Soon, guests at W Hotels will be able to swap overflowing Porta Potties and sweaty seas of humanity for a luxurious and convenient music festival steps from their guest rooms.
The Wake Up Call festival series, beginning in September, will combine the brand’s longstanding zeal for music and modern, eclectic amenities.
“W is throwing out the festival playbook and creating an experience that is as fabulous as it is fun,” says a W press release. “Where the day begins and ends in luxe accommodations (that don’t require surge prices to get back to). Where pools of mud are replaced by poolside performances. Where endless seas of people give way to Instaworthy views of the sea. Think day beds, not day passes. In other words, it’s time for a real Wake Up Call.”
The new series is being introduced globally two years after its inauguration at W Scottsdale, which staged the first music festival ever to be held on hotel grounds. This year’s rollout will launch at W Hollywood, followed by W Barcelona and then W Bali. Dates will run September through October.
As you would expect, Wake Up Calls will be intimate affairs by music fest standards—2,000 to 3,000 attendees max, according to one source. Not just anyone can get in, either—though all it takes to try scoring a ticket is membership in either Marriott International’s Starwood Preferred Guest program or Marriott Rewards. Ticket prices were not announced, but admission to the Scottsdale festival started at a reasonable (for music festivals) $50.
Both big-name and rising artists will take the makeshift stage this fall. Angus and Julia Stone, Charli XCX and Martin Solveig are among the acts. Performances will vary by location.
“We saw a unique opportunity to flip the music festival experience on its head a little bit, to control the environment and provide an experience that only we could provide because of the of W-ness of it all,” Pablo Henderson, W’s senior global director of brand marketing, told TravelPulse. “The music festival has become such a relevant part of pop culture and has evolved over the last few years…While the music festival is really around music, it’s also an extension of a lifestyle experience.”
Like most festivals, attendees can get a posh upgrade to VIP for a little extra. Wake Up Call: The Complete Set List is a VIP package that touts round-trip flights to all three festivals, accommodations at each destination and meet-and-greets with the artists.
In addition to the hard-to-beat experience, festival goers can enjoy workout sessions by fitness masters and indulge in exclusive dishes and cocktails between acts.
“Wake Up Call combines the pre-party, the main event and the post-party, all in one perk-filled package,” the press release says.
Rewards members can bid on other excursions within the series. DJ masterclasses, after-parties with the singers and artist-crafted off-site adventures are ripe for the picking. Bidding starts at 250,000 points for the VIP package.
“Music is a universal language, one we have spoken since day one at W,” Anthony Ingham, W’s global brand leader, said in a press release. “We’ve brought the Whatever/Whenever mentality to recording artists and guests for years—through concepts like our W Sound Suite recording studios and countless performances in W Living Rooms—all to bring people closer to the music they love. Now we are taking our groundbreaking Wake Up Call music festival around the world, disrupting the festival scene in ways that only a W hotel stay can.”
