05/08/2025
The Woking Alternative Market & the Woking Wisdom & Wyrd Festival (2026)
It is with deep regret that we must inform you all that the Fiery Bird Music Venue, and the team behind it, have been utterly let down by the owner of the building & the local council in the last few days.
The building contract will not be renewed by the landlord and the local council have stepped back from offering any support for the community support that kept the Fiery Bird alive.
On top of this recent vandalism to the property has caused significant financial strain on the operations of the building, and had they not happened the team would have been able to support events up until the middle of 2026, with our own Festival being one of the last few events to have happened on site sending it off with a bang.
Not only will this impact our own events but a very large number of other local community support groups who will now be left with out a home and will close down when the venue closes its doors.
This means that we are presently unable to book any events beyond the November Woking Alternative Market at that venue.
We are working hard to secure a new venue for the Woking Wisdom & Wyrd Festival however locally there seems to be very little of an appropriate size or affordability.
We understand that tickets for the event had gone on sale, however we must now urge all ticket holders to contact the venue to discuss a refund.
We ourselves at Atru are devastated with this news and ask for a couple of days to compose ourselves before we respond to any emails regarding the Festival.
However if you know of a suitable venue, which would hold up to 100 stalls during the daytime (indoors & out) and be able to host music indoors in the evening in the area please reach out to us via Email rather than IM with the title being “wisdom & wyrd venue proposition” so that we can locate it swiftly as a priority.
The Fiery Bird will be releasing their own statement in due course which may shed more light on the matter, however we've told you all that we know, as well as highlighting their own stance moving forward.
We will also be looking for smaller venues in or close to town centre in order to run Woking Alternative Pop Up Markets.
Thank you.
Atru
