August 1968 saw the first ever iconic festival on the Isle Of Wight with a stage made out of two trailers! Jefferson Airplane, The Move and T-Rex performed to a crowd of 10,000 fans.

1969 saw the event grow with an audience of more than 150,000 people with Bob Dylan headlining the two day event. By 1970 this was THE festival to be at and a splendid 5 day extravaganza was arranged with major acts of the time lined up including the late great Jimi Hendrix.

Such was its attraction that in excess of 600,000 people turned up to the event - many declined to buy a ticket and a bit of chaos ensued - as a result the infamous 1970 'Isle of Wight Act' banning all future festivals was passed in Parliament - the fun was stopped in its tracks! See the festival website for more history - including how Dylan came to play there.

In 2002 after an enforced absence of 32 years  the festival was re-established by John Giddings - with a line up that included Robert Plant, The Charlatans, Ash, The Coral, The Bees and Starsailer. Although there is a much reduced capacity of 35,000 the Isle of Wight festival has now been re born - and how!

Now the festival has REALLY established itself as a must for festival fans and continues to go from strength to strength - it always has a great line up and is so popular that it sells out really quickly. It's a great festival - highly recommended.