The venue will combine music, art, cocktails and tech.
Last year saw festivals go virtual but it seems the summer festival season is making a mighty return, with the team behind Glastonbury’s Shangri-La launching a dream IRL venue in the heart of Bristol. Known as Lost Horizon, it will encapsulate the radical Glasto area known for its deep history in outsider art and underground culture to create a new independent arts centre and bar.
Just a stone’s throw away from Cabot Circus and Old Market, the team behind Shangri-La promises to bring “a creative playground for the ever-growing Shangri-La family to showcase art, live music and performance throughout the summer”. Lost Horizon aims to become “a platform for world class digital and visual art, performance, protest, free speech, and ground-breaking ideas, alongside a diverse, mixed musical programme crossing continents, genres and musical boundaries”.
In collaboration with ShangrilART, Bristol’s newest independent arts centre is the opposite of a white wall gallery, inviting guest curators and artists residencies to disrupt and inspire, pushing the boundaries and borders of culture, art, and digital content. The dynamic and ever-changing area of Glastonbury’s Shangri-La is a theatrical, immersive installation and will be incorporated into the Lost Horizon venue opening in a Bristol warehouse from July 1 onwards.
Art showcased in the venue will begin with a special collaboration of five unique pieces from Dan Hillier and Carl Cashman, as well as a brand new holographic screen print from Aida Wilde. Every Saturday 12-5pm, there will also be ShangrilART takeovers, soundtracked with playlists from ShangrilART’s artists.
Plus, acts already confirmed for the venue’s two opening weekends include Beans on Toast, Bitch, Please!, China Bowls and The Nextmen. The Lost Horizon venue will also feature a suntrap beer garden, outdoor street art gallery and new exhibitions that will be added fortnightly to the indoor space.
With the cancellation of Glastonbury for the last two years, Lost Horizon was originally launched as a virtual reality venue – welcoming more than 4.3m people at the debut Lost Horizon Festival in July 2020 – with a mini VR hub due to be located within the Bristol real-life venue.
There will be three bookable sessions each Thursday, Friday and Saturday, with a jukebox session taking place 5pm-7pm and live shows at 7.30pm-10pm and 10.15pm-1am.