ORGANISERS behind a Southend music festival are hoping to almost double the event's capacity and remove restrictions on under-18s attending to make next year’s event even bigger and better.
Lazydays Festival, in Priory Park, celebrated a hugely popular inaugural year which saw more than 2,500 people attend during the summer.
Now, the team organising next year’s festival has applied to Southend Council to increase the maximum number of attendees to 4,999.
This year’s event saw under-18s allowed to attend day sessions but next year’s festival - booked for July 25 to July 27 - is hoping to be even more family-friendly with no age restrictions throughout the weekend.
The festival recently announced Libertines and Babyshambles frontman Peter Doherty for a headline performance on the Saturday, with another headliner set to be announced later this week.
Co-founder Mike Bromfield, who started the event alongside Elliot Waters and Andy Williamson, believes the changes will usher in a ‘bigger and better’ festival.
Mike said: “We are thinking about the next two or three years, we want to be grounded in the community and work with residents to put this on.
“Some changes may not be things coming in 2025 but if the restriction on under-18s are dropped we are implementing those changes now.
“One of the bits of feedback we had this year was with some of our popular sessions were limited to five hours, meaning there were loads of eager people ready to start the second doors opened.
“We are also applying for earlier opening times so people can make the most of the event and we can reduce queuing.”
The changes could also see the festival opening three hours earlier on the Friday and an hour earlier on Saturday and Sunday.
Mike added that the next headliner to be announced has played in Essex before in the 2010s, adding the announcement will make people ‘very excited’.
He said: “This is bigger and better, we have definitely listened to feedback and we had a high satisfaction rate, we want to run an even better event.
“We want to do that by making it more responsible and we want to make sure it does not impede on people in Southend who don’t want to go.
“It is all about making this more family-friendly and accessible, we are so excited to put Southend more on the map when it comes to culture.”
For tickets, bookings.lazydaysfestival.com/tickets
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here