AV show, was next level, and the music programme, from Chris Macmeikan, Katie Marshall, Bobby Friction, Mo Hassan and so many more, mirrored the importance of community emphasised in the garden on every one of the five stages.
It’s a story that needs sharing with the world, but where do you even start? Well, that’s easy, you start again.
The intention of The Wilding was to bring back that feeling of wonderment and awe, of being open to the unexpected, and communication was key to that.
We slowed things right down.
We thought about everything anew. Would Shangri-La join social media, as it is now? The answer was no. So we left. Feels radical doesn’t it, but guess what? It was the best thing we could have done.
Our line up announcement was a physical poster, sent out to press and artists in the post, or, where possible, delivered by hand. With it, we sent seeds for planting, to create an action that involved people in the start of The Wilding.
This simple act opened conversations; we met new people, they grew sunflowers in their gardens and on their balconies, and they engaged with us, in the true sense of the word.
After that, nothing. We kept the whole field a secret until the moment it opened so we could all experience The Wilding coming to life together.
The press became our conspirators. We told them our secrets under strict embargo so they could help us tell our story. The BBC made a beautiful film that we pitched via a tour of a sketch up model, on zoom, that went out on prime time BBC 2 on Saturday night. Creative Boom, Dezeen and other creative titles planned stories via FaceTime from the field as it grew before our eyes. Deb Grant and Nathan Shepherd donned their high vis for a first audio sneak peek that went out throughout the whole of their Wednesday night New Music Fix show on BBC 6 Music.
We chat to our favourite Guardian photographer for weeks ahead of time, to work out the exact moment the field might work best, which resulted in inclusion in four different photo essays, including one of our very own.
The press tour was glorious chaos, and you just have to take a step back and remember this is exactly how it should be. 70 journalists turned up half an hour early. We weren’t quite ready. Our 50 strong procession of renegade morris dancers, tele-shrubbies and guardians of the realm went rogue, and had to be chased across the field. But there were interviews happening in secret gardens, presenters eating the tomatoes from our allotments, and everyone was dancing.
The Wilding was the moment. It captured everyone’s imagination tapping into feelings that people hadn’t quite articulated yet. We were on Women’s Hour, The Art Newspaper, Creative Boom, Design Week. Even the RHS Magazine came to the garden.
As for telling the story ourselves, we’re building our own community online, that we own and no-one can change under us. Our newsletter, Sign Up For Joy, was launched from Glastonbury as The Wilding came alive, sending out daily news and secrets.
Documentation became an art project, not a press office function, and each of our photographers was commissioned to deliver a photo story about a different area, or concept. In the coming weeks a series of six connected films, produced on site, will be released telling the story of The Wilding. A zine was created and printed live in the field, from art created throughout the weekend.
All of this will have a home on our new website, www.weareshangrila.com, where you can Sign Up For Joy, so we can tell you more of our stories and let you know when there’s something new to see.
We want to show our films in the cinema. We want to exhibit our photography. We want to bring people together again in real life. We want to make a documentary, make a book, there’s no end of possibilities for communication if you think what you could do if you could start again.
Shangri-La is a place everyone is trusted to experiment, to push boundaries, so we can find out what happens if you do things differently, and see what the future might look like.
It’s a privilege to be part of and I’m proud to tell its story. Also, this year, we kinda smashed it.
