Pictures: Body & Soul Festival Kicks Off

This weekend, thousands of lucky festival-goers will flock to the Body & Soul Festival in Ballinlough Castle in Westmeath. Now in its seventh year, the three-day arts and music festival is as popular as ever; the capacity for this year’s event is now 15,000 – a significant jump from 10,000 in 2015. This isn’t just your average music festival; as well hundreds of acts across 14 stages?it is an immersive summit of the arts – discovery, spoken word, holistic escapes, lakeside splendour, woodlands, blissful treatments and theatrical delight. The festival will also be home to the largest outdoor meditation in Ireland with 2,000 people expected to attend. The festival is a contemporary take on the age-old tradition of celebrating the summer solstice and the turn of our year. ?The Meditation offers an opportunity to reflect on the year just gone and to focus intention for the year ahead. It includes body awareness, mindfulness and silent reflection for people to reflect the year that was and to celebrate the new year, as well as a huge array of gastronomic delights from?The Happy Pear and the Greenslate collaborative cafe, featuring 3FE coffee, Nobu and Sprout & Co.

The Gloaming and Girl Band kicked off the musical proceedings on the main stage last night, while Bitch Falcon, Optimo and Ho99o9 played the Midnight Circus and?Hudson Mohawio, St Germain, Floating Points and Saint Sister will play today, Saturday. ?Sunday will see a surprise guest appearance and Santigold will close?the main stage for the weekend.

We have snaps from the first day in our gallery above, do you feature?