Edinburgh Festival
The Edinburgh Fringe started in 1947 as eight uninvited companies performing outside the International Festival and is now the largest arts festival on earth
The official story of the Edinburgh International Festival begins with Rudolf Bing in 1947, who founded it as a postwar cultural renewal – a deliberate act of civilisation after years of destruction. The more interesting story begins at the same moment, when eight companies who hadn’t been invited to perform decided to perform anyway, outside and alongside the official festival, in venues the International Festival hadn’t booked. That was the Fringe. It has been eating its parent ever since. The International Festival is excellent and runs at major venues with major companies; the Fringe is overwhelming in scale, erratic in quality, and produces more genuinely surprising work in a single August than most cities see in a year.
In August, Edinburgh hosts the International Festival, the Fringe (around 3,500 shows across 300-plus venues), the Military Tattoo on the Castle Esplanade, the Book Festival in Charlotte Square, the Art Festival, and the Comedy Festival. The city’s population more than doubles. The atmosphere is unlike any other month – historic buildings pressed into service as pop-up theatres, the Royal Mile blocked by performers doing ten-minute extracts of shows and handing out flyers, every pub packed until 3am. If you go once, you will understand why people make it an annual trip.
How the Fringe Works
The Fringe runs on a model where performers hire venues and take the financial risk themselves. This creates enormous variety and a quality spread that runs from world-class shows in development (the Fringe has launched careers that went on to win Oscars, Oliviers, and Tony Awards) to students doing their first production to professional comedians working out new material. Booking blind is risky. The Scotsman, The List, and The Stage publish daily reviews throughout August; a four or five-star review from any of them is a reliable signal.
Most shows cost GBP 10-20. A few sell out early – shows that have generated significant pre-festival buzz, or returning shows with established audiences – but the majority are bookable up to the day before or from the venue box office. The Half-Price Hut on The Mound opens at 10am daily and offers discounted same-day tickets; it is one of the better resources for flexible visitors.
The Tattoo and the International Festival
The Military Tattoo on the Castle Esplanade books out months ahead – sometimes a year ahead for the weekend performances. It is a military band spectacular with fireworks over the castle at the end and draws audiences who find it moving and audiences who find it excessive; both responses are legitimate. It is undeniably a spectacle.
The International Festival’s opera and orchestra programmes are expensive (GBP 20-80) and should be booked in advance. The Opening Event, typically a large outdoor concert in Princes Street Gardens, is free.
Accommodation and Eating
Book accommodation as early as you possibly can. Festival accommodation prices run three to four times the September rate. Staying in Leith, Stockbridge, or Bruntsfield and using buses into the city centre is cheaper and Edinburgh’s bus network is good enough to make it practical.
The Pitt Market in Leith on Friday evenings and Saturdays offers street food at lower pressure than the city centre. Mary’s Milk Bar on Grassmarket does remarkable ice cream; the queue moves faster than it looks. For regular restaurant dining, reservations matter in August in a way they don’t at other times of year.
Wear layers. August in Edinburgh is not reliably warm and rain is likely at some point during a week-long visit. This is Scotland.