The Big Retreat Festival is returning to Lawrenny in Pembrokeshire Coasts National Park this June with 3 days of wellbeing and adventure focused events, over 200 carefully curated, experiences, classes, workshops and inspirational talks, are all included in a weekend ticket.
Some of the highlights for this year’s festival include popular bands Reef and Toploader, as well as appearances from Mr Motivator and cooking demonstrations by This Morning chef Juliet Sear. Rusty Shackle and Huey Morgan from the Fun Loving Criminals are among those to feature from Wales’ music scene.
The festival was voted one of the top 5 wellbeing and adventure festivals by the Guardian and claims it has something for everyone, with live music, wellbeing and fitness workshops and events, cookery workshops and demos, as well as plenty of outdoor space in the beautiful Pembrokeshire countryside. There are also child and family focused events with the little retreaters programme, offering activities such as arts and crafts, mind boggling science, drama, disco and games.
Yet the origins of the Big Retreat festival goes back much further than this. As organisers note, it’s about a sense of connection, community and wellbeing within a beautifully unspoilt area of West Wales.
The Big Retreat Community CIC was set up in 2017, founded by Amber Lort-Phillips, producing large and small events within the Pembrokeshire landscape. Their mission is “to use the great outdoors to enhance people’s connection to nature, biodiversity, arts and science in order to improve people’s overall wellbeing. Empowering everyone to Feel Good.”
Alongside these smaller events they have developed the Big Retreat festival, to develop a platform for emerging talent, arts and culture within Wales. They note that the festival is a Welsh wellness festival and is used to promote Welsh culture, heritage and arts.
“Our aim is to support emerging artists across the full spectrum of the Arts offering real world professional training and experiences to engage people with science, wellbeing and nature in order to create positive change in our communities, shaping a cultural environment where excellent outdoor experience thrives.”
They believe in the enhancing power of the outdoors on wellbeing and have objectives which support the local community and all that it has to offer, as well as protecting the natural world in which they are based. The focus of the Little Retreats programme is to create safe training spaces for marginalised groups, offering training programmes within the wellness industry for social groups at risk.
They are also keen to encourage public engagement with science and biodiversity as well as to work with communities in Wales to bring about positive change through nature connection to enhance people’s wellbeing and mental health.
“At our Christmas Fayre in November (in memory of Gryff Morgan) we raised over £4000 for local mental health initiatives; we are looking forward to sharing with you how the money from this project is being spent.”
The Big Retreat is open to everyone and offers an uplifting experience in an unspoilt corner of West Wales. The final words of the organisers are one of welcome, “We put our heart and soul into the festival. Our guests are family.”
Amber Lort-Phillips, founder of the festival says,
“We just can’t wait to welcome the Big Retreaters back next summer to laugh, sing, dance, share their stories and look after each other as they create memories for life.”
To find out more about The Big Retreat, to get involved or book tickets, visit their website and Facebook page.
