Ironfest organisers have estimated that this year’s festival saw a ten percent growth in attendees, hitting over the 20,000 mark, despite increased ticket prices.
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The 19th iteration of Ironfest also saw more events and more stalls.
“The show itself was way bigger than what we were expecting,” festival director Macgregor Ross said.
“The showground was at capacity as far as space goes, and all the participants were super keen. There was about 40 more stalls and so many more events.”
The event has seen a big jump in attendance from roughly 18,500 last year.
“It’s funny that over the years we have noticed that as the number of participants increases, they bring their people and their networks and the numbers go up.
“It’s just word of mouth. We had a lot of new people come. We want to keep building a bigger, more quality event.”
We want to keep building a bigger, more quality event
- Macgregor Ross
He said the weekend went relatively smoothly.
“The feedback generally speaking was positive and good, however their were complaints about the toilets flooding.”
Lithgow Living History member, Vicki Hartley, who has attended the event for the past six years said this year “topped” the lot.
“This is the best festival, it’s the biggest, with the most people and participants. And the atmosphere is so happy, everybody seems to be loving it.”
The Ironfest crew took little time to announce next year’s theme, which will be ‘Once upon a time’.
“It’s our 20th anniversary, so we thought let’s start telling that story. That was part of it, going back to the beginning of the festival. It’s fairy tales and medieval, it’s an all-inclusive theme.”
Ironfest will release its exact numbers in coming days.
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