Wilderness Festival 2012 - The Review

Wilderness Festival 2012 - The Review

14 August, 2012
by: Tom Jeffreys

Pimms, cricket and mass skinny dipping...

While the past week has seen London awash with Olympic fervour of cultish proportions – blanket media coverage, garish uniforms and tourist columns of wide-eyed enthusiasm – true sporting greatness was being contested not in the billion pound stadia of Stratford but in the exquisitely idyllic surroundings of Cornbury Park, just outside Charlbury in Oxfordshire. Two incompetent teams of cricketers slug it out in gentlemanly fashion. A swelling crowd gaze on intent, drunk on Pimm's and the picturesque. A commentator rumbles on in tones of slurringly clipped precision. A man in a tutu charges in to bowl. The umpire is asleep in the grass. Welcome to Wilderness.

Organised by the folks behind Secret Garden Party and Lovebox, Wilderness is for the most part a much more grown-up affair. There's lots of middle-aged people here, staying in camper vans, queueing in orderly fashion for the showers each morning. And there's lots of children too – dashing about, having a whale of a time. Wilderness is well-suited to its diverse audience, with a particular focus on food marking it apart from the norm. Banquets organised by the likes of St John and Ottolenghi were much publicised in advance (and sold out) but across the festival the food was delicious: oysters from Broadway Market's brilliant Fin and Flounder; tangy breakfast shakshuka from Bristol's Poco Loco; and richly delicious macaroni cheese from Annie Mae's – so good I think we had it three times in as many days.

This inclusive family feel extends right down to every detail – from incredibly friendly security staff to regularly cleaned toilets. A whole raft of craft stalls, yoga, massage tents and the like complete this feeling of calm and well-organised relaxation. There's a sense in which the large swathes of vintage shopping might be a step too far – setting a dress code to then sell very cyclical kind of commercialism – but in grounds this stunning, complete with beautiful boating lake, it seems churlish to complain.

Fortunately, this wholesome side to Wilderness doesn't come at the expense of the brilliant silliness which makes this kind of festival so much fun. A multi-drum procession leads revellers into sunken dells; masked party-goers stumble around the roller derby; there's a mass skinny dip (apparently, we missed it completely); and throughout the day, men in co-respondent shoes and double-breasted suits bawl at each other in New Yawkese (courtesy of Future Cinema). There's music of course – from Rodrigo y Gabriela, The Staves, Jake Bugg and the infectiously delightful We Were Evergreen – plus talks (we catch an interesting discussion of the continuing relevance of William Morris) and a very helpful, very bearded chap at the species tent who helps us identify a strange flower we saw down by the river bank. A dark mullein, apparently...

But it was the cricket match that will live longest in the memory. In glorious sunshine, with that precarious balance of organisation and chaos, it's arguably a neat synecdoche for the festival as a whole. More importantly, of course, we won. And with an innings-anchoring 20 on a tricksy pitch and a big wicket at a vital time (we'll overlook the dropped catch and the wides) I can happily say I did my bit to secure a famous victory for the home side against the Gentleman Wallops XI. The victors were awarded a very special cricket ball trophy, and mine now sits in pride of place atop the mantelpiece. 'Official legend' is engraved upon the base. Now that's what I call legacy.

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Tom Jeffreys