Hidden Door Festival returns to Edinburgh from Fri 25 May – Sun 3 Jun with another full programme of music, visual art, theatre, film, spoken word and dance. The pop-up Festival, which has brought life back to some of the city’s forgotten spaces, will be back in Leith and will welcome hip-hop trio and local boys Young Fathers as one of the headliners.

Last year, the festival brought Leith Theatre back into temporary use and the building, recently granted £1 million to help with renovation, will again be the festival hub. But expansion is in the air. The festival will also be taking over the nearby former State Cinema building, which is currently empty and derelict while it awaits redevelopment.

As usual, the festival will be free to enter during the day, with tickets available to purchase for the evening events.

The festival has grown steadily since it began in 2014 in the then abandoned Market Street vaults. Its next home at Kings’ Stables Road is also now being redeveloped, a sign of how the Festival works to raise the profile of forgotten spaces.

Young Fathers, whose new album is imminent, will headline on Sat 2 Jun. Also lined up for the music programme are electronic pop duo Sylvan Esso, Nadine Shah, and Welsh singer Gwenno, whose Cornish language album is out today. 

Twelve different theatre companies are on board, including The Golden Trailer Collective, who are a group of nurses and mechanics based in the Central Belt, and bilingualism promoting company Theatre Sans Accents. Taking a short hop down the road, Village Pub Theatre will be presenting three nights of site-specific mini plays.

31 artists have been selected to fill the nooks and crannies of the buildings with their work, and the film programme is being put together in collaboration with guest curators Africa In Motion, Edinburgh International Film Festival, Edinburgh Short Film Festival, Kino Klub, New Media Scotland and Scottish Queer International Film Festival.

Fringe bigwigs Gilded Balloon are getting a piece of the action, programming two comedy nights (GB’s Katy Koren says they are “beyond excited”) while a Flint and Pitch night leads a strong spoken word programme.

“We are proud to create a festival which celebrates the innovation and ambitious experimentation that is so strong in Scotland today,” said David Martin, the Festival’s Creative Director. “It’s inspiring to see such a range of new talent in Scotland dedicated to creating a mesmerizing and unforgettable experience for our audiences.”

Tickets are on sale now from http://hiddendoorblog.org/tickets