Cinema
· Festivals
Festivals
· Concerts and music
The Łódź region has more than two hundred recurring festivals in its calendar: from a light festival set up in the centre of Łódź, through a multicultural festival around the Centre of Dialogue, to alternative music at Klub Wytwórnia, jazz in Zgierz and mineral fairs at EC1. This page shows which festivals come back every year, what happens at them and who they are for - not the programme of one particular edition, which you will find in the current events calendar.
Festivals in the Łódź region fall into a few clear strands that repeat season after season: a light festival in the city centre, a multicultural festival built around memory and dialogue, music festivals (from alternative rock through classical music to jazz and tango), film reviews, and recurring trade festivals in the halls of the former EC1 power plant. Each of these strands has its own fixed location and time of year, so it is easy to plan a visit even without knowing the exact dates of a given edition yet.
Light.Move.Festival turns the centre of Łódź into an evening walking route made up of a dozen or so light installations, mapping projections on building facades and concert stages. Installations stand in Park Sienkiewicza, in Park Staromiejski and along Piotrkowska Street, while mapping appears on tenement houses and on the walls of Manufaktura. The route can be walked on foot throughout the evening, with no need to keep to one particular hour, and most points are free to enter. The festival returns at the turn of summer and autumn for several evenings in a row - the exact dates and installation map for a given edition are described separately on the Light.Move.Festival page.
The Łódź of Many Cultures Festival brings together theatre and dance performances, world music concerts, author meetings, art workshops and historical walks tracing the footsteps of Łódź's former inhabitants. The programme runs mainly around Park Ocalałych (Survivors' Park) and the neighbouring Marek Edelman Dialogue Centre, though part of the events also takes place on other theatre and concert stages around the city. Some points of the programme are free, others need advance sign-up - this varies by format: workshops and meetings in small rooms more often require registration than open-air concerts or walks. A full description of the festival's idea and its regular elements is on the Łódź of Many Cultures page.
Soundedit is a several-day concert festival at Klub Wytwórnia, built around alternative music, rock and new wave, with Polish and foreign performers - tickets are usually sold for single concert days, and regular attendees can also get a pass for the whole festival. The Eufonie Festival presents classical and operatic music at the Grand Theatre, with soloists and orchestras from Poland and abroad. The International Tango Days bring tango orchestras from around the world to the Łódź Philharmonic, together with shows by master dance couples, while the neighbouring town of Zgierz hosts a local jazz festival with concerts at its own cultural centre. Klub Scenografia hosts a returning festival referencing the tradition of Polish rock, sometimes combined with an awards gala for musicians of this genre.
The Kamera Akcja Festival, organised at Monopolis, includes dozens of screenings of feature and short films as well as meetings, panels and workshops with filmmakers - the programme regularly includes titles shown earlier at the festivals in Cannes, Berlin or Venice. A separate strand of festival cinema is run by the National Centre of Film Culture at EC1, where recurring series of screenings and themed meetings related to the history of Polish cinema return.
EC1 - Łódź City of Culture hosts several recurring trade festivals set up in the space of the former power plant: a festival of minerals, fossils and jewellery with exhibitors from all over the world, a festival of houseplants and garden plants at various prices, and a jewellery and design festival combining fairs with exhibitions and workshops. On top of that there is Researchers' Night - an evening of experiments, lectures and meetings with scientists, open to whole families and aimed also at children interested in science.
Light.Move.Festival is a family and couples' proposition - a walk around the installations needs no ticket or booking, so it works well as a spontaneous evening plan. The Łódź of Many Cultures Festival is aimed at viewers interested in history and social topics, with part of the programme also suited to children, including family shows. Soundedit and the rock festivals are aimed at fans of specific music genres, as is the jazz festival in Zgierz or tango at the Philharmonic. The trade festivals at EC1 attract both collectors and enthusiasts of a particular subject, as well as people looking for a weekend outing idea without planning ahead.
Outside the festival season, the same venues - the Centre of Dialogue, EC1, Klub Wytwórnia or the Philharmonic - run a normal, much calmer programme of concerts, meetings and exhibitions. Festivals pack a dozen or several dozen events into a short period, so the calendar on those days is much denser than a regular week, and some attractions are only available within the festival window - such as the Light.Move.Festival installations or the trade festival stands at EC1.
The Marek Edelman Dialogue Centre and the neighbouring Park Ocalałych are the main stage of the multicultural festival - the rooms inside host meetings and workshops, while the park is used for walks and open-air events. Park Sienkiewicza and Park Staromiejski turn into open-air installation galleries during the light festival season, and function as ordinary city parks the rest of the year. EC1 - Łódź City of Culture is an exhibition hall in the former power plant, regularly rented out for successive trade festivals, so its programme changes from month to month more than at other institutions. Klub Wytwórnia serves as the main concert stage for music festivals, while Klub Scenografia hosts smaller, more intimate rock festivals.
Open-air festivals with free admission, such as Light.Move.Festival or most concerts within the Łódź of Many Cultures Festival, need no ticket - you just have to reckon with crowds on weekend evenings, so a calmer visit is more comfortable to plan on a weekday or earlier in the evening. Tickets have to be bought for concerts at Klub Wytwórnia within the music festivals and for part of the trade events at EC1 - at the peak of a festival there can be a queue at the box office, so it is safer to buy them online in advance. Workshops and meetings in the small rooms of the Dialogue Centre usually require advance sign-up due to a limited number of places. Paid parking applies in the centre, so it is more convenient to reach the Piotrkowska area and the parks by public transport than to look for a spot on the street. Open-air festivals can be cancelled or postponed in really bad weather, so it is worth checking current information from the organiser of a given edition before heading out.
The festival usually returns at the turn of summer and autumn, for a few evenings when the light installations are best visible. The route and locations of the main installations repeat from year to year; the exact date of a given edition is given by the organiser.
It depends on the event. The Light.Move.Festival installations and most open-air concerts within the Łódź of Many Cultures Festival are free to enter, while tickets have to be bought for example for concerts at Klub Wytwórnia or for trade events at EC1.
It is a festival built around the Dialogue Centre and Park Ocalałych, combining performances, concerts, meetings and workshops devoted to the multicultural history of Łódź and to present-day themes of identity and memory.
The city and region also see the return of the Eufonie Festival with classical music at the Grand Theatre, the International Tango Days at the Łódź Philharmonic, and smaller jazz festivals, for example in the neighbouring town of Zgierz.
For the larger trade festivals it is safer to buy a ticket online in advance, because at the peak of the festival there can be a queue at the box office.
Yes, part of the programme, such as a walk around the Light.Move.Festival installations, family shows at the Łódź of Many Cultures Festival or Researchers' Night at EC1, is suited to families with children.
Festivals are only part of the calendar - festival events in Łódź itself are also gathered on the festivals in Łódź page. Concerts outside the festival season can be found on the concerts and music in the region page, theatre performances on theatre in the region, and exhibitions accompanying festivals on exhibitions in the region. Themed walks, including those organised for the multicultural festival, are described on the themed walks page, and trade events outside EC1 on fairs and markets. The full calendar of all events in the region is on the events in the Łódź region page, and festivals aimed at children on the events for children page. Festival venues as sightseeing attractions are described by the Park Sienkiewicza, Park Ocalałych, Manufaktura, Klub Wytwórnia and Klub Scenografia pages.
