Warsaw Zouk Festival 2024 Review

Warsaw Zouk Festival is currently the biggest zouk festival in Europe and has already been running for 11 years. I had never been before, but decided to go this year, since the artist lineup was pretty attractive and the organisers had promised to fix some organisational issues from last year to make the experience better. So here’s the detailed review of my experience at Warsaw Zouk Festival 2024!

Venue

The event took place in Airport Hotel Okęcie, a nice 4-star hotel close to the airport. They offered free transfer to and from the airport, which was super convenient. Everything took place at the hotel – night parties, day parties, workshops and accommodation. You could even get food 3 times a day from the hotel restaurant, which meant you didn’t really need to leave the venue at all. The workshop rooms were very nice and pretty – I especially loved the one on the 10th floor which had an amazing view to the city!

A variety of restaurants and small grocery stores were walking distance and a big shopping centre Westfield Mokotów was a short bus ride away.

I had some negative experiences with the hotel staff but there were so many upsides to the venue that I’d still give full points for this category.

Attendees

This festival has an “annual meetup” vibe where many well-known artists are present, as well as big groups of people from many countries. I don’t know where to find an official number of participants but I heard numbers like 1500 or 1700, correct me if I’m wrong. You could find dancers of all levels there, from beginner to advanced. Compared to Portugal Zouk festival 2023 there were definitely more beginners at this event. The follow-lead balance was close to equal and as a follow I didn’t encounter any issues in finding leads to dance with at parties.

Workshops

There were 3 or sometimes even 4 workshops happening at the same time, so every person probably had a different experience based on what they chose to attend. 

I mostly took counterbalance/on-axis turns or lambada themed workshops. Looking back I probably didn’t make the best choice – I wish I had skipped lambada and focused on Rio zouk style workshops. Also I should have taken more advanced level workshops to keep it more interesting for myself.

One of my favorite workshops was about one leg spins with Marck & Melyssa – they gave really useful technique tips and at the same time were relaxed and making the class fun. They didn’t quite reach the Kadu & Larissa level of banter, but they’re the only ones I’ve seen giving off a similar vibe – aka instructors who genuinely have fun with each other and the students.

Another favorite workshop of mine was morning conditioning class by Vanessa – this type of workshop needs to be present at every festival as the first class of every day, WOW!! It included stretching and waking up your body, strength training and drilling solo technique. It was such a good preparation for the body and mind before we went off to partnerwork classes!

Organisation

One of the organisers of this festival is Ania Chagowska who is also behind the huge and famous El Sol salsa festival. She and the team did a great job. Everything ran smoothly and was top notch to the smallest details – full points for this category!

They did a great job on listening to the feedback from the last year and fixing issues – the follower-leader balance was now great, the garage dance space was now warmer etc. 

I loved the fact that they made everything take place in one venue. You could book a room in the main hotel and all workshops and parties took place in bigger common rooms of the hotel. 

One thing I especially loved was that the hotel restaurant offered (delicious!) food for us 3 times a day – breakfast was included in the hotel room price and you could pay extra if you wanted to get lunch or dinner buffet the hotel as well. This way you could completely focus on dance training and not worry about other things. I did venture out into the city for dinner a couple of times though, since I wanted to walk and get some fresh air. 

I was gladly surprised to find vegan and gluten-free food options within the hotel buffet as well. Lunch and dinner menu varied a lot though – some days I could find suitable food, but sometimes not. It’s worth asking the restaurant staff beforehand.

Parties

There were so many parties! Starting from Wednesday up until Monday, you could have partied 6 nights in a row. I attended 4 night parties and that was WAY too much for me, I need to be more mindful of that next time. There was also a day party happening during 4 festival days, but I didn’t attend, since I wanted to prioritize workshops.

The night parties had dress-codes and as always I enjoyed putting together outfits for them – there were 90’s vibe, White/Lambada and Glitter themed parties. At night parties there were 3 different rooms to choose from, based on your music preferences. I mostly stayed in the main hall since the music there was to my liking. 

Unfortunately I only truly enjoyed 1 party out of 4, which is quite a low number. First party had weird music, second party was simply “OK” and the last one I was already so tired I only danced with 2 people and then went to sleep.

Competitions

The festival also hosted official Jack’n’Jill competitions. I enjoyed competing, but the general feedback to the competition wasn’t that positive. In Advanced category there was an issue with the DJ playing a competition song that technically wasn’t in the zouk genre and also some people expressed that the judging of Novice category wasn’t according to the rules. 

Summary & Scores

To summarize, I have to say that this time I need to give two different scores to the festival. One for what I objectively think this festival was and the second for my personal experience, because there is a mismatch. While I think the festival itself was 9 out of 10, my experience was 6 out of 10.

My score is lower for many reasons – I probably didn’t make the best choice in workshops, I couldn’t dance full out since my neck was still hurting a bit from an injury (which happened before the festival), I only truly enjoyed 1 party out of 4 and had some issues with the hotel staff. After the festival I did not feel inspired and motivated like I normally do and it took me an unusually long time to recover.

Taking all that into consideration, would I attend this festival again? I’m on the fence and leaning towards not going, but I may change my mind once the next year’s edition comes closer. 

Nevertheless, this festival is organised by people who know what they’re doing and are able to take care of and cater to both artists and attendees. Many people attend every year and the growing number of participants speaks for itself. I have some photos and videos of the festival up on @jettence Instagram page, follow me there and look for WZF’24 in the highlights!

If you attended Warsaw Zouk Festival in 2024, what score would you give to your experience? Leave it in the comments below!

Disclaimer: I paid for the full pass and all opinions are my own. Whatever I experienced this year does not automatically mean that the next editions of the festival will be similar or that you will have a similar experience. 

I regularly write festival reviews of dance events that I attend. If you’d like me to cover your festival, contact me at hello@jettence.com