Preview: WHOLE Festival 2025
Club culture with attitude:
In the middle of machines, dust and self-empowerment
From 18 to 21 July 2025, Ferropolis, the open-air museum near Gräfenhainichen, Saxony-Anhalt, also known as the ‘city of iron’, will once again be the backdrop for one of the most uncompromising festivals for queer club culture: the WHOLE Festival. What began in 2017 as a collaboration between several Berlin party collectives has developed into one of the most important platforms for intersectional electronic music culture in Europe and a space where body, politics and sound coexist on equal terms. Since moving to Ferropolis in 2018, WHOLE has grown enormously without forgetting its original idea. The site, a former open-cast mining area with shut-down excavators, sandy soil and a view of Lake Gremmin, creates an environment that is not only visually impressive but also contributes to the atmosphere of the festival: raw, unadorned and far removed from conventional festival formats.
In addition to five stages, WHOLE offers an extensive programme: workshops, community talks, drag performances, political panels, yoga sessions, film screenings, readings and healing spaces. These formats have been deliberately expanded in recent years in response to what club culture is all about: accessibility, diversity, self-organisation.
Even away from the dancefloors, WHOLE is a place where community is not only lived, but actively shaped: awareness teams, safer spaces for FLINTA*, barrier-free structures, vegan catering and a diverse camp life ensure that people who often experience little safety at other festivals can move freely.
This is particularly evident in the active involvement of underrepresented groups: Black, Indigenous and People of Colour, trans, inter and non-binary individuals, queer refugees and people with disabilities are not only part of the audience, but also actively involved in the programme. Whether on panels, in curated spaces or on stage. This diversity is also reflected in the musical line-up. Although the final programme for 2025 is still pending at the time of this preview, a look at last year shows where things are headed: not just a collection of big names, but a hand-picked mix that clearly focuses on the sound – cross-genre, internationally inspired and made for the dance floor.
Among others, the following artists showed what this can sound like in concrete terms:
Bored Lord delivered an uncompromising, physical set combining footwork, jungle and ghettotech – fast, queer, unconventional.
Gabrielle Kwarteng impressed with a powerful, emotionally charged set combining deep house grooves, US rave history and soulful breakbeats. Her selective mix was less dramatic than atmospheric. Built with love, it goes straight to your legs and is guaranteed not to show up on Shazam.
Yazzus has brought together gabber, rave and UK bass – loud, wild and at their own pace (fast!).
Also appearing were Peach, Eris Drew & Octo Octa, Shy One, Suze Ijó, musclecars, among others. A strong line-up that, as a whole, focuses on diversity, context and club culture as a form of expression.
The audience is international, mostly queer and often part of the scene themselves – as DJs, organisers or collective members. Many travel from North and South America, West Africa or even the Middle East. They come because WHOLE is a place where everyone can express themselves freely and where identity is not something to be negotiated, but simply lived.
So if you don’t have any fixed plans for this summer and see festivals not just as a party, but also as a political and cultural space, WHOLE offers a rare alternative: international, collectively conceived and with a clear understanding of community. A place that shows how club culture can still be empowering today.
More info:
Teaser image: Whole Festival 2018 Crowd dancing at stage.jpg
by Shikeishu, CC BY-SA 4.0