David Bates’ Famous Spiegeltent spread the Festival love - Vladimir McTavish
Disappointed to see that the Famous Spiegeltent will not be appearing in St Andrew Square at this year’s Fringe. This is due to a change in the city’s planning regulations, which have classified the pop-up venue as a permanent structure.
The “tent” is a Fringe institution, having had various temporary homes throughout the city. Over the years, it has been erected on the roof of Waverley Mall, outside the Assembly Rooms on George Street and more recently at St Andrew Square where it has hosted events for the Edinburgh Jazz Festival as well as the Fringe.
It created and became the home to the cult late-night cabaret show “La Clique”, who are currently trying to find an alternative venue. For this August.
While the city may be flooded with temporary performance spaces during festival time, what had made the Spiegentent unique has been the persistence of its director, David Bates in staging the venue in a variety of New Town locations, rather than the over-saturated university area.
This was not only good for the New Town, it was good for the Fringe itself to have a city-wide presence. The existence of live outdoor events in spaces like St Andrew Square spreads the tourists footfall over a larger area and also helps draw potential audiences over to the north side of Princes Street, where there is some excellent programming on offer at the Assembly Rooms and The Stand, as well as smaller venues such as the Voodoo Rooms.
It appears that there is no scope for either the city council or Bates to re-visit the decision, leading to the possibility of less of a Fringe vibe in the area.
However, gossip on the local arts grapevine suggests another promoter may be planning to step in and create a pop-up venue in the space.
That will be good news for St Andrew Square, good news for the Fringe and good news for venues and businesses in the in the New Town.
Watch this space for further news. Hopefully we’ll see a city-wide festival this August.