Glade Festival considers site move

United Kingdom | | 22 July 2005

Glade Festival organisers have revealed, exclusively to VF, possible plans to move next year's event to a new home, after a number of fence-jumpers infiltrated last weekend's dance party.

Glade bosses are currently considering three different sites for 2006, after gatecrashers got word of where the event was taking place, despite its location supposedly being 'secret'. However, they have stressed that moving is only one of several options to combat the problem.

The Glade Festival 2005 took place last weekend (15-17 July) at Aldermarston, Berkshire. The event had been sold out for more than a month.

A spokesman explained to VF: "When we launched Glade last year it was secretly located and people only found out where it was the week before. As it was in the same place this year, we had a bit of a problem because people already knew it."

Unlike some of its bigger contemporaries, The Glade Festival has no corporate sponsorship and therefore can't currently afford state-of-the-art fencing and security like Glastonbury. Fence jumpers infamously became the scourge of Glasto until 2002 when a million pound 'super-fence' was installed.

The spokesman admitted, "We attracted a few gate-crashers. We managed to catch quite a few but we were aware that there were some who had successfully broken into the festival. Security measures will continue to be improved for next year."

Organisers are looking at three separate locations; one on the South of England, one in the West Midlands, and one in the West Country, however festival head-honcho Anselm Guise said it's by no means certain that the festival will move.

He said: "The only black cloud over an otherwise brilliant event was a tiny minority of people who fence jumped and tried to cause trouble. As far as possible this was dealt with and next year this will be addressed. We'll either move or greatly improve security."

Despite the gatecrashers, thousands of ticket-paying dance fans at Glade had a fantastic time throughout the sun-drenched weekend, with Sasha, Dreadzone, DJ AFX, and The Bays among the many highlights.

Our reviewer Jon Wright said: "I didn't really get the sense there were many gatecrashers. It wasn't rammed and I didn't see anyone breaking in. It was simply a fantastic festival in every respect."

To read Jon's review of The Glade Festival 2005 click here.