The Sitges Annual Festival presented its programme this Thursday at La Torreta (Baluard Vidal Quadras), where it shared this year’s featured figures and the procession routes. There are no changes to the main events at Sant Bartomeu i Santa Tecla, but the festival is including new features to enrich it, like the creation of the La Plaça space around the Miramar Centre Cultural. This space will be one of the epicentres created for the 2025 edition of the Annual Festival with the goal of making it a meeting point for popular activities and a space of debate, shows, concerts and workshops linked to the town and our festival. This initiative aims to take back the streets so that everyone can participate actively in the festival from start to finish, from 19 to 26 August. It will feature shows and activities for all audiences.

At the event this Thursday evening, the names and locations that will be pivotal in the most traditional days of the Sant Bartomeu i Santa Tecla Annual Festival were also revealed: the standard-bearer of Sant Bartomeu will be Joan Pros Borràs and of Santa Tecla will be Vinyet Caballé Artigas. The musical ensemble Retrio will give the opening speech, and Alba López Varas has written the Poem to the Flag. As already announced, Carlos Izquierdo Capo created the festival image and posters, where the sounds generated by the festival are the inspiring motif.

A more inclusive festival: from Quiet Areas to rides

Sant Bartomeu i Santa Tecla also includes areas called ‘Trams en calma’, or Quiet Areas, although not ‘Trams en silenci’, or silent areas. These areas are designed for people with sensorial diversity to ensure they can comfortably enjoy the festival. In these areas, the carts won’t make noise and the volume of the drum and music groups will be turned down. Both Sant Bartomeu and Santa Tecla will have the same Quiet Area, a segment in the processions on Sant Bartomeu and Santa Tecla day; it is a stretch 120 metres long that comprises half of Carrer Sant Bartomeu, Sant Gaudenci and a brief stretch of Carrer Sant Francesc, where both processions go.

Signs will identify this area, and there will also be pictograms for users, and a brochure explaining the order of the dances will be handed out. Plus, the sitgesfestamajor.cat website will publish educational support to complement the experience of the people who visit the Quiet Area.

The intention is to keep the same location of the Quiet Area streets in the future.

Similarly, to ensure that everyone will be able to enjoy the Annual Festival to the max, the times of the rides at the Fair designed for people with sensorial diversity are being expanded. The Annual Festival Fair (set up in Parc de Can Robert from 2 to 24 August) will have no music or lights on 6, 7, 13, 14, 20 and 21 August from 6 to 8 pm. Plus, the rides will offer a 50% discount off their usual price all day long on 6, 13 and 20 August.

Finally, Fundació Ave Maria users will have a space of their own for the first time in 2025; specifically, the Ball de Gitanes with diversity dance has been scheduled on Thursday 21 August at 6 pm, in collaboration with the Agrupació de Balls Populars.

0.0 campaign against gender violence at the Sitges festivals

The Sitges City Council’s Councillor's Office for Civil Rights is launching the 0.0 Violence Campaign, which aims to reverse the concept of alcohol abuse at festivals and draw from ideas that are already in the collective imagination, like 0.0 drinks and zero tolerance for gender violence and LGTBI-phobic aggression. Therefore, that the official drink of the festival contains 0.0 Violence with the ingredients 100% respect and 0% aggression.

The Sitges Annual Festival, which was declared a Heritage Festival of National Interest by the government of Catalonia in 2016, is holding a variety of events this year. Both the Grup d’Estudis and the Colla Jove del Ball de Bastons are celebrating their fiftieth anniversary this year. For Santa Tecla, the giant carriers will be in charge of the offertory for Santa Tecla to pay tribute to the fiftieth anniversary of the creation of the town’s pair of new giants.