Womad festival, the global music festival co-founded by Peter Gabriel, is to return in 2026 at a new venue.

The festival took a year off in 2025 in order to “return fully charged”, and left its home of Charlton Park, Wiltshire, where it had been held since 2007. Its new venue remains in Wiltshire, at nearby Neston Park in Corsham.

“It immediately felt to us like a warm and welcoming home into which we could sink our roots,” Gabriel said.

“In a world in which many bad actors seem to be achieving power by fanning the flames of hatred, racism and division, a meeting place for all the world’s cultures and dreams, built on mutual respect, seems all the more precious,” he added.

Womad is an acronym for World of Music, Arts and Dance, and it has one of the broadest musical remits in the British festival scene. Artists tend to span pop, dance, folk, jazz, hip-hop and beyond, and are drawn from a diverse range of global nations.

Neston Park is a stately home owned by Sir James and Lady Venetia Fuller: James is one of the family board members for Fuller’s brewery, and Venetia is an entrepreneur. “This will be the first time we’ve opened the estate to any type of event and Womad’s message and what it stands for is something we’ve long admired,” they said in a joint statement.

The festival began in 1982 in Shepton Mallet, moving to near Reading between 1990 and 2006, followed by Charlton Park.