Cash-strapped festival to hold fundraiser

A popular festival having a fallow year due to financial pressures has announced a fundraising event.

Organisers of Readipop Festival announced in November that the three-day event in Caversham, Berkshire, would not happen in 2025 because of rising costs.

The festival has announced it is hosting a one-day fundraising event on Saturday 13 September at Reading University Students' Union, featuring live music, arts workshops and street food.

Readipop founder Gavin Lombos said the event, called Readipop Fiesta, would enable organisers to keep bringing "a strong line-up of musical talent to Reading".

"We're immensely proud of what Readipop Festival has become since it launched in 2016 and the large, diverse section of the local community that it has brought together annually since then," he said.

"However, the costs of building a festival site from scratch and running a three-day event has increased hugely in the last few years and seriously threatened our ability to continue Readipop Festival."

The event will take place across five stages on the university's Whiteknights Campus between 12:00 BST on Saturday 13 September and 02:00 on Sunday 14 September.

It will have a capacity of 2,500 attendees.

Organisers said all profits would go towards the work of the Readipop music charity in the local area, to build a sustainable future for the festival.

Earlybird tickets will go on sale on 14 April, after which the fist line-up announcement will be made.

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