With temperatures hovering around a sweat-soaked 30 degrees Celsius, Adelaide’s beaches are the place to be this summer. Take your pick from the city’s half-dozen gorgeous beach suburbs.
Highlights include Romeo Castellucci’s Go Down, Moses; Patch Theatre’s ZOOOM (combining old-school whimsy and state-of-the-art technology), and the guitar legend John Zorn performing Masada Marathon, Classical Marathon, and Triple Bill.
Rundle Mall
With temperatures hovering around a sweat-soaked 30deg Celsius during the summer months, a refreshing swim is always welcome. Escape to one of Adelaide’s half-dozen beaches – Aldinga is family favourite, Henley’s a short bike ride from the city centre, or kick back on Glenelg’s seafront.
Rundle Mall is the heart of Adelaide’s shopping, dining and entertainment scene and every year hosts a curated program of world-class events and installations. During the Festival season, the Mall’s Gawler Place canopy is home to MallFest, a curated schedule of exciting food, drinks and entertainment to suit everyone.
The program includes workshops led by local fashion, beauty and lifestyle bloggers and industry experts, a pop-up bar from Coopers Brewing, an interactive fashion exhibition from the Art Gallery of South Australia and a series of exclusive Vogue-mandated offers like complimentary styling sessions and gifts with purchases from Rundle Mall retailers.
From 8 – 10 October, the annual Vogue Festival takes over Rundle Mall and Adelaide’s iconic retail streets for a three-day celebration of Australian fashion, food and lifestyle. Presented by VOGUE and organised by Adelaide Economic Development Agency, the COVID-19 safe event will feature a series of high-profile activations, exclusive in-store pop-ups and premiere ticketed fashion events.
Beaches
Adelaide’s festivals are a smorgasbord. Whether you like hip hop or classical guitar, cabaret or staged drama, you’ll find it in Australia’s Festival Capital. Originally, the Fringe was meant to be a celebration of all arts on the fringes of mainstream culture, but now it’s grown into one of the largest festivals in the world. In fact, it’s even bigger than Edinburgh’s Fringe! The month-long event is a feast for the senses, and you’ll find something at any price point, from cheap shows such as comedians, magicians and burlesque dancers to dazzling acts like pyrotechnic spectacles and opera productions.
The city’s newest major event, Illuminate Adelaide, turns on the lights to illuminate a program of art, light and imagination in all corners of the city. The program includes performances by the likes of Australian opera singers Marlene Dietrich and Hephzibah Menuhin; pianist Hans Hotter; the Sydney and Victorian symphony orchestras; American jazz guitarist and composer Dave Brubeck; the Abreu Brothers; a concert series with international renowned lutenist Marc Ribot and his quartet; and Batsheva Dance Company’s Sadeh21.
The Tasting Australia food and wine festival is a mouthwatering affair that takes you on an indulgent 10-day journey across South Australia’s diverse food and wine landscape. Expect hands-on workshops, exclusive dinners and long-table lunches that celebrate the region’s celebrated chefs and producers.
Fringe
Whether your palate favours hip hop or classical guitar, cabaret or staged drama, there’s something for everyone at Australia’s Festival Capital. This late-summer international festival showcases visual and performing arts, capturing the imagination of audiences around the world.
The Adelaide Fringe, the official fringe component of the Festival of Arts, started out as a celebration of everything on the margins of the mainstream (think comedians, magicians and burlesque dancers). But it’s now the second largest festivals in the world with an astonishing month-long smorgasbord of shows to delight all tastes.
Highlights of this year’s festival include a dazzling display of digital illuminations, Blinc, at the Royal Botanic Garden; Danny Elfman’s Music from the Films of Tim Burton; and unique festival shows like Tommy and Unsound. The Adelaide Festival Theatre program included Toneelgrop Amsterdam’s Roman Tragedies; Batsheva Dance Company’s Sadeh21; and a new work by Palestinian playwright Amir Nizar Zuabi, Grey Rock. This wry and affecting play depicts two extremes of life – big-scale dreams and quotidian realities.
The Adelaide Festival also hosted a reimagined version of Romeo and Juliet by local company Patch Theatre, starring British stage and screen star Juliet Stevenson; a production of Twelfth Night directed by Sir Robert Helpmann CBE; Groupe F’s pyrotechnic spectacle A Little More Light; and Mahler’s monumental Eighth Symphony performed by the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra. Other festival highlights included opera singers Tito Gobbi and Marie Collier; Acker Bilk and his Paramount Jazz Band; and Australian poets Kurt Vonnegut, Susan Sontag and Allen Ginsberg at Adelaide Writers’ Week.
Festivals
Known as Australia’s Festival Capital, Adelaide is where you go to see world-class artists and performers at their best. Whether you’re into hip hop or classical guitar, cabaret or staged drama, you’ll find it all at the festivals held throughout the year.
The annual Adelaide Festival of Arts – now incorporating the four-day World Of Music, Arts & Dance (WOMADelaide) and the literary Adelaide Writers’ Week — has something for everyone. The city’s stunning inner-city Botanic Park is the venue for a wide range of performances and there are workshops and talks for those who want to learn more about the art form they are seeing.
For 2023, highlights include the Australian Ballet Company’s production of Troilus and Cressida; the Royal Opera House’s staging of Barrie Kosky’s Helpmann Award-winning opera Saul; the State Theatre Company’s premiere of Backbone; Schaubuhne Berlin’s performance of Richard III; and Dame Judith Anderson performing four classical drama recitals.
Midwinter brings the dazzling Adelaide Cabaret Festival where a host of the world’s biggest cabaret acts sashay through venues across the city. From jazz to juggling to vocal gymnastics and almost every other form of human performance, this is a riot of creativity.