Sat 23 Aug 2025 • Polly Shute
Creating a community
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Out & Wild 2026
It's been 4 years since the Out & Wild story started.
Back in 2021 I delivered a small gathering of 40 people at a beautiful space in Pembrokeshire. My ask for all the attendees was simple 'Is there a space for a new event for queer women?'
The answer was a resounding yes. And the original model we worked to, of a space that was focused on wellbeing, music & comedy, spoken word, sports & hikes and workshops still remains the same.
In those 4 years we have seen our attendees grow from just over 200 for our first event to almost 1000 this year in Devon. But what has always been important to my team and I has been the focus on community and connections. This means we will always want to keep Out & Wild to being a boutique festival and where this year, we will limit the number of attendees to a max of 1500.
You tell us you love the fact that you can connect with people through shared experiences, whether that is attending a workshop or wellness event together, or even just chatting while queuing for a coffee.
For 2026 we are learning from the feedback attendees gave us. Thanks to all who took part in our survey and we will be publishing the findings in September and our response to the feedback. Top of the list will be ensuring we do create a real 'festival village hub' at our new location. We know how important that is. We will also be creating 30 minute breaks between the dozens of experiences we run, so you have the time to reflect, chat to people you meet, or just get a much needed coffee or drink!
And we will be announcing the programme a lot earlier and repeating popular activities, so you get the chance to plan and make the most of the three days and nights. And investing in maps and great signage, so its easy to find where to go.
We are also excited to provide an opportunity for those of you that camp or bring a van, to extend your stay at the campsite we have. And if there is appetite, we will also look to plan some walks along the South West Coast Path and other activities.
Our theme for Out & Wild 2026 (on our 5th Birthday!) will be all about community, and how we use the festival and the other events we plan across the year (you can read more about these HERE) to bring LGBTQIA+ women and non-binary people together.
We are seeing a lot of challenges around LGBTQIA+ rights and so many venues and events closing down and we want to continue our role as a fun, safe and supportive space where you can meet like-minded others. As part of this we will be growing our events outside the festival and ensuring we go to new locations (and yes that includes the north, Scotland and oversees).
With the focus on community, I want to give a big shout out to the community of volunteers that make Out & Wild happen. We now have a team of over 30 people who support us year round as well as over 50 during the festival. I call them family, because that is what we have become to each other.
Lastly, I am taking the big and bold move this year to leave my part time charity job and invest myself fully in growing Out & Wild Community. It's been hard to juggle two jobs, and I feel strongly this is my year to fully invest my time in what has grown from a dream back in 2021 to a passion project. I am a big believer in manifesting (you will hear more about that in a workshop I will run at the festival!) so I am updating my vision board in the next month.
I look forward to meeting many of you at the Festival next July or at the pop Weekenders and other events we are going to run.
And if you have any ideas on what you'd like to see from Team Out & Wild, we will be running more surveys throughout the year, or please drop us a line at info@outandwild.co.uk - after all this is your community.
Thanks,
Polly x
