New festival to be staged at Outlander and Princess Switch filming location

An 18th century mansion house featured in the TV series Outlander and the Princess Switch movies is set to play host to a new music festival this summer.

Gosford House, near Longniddry, in East Lothian, will provide the spectacular backdrop to Out East, which will be staged across two days in August.

It is hoped up to 6000 festivalgoers will be attracted to the grounds of the neo-classical mansion house, one of the final designs of the celebrated Scottish architect Robert Adam.

The festival, which will launch ticket sales on Friday, will feature Clean Bandit and Ministry of Sound Classical in its line-up.

The arena for the event, which will have its own campsite, is said to be big enough to be able to accommodate social distancing restrictions if they are still in place in August.

It will have a food and drink village, a dedicated children’s stage and even its own woodland trail.

Set in a 5000 acre estate of coast and parkland, Gosford House is one of the most popular filming locations in the Lothians.

Stars like Gillian Anderson, Richard E Grant, Eddie Izzard, Dominic West, Rebecca Hall, Peter Mullan and Jack Lowden have made movies including The House of Mirth, The Little Vampire, Castles in the Sky, The Awakening and Tommy’s Honour there.

Gosford House in East Lothian will be playing host to the new festival in August.

Gosford House was used most recently for the filming of the two Princess Switch sequels, which saw star Vanessa Hudgens spend months shooting across various locations in the Lothians. It has also been used by brands like Chanel, Ralph Lauren, Rox and Ballantines for the filming of commercials.

An official announcement about the event states: “Out East is a fun-loving new family friendly festival for the carefree, the intrepid and the brave.

“Landing in a socially distanced Gosford House this August, the festival will offer a glorious blend of music, arts and culture, wellbeing, incredible food and open-air dancing.”

Festival director Shane Grieve said: “We wanted to create something that was a celebration of good times.

Outlander and the Princess Switch movies have been filmed at Gosford House.

“We’ve sourced a mix of live performances and entertainment to make sure that there’s something special for every member of the family.

“It is also extremely important to us that we look out for each other so we have launched a

friendship policy.

"We want everyone that visits Out East to have the best time - but not at the expense of others.

"There will, of course, be official security at the festival, but we’re asking everyone to take responsibility for their behaviour and to look out for each other.”

Out East is the second new festival to announce plans to launch this summer in the last few days.

A nine-acre farm at the foot of the Glen Affric hills in Inverness-shire has been lined up to host Capers, a “luxury glamping festival” planned to be held every two weeks over the summer if there is enough demand.

Festivalgoers will get luxury bell tents with their own gardens for their “bubbles” at Capers in Cannich, which is also planned to be staged entirely outdoors with social distancing in place.

The event in the Highlands, which is initially planned to be staged for up to 200 attendees when it launches at the end of May, was billed as Scotland’s first new festival created in responsive to the pandemic.

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