UK Festival Guides met up with Apple Tarts Festival owner David Hillier and here's what he had to say about the ethos and hard work that goes into creating an event to remember.
Apple Tarts Festival takes place at Brogdale Farm, Faversham, Kent, and is a 500 person event. It on from Sunday 3rd June to Monday 4th over the Queens Jubilee Double Bank Holiday weekend with bands and DJ's playing across 3 stages in the beautiful surrounding Orchard fields.
We met up with organiser David Hillier to find out where it all started, the ethos behind it and what is in store at this years festival!
Q: You ran suburban tarts club night, but how did you make the big decision to start the festival?
“We started Suburban Tarts after going to Standon Calling, which was so amazing and inspired us to try running a night ourselves. Suburban Tarts then did a lot better than we planned and we got a bit carried away, and had one of those conversations that you have after a night in the pub, where we came to the conclusion that you end up going to a festival and often not really watching the bands you wanted to see; instead you want to become part of something special, a one-off experience. So, we thought we’d give it a go, and ended up being really happy with the way the first Apple Tarts went, despite it being fraught with panic. We finished last year, and were not sure if we were going to do it again, but it got to September and the devil on our shoulder started telling us to try it again, and now here we are!”
“It ramps up, going from being part-time, to now completely taking over my life. It can get very stressful and if I could guarantee that we'd sell all of our tickets it'd be the best job in the world, as we're basically curating an environment for loads of people to go and have a great time. Unfortunately we're not Glastonbury, so we can't guarantee that, which makes it a bit more difficult; though we are now adapting, and trying to find different ways to sell our tickets”
“Last year we sold out, but found that rather than people buying them in advance, they bought them in the last three weeks. Now we know this, we're working on projects to encourage people to buy their tickets early. We've got all the organisation done already, so now we're just going to focus on that at the moment.”
Q: How is this year going to be different from last year?
“We're doing it in a different field this year, on the same farm (Brogdale Farm, near Faversham) which is a national fruit collection, which means our new field has an orchard attached. The plan was always one field, one day, but the addition of the orchard means everyone will be camping amongst the trees. Hopefully it will give it a totally different atmosphere, but still holding onto the private party feel as their will only be 500 people there.”
“We've got a few more tents this year, we've got the Big Apple, which is the main tent, and we’re going to have Granny Smiths Tea Rooms during the day which will have a bit of a royal theme and serve cucumber sandwiches, homemade cakes, coffee, and other stuff that might help sober people up! This will then turn into a headphone disco at night. We've also got Bobbie's Bar where we are going to have Slagbox during the evening- Slagbox is a singles night that started in the Dolphin in East London, and it’s a weird and wonderful twist on the whole concept. I don’t want to give too much away but it really is something to behold. Finally, we'll have the Orchard Stage, which will be an acoustic stage in a clearing in the orchard. We're going to encourage the bands we've got playing to do acoustic sets, but we've also got local people to come down and play as well; I’m currently talking to the local philosophy discussion group about coming down. You just can't sit still and think it’s going to be the same as last year, and since there's going to be roughly double the number of people there, we need to give them a bit more!”
Q: One of the interesting things about Apple Tarts is that it’s all about the people who go, in that everything is voted on. Is this something that you did at the club nights, or is this something you developed for the festival?
“No, we didn't do that at the club nights, but in the run up to last year’s festival we decided that it would be an obvious extension of Apple Tarts people-based concept. Apple Tarts is on the Jubilee weekend, and we thought that we couldn’t just ignore that, so rather than an entirely "royal" themed event, we thought it would be interesting to start a republic within the festival. It’s worked out really well, both as a promotional tool, and also as a way to engage with people in the run up to the festival, giving them a chance to program their own festival. It makes it a little bit nervy for us as we don’t know exactly what people are going to say they want, but people seem to be really into the concept, and seem to be engaging with it in a way that we're really happy with.”
Q: Is there anything else you're hoping to do, either now or in the future?
“Well, you go to all the big festivals and they've got loads of things to do that aren't really involved with seeing the music, which is obviously a really important part, but they often become the things that really endure. You've just really got to think outside the box.”
“When you're younger it’s ALL about the bands, but now it’s so much more about the atmosphere and creating an environment that’s a world away from what people normally have. Saying that, we're really excited about the acts we've got playing this year, which are a mix of local Kent-band artists like Will Varley, as well as bands from all over the country. The City Shanty Band are an 11-man collective from East London who sing sea-shanties with a modern twist, and Black Mekon are a filthy garage-blues duo who have been around the world touring for the last few years and we are really excited about.”
“On the main stage we're going to have 8 bands and 4 DJ's, with maybe 10 playing the headphone disco, and at least another 6 on the Orchard Stage, so there's going to be a lot of stuff going on. We can’t wait!”
Interviewed by George Jeffery
Published on 17 April 2012 by Wayne Feltham
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