Vivid Sydney has, once again, broken its attendance record to reach 3.28 million people over the 23 days of lights, an average attendance of 142,608 per night, in 2023 while Vivid Food becomes the 2nd most popular of the 4 event pillars with at least 197,000 people or 6% of total attendance.
It was such a pleasure to be involved in the ‘Vivid Sydney’ 2023 program with the inaugural ‘Vivid Fire Kitchen’.
Our city really comes alive during these weeks & it was a privilege to share a little slice of what we do at ‘Firedoor and Gildas’.
Lennox Hastie, Firedoor & Gildas Owner-Chef
Vivid Food‘s Fire Kitchen, a barbie like no other at Barangaroo’s The Cutaway that sees the best of Sydney dining meet the world’s best pit barbequers, had an attendance of 190,000 people or 8,260 people per night. This was the only portion of Vivid Food to have it’s attendance revealed though they did reveal The Residence at the iconic Aria Restuarant by one of the best chefs in the world, Daniel Humm of the Eleven Madison Park Restuarant, was sold out.
We could not be more thrilled to participate in ‘Vivid Sydney’ and bring ‘Eleven Madison Park’ to the iconic ‘Aria’ Restaurant. This year’s theme of ‘Naturally’ closely resonates with our core values & journey as a restaurant.
Chef Daniel Humm
The Aria Restuarant holds about 90 people in 1 sitting & a sitting lasts about 1 hour and 45 minutes. The Residence was on from June 6-17, a 12-day period and with opening hours between 12pm-1:30pm (Thursday-Saturday) & 5:30pm-9:30pm (except Sunday), plus the extra sitting time, this would equate to a total attendance of about 7,442 people or 620 people per day. This boosts Vivid Food‘s attendance to 197,442 people but still around 6% of total event attendance.
This 6% of total event attendance automatically makes Vivid Food the 2nd most popular event pillar as Music & Ideas combined usually make up 4% of overall event attendance. Vivid Light always takes the lead with a maximum 96% of attendance but with Vivid Food making up a minimum of 6% of total attendance, this could drop to a maximum of 94% in 2023.
At the time of writing, Vivid Sydney has not finalised the rest of Vivid Food‘s attendance so we can’t determine how high that pillar’s attendance got or whether this was the sole contribution to Vivid‘s mind-blowing attendance record or to confirm whether it was the most popular pillar of Vivid, though it is extremely likely Vivid Light is still the most popular but there is a chance a serious dent has been put in its attendance – a 2% drop in proportion has already been confirmed as stated above.
Another reason Vivid‘s attendance reached 3.3 million could be the Written In The Stars drone shows. These were Vivid‘s 1st free regular drone shows. Previous drone shows have been 1-night only (2022’s Paramount +) or when they were regular, which was their debut world-record breaking drone show in 2016, Drone 100, it was paid admission.
There were 6 free drone shows announced for Vivid in 2023 but due to overwhelming demand, a surprise 7th drone show was held on closing night. According to Vivid‘s statistics, more than 500,000 people viewed Written In The Stars – that is also more than 71,428 people per 10-minute show.
The combined total of Written In The Stars, Fire Kitchen & The Residence is about 697,442, which is approximately the amount Vivid grew from 2022 to 2023. However, while Vivid acknowledges the drone shows boosted attendance, it is still considered part of Vivid Light and until attendance figures are released for Vivid Light outside of the drone shows, we cannot be sure this boosted attendance to the 3.3 million record reached. It may have been people decided to solely attend the drone shows so they could see everything at once and thus, temporarily boosting attendance/crowds around the drone show timeslot but when the drone show was not on, it became quieter than usual. The addition of Vivid Food also adds to this uncertainty as detailed above.
The preliminary ‘Vivid Sydney’ attendance figures this year are extraordinary. Australia’s largest festival has grown by around 30%. That’s an increase comparable to the population of the Gold Coast.
Over the past 3 weeks, the city has felt vibrant & electric. The program this year went from strength to strength. The new ‘Vivid Food’ program was a huge success. The music program featured some iconic artists including an important tribute to Archie Roach AC. The drone show captivated audiences young and old & of course, the immortalising of John Olsen’s work on the Sydney Opera House Sails was a timely tribute, a meeting of 2 Australian icons.
Sydneysiders & visitors relished the chance to enjoy our night-time economy & we showcased Sydney, at its finest, to the world.
These figures show how popular ‘Vivid Sydney’ is, how it captures imaginations & shares with visitors and Sydneysiders alike the best talent from our creative, entertainment & hospitality industries.
John Graham, New South Wales Tourism, Arts, Music & The Night-time Economy Minister
Elsewhere, in Vivid Music, A Bend in the River: A Tribute to Archie Roach AC, held at Sydney Town Hall, had an attendance of more than 1200 people or more than 47% capacity while in Vivid Ideas, Mike White & Jennifer Coolidge in Conversation (of The White Lotus fame), held at the International Convention Centre Theatre at Darling Harbour, had an attendance of 7366 people or 82% of capacity.
After COVID-19, we proudly raised the bar in 2022 growing the festival’s attendance by 7%. This year we surpassed those figures. I’m still pinching myself.
It’s hard to comprehend the magnitude of the increase in turnout. We’re extremely proud & very grateful to all our artists, performers, musicians, speakers and chefs. Without them, our program would not be anywhere near as successful.
‘Vivid Food’ has been the standout in 2023. More than 190,000 people checked out ‘Vivid Fire Kitchen’ which is just incredible with many of our ‘Vivid Food’ events receiving rave reviews, selling out or achieving very high attendance.
Vivid Sydney Festival Director, Gill Minervini
While there is now a formal Vivid Food pillar, informal dining still played a major role at Vivid Sydney 2023. 745,000 people (or 32,391 people per night) ate meals at Vivid Sydney 2023, up 44,000 people (or 1,913 people per night) from last year. With an average attendance of 142,608 per night in 2023, that means 23% of people eat informally at Vivid Sydney but 88% do not. Though this conflicts with a statistic saying a record 81% of attendees purchased food and beverages at restaurants. It could mean out of all the people who purchased meals at restaurants, only 23% ended up eating theirs but that would seem absurd. Vivid Sydney did not respond to our query on this by time of publication.
The growing success of ‘Vivid Sydney’ year upon year is a credit to the NSW Government, Destination NSW, the events team & all in involved. The impact it has on the city of Sydney is unparalleled & to see our hotels at times reaching 90% occupancy during winter is a remarkable achievement.
The implementation of new activations such as additional drone shows & the new ‘Vivid Food’ pillar allowed our stunning city to shine brighter than ever before.
‘Vivid Sydney’ is a magnificent event as it not only draws millions of people to the city but encourages them to spend the night in one of our many incredible hotels.
I would like to extend my thanks & congratulations to all who made this event possible. Your creativity, innovation & vision continues to light up the night sky.
Michael Johnson, Tourism Accommodation Australia Chief Executive Officer (CEO) & interim-Accommodation Association CEO
Sydney CBD hotel occupancy rates went up 12% on 2022 reaching 78% on average, peaking at 90% on Friday & Saturday nights. Other businesses near or in the Vivid Light Walk also had “strong returns” with restaurants, cafes and bars having a “surge in patronage”.
Sydney Spectaculars 