Live: Your Friday Highlights

Yesterday, we opened our gates to welcome Wonderers for the first time this year—marking the beginning of our tenth edition. 

BEX and roaming performers guided people from the Main Entrance with SWANG WAVE, a biophysical ritual reflecting the cosmic rhythms that link our bodies, the land and the wider universe. We followed all the way through The Fields as the sun began to set, ending up at Creature Stage for a theatrical opening performance by Hatis Noit and Orly Anan. 

Many other venues celebrated the opening, including Dhyana’s opening ritual within a brand-new Baan Bardo and a communal ceremony at the heart of The Fields, in Wonderness. Each welcomed Wonderers home.

In the upcoming days, we invite you to live deeply, to explore The Fields not at a breakneck pace, but with the intention, curiosity and play of a child taking their first steps. 

Some of you have already been eating well—Wonder Kitchen welcomed its first guests with a communal feast of grilled meats and smoked food by Thai culinary virtuoso Chef Napol Jantraget of Thai fine dining restaurant Kwann.

You’ve explored, and watched, and felt deeply, joining us in the sunken theatre of Unconditional Space to watch the first screenings, launching an incredibly diverse programme by Hong Kong-based Aaditya Satish. And there has been a lot of dancing.

It’s a year of many new things, including learning to live a different way. To be more mindful, to slow down, to allow ourselves to linger in pockets. As we seek this new way of living, the pavilions in The Fields have changed with us. 

At the top of the slope behind Open Kitchen stands a symbol of transitions, inspired by the pause between one life and the next: Baan Bardo. It is both a space for journeys inward to consciousness, with rituals, ceremonies and workshops curated by Dhyana from day to evening, and then to revelry deep in the night with artists that combine dreaming with dancing, like Archil & Leon and Alex Albrecht. 

In Molam World, the first artists performed on Haan Molam, a brand-new multipurpose structure. This permanent feat of folk architecture isn’t just a stage, but is a symbol of Isaan community and something we hope welcomes many more activities and people throughout the year. 

Wandering Kitchen, a living, moving culinary platform, shared its first meal last night in Ancestral Forest, launching both itself and ‘Wonderfruit Gathering Tables’ by Pinaree Sanpitak. 

And for the first time, we’ve introduced Our Parkland, a natural living room that encourages a slower-paced experience—one without rituals, without ceremony, that just asks you to sit down, lie in a hammock strung between Chamchuri trees and exist.

Today, we ask you to join us in living in The Fields. You are not passerbys, not visitors in a gallery—our home is your home too. Our playground; your playground. 

Do something you always wanted to do. Join a session that expands your experience. Watch a film. Dye your clothes blue at Indigo World. And explore ways to live in community—to live as others live, if only for a few hours. To see as they see.

Here are some of Friday’s highlights, non-exhaustive, just to help you start exploring:

Starting at 9am at the Medicinal Plant Village

The first session of Thai Medicinal Plant Studies: Botanical Drawing Workshop. Make your very own drawing as you learn about the health benefits of each plant in Thai traditional medicine. Multiple sessions of this paid experience are available daily throughout Wonderfruit. Walk-ins welcome.

Starting at 10am at Molam World

Make your own Phi Ta Khon mask and take part in a Thai tradition that is both celebration and ritual blessing with Tamnarn Loei.  

2–2:45pm at Baan Bardo

See the kinetic maze in daylight and join Dhyana Co-Curator Harry Einhorn for a journey of discovery into the mind in Echo of Wisdom: A Sonic Dharma Exploration. (And if you haven’t seen Baan Bardo at night, we highly recommend you come back when it’s dark for the full effect.)

4:45–6pm at Unconditional Space

Please Eat Wildly! with Bakudapan shows us how to taste and cook edible weeds foraged from the surrounding area, demonstrating how living in harmony with nature is simpler than it might seem.

Starting at 5pm at Solar Village

Gather on the hill and watch a solo, hybrid DJ set from Paris-based multi-instrumentalist FKJ as the sun dips below the horizon.

Starting at 5:30pm at Indigo World

Gather for a sunset picnic by the leaning blue panels of Indigo World. Injin Kim and friends offer a generous spread of mandus, vegetable kebab, banchans and kimchi and artisanally-distilled rice spirits from Onson. Walk-ins still available for this paid experience. 

Starting at 7pm at Wonder Kitchen 

Head down to Wonder Kitchen’s new location opposite Enfold. Here, you can listen closely to the living plants, fungi and herbs that make up each ingredient in Taste Sound, an immersive headphone experience by Electric Sheep’s chef duo and musician-biologist Modern Biology. Limited walk-ins available.

Starting at 8pm at Baan Bardo

Open Reel Ensemble plays a unique set of rhythms and melodies made entirely by manipulating reel-to-reel tape recorders.

Starting at 10pm at Creature Stage

Every year we present Sufi artists in The Fields, sharing their traditions and music. This year, Creature Stage brings together CARAVANA, purveyors of the sound of the Manganiyars, a community of hereditary sufi and folk musicians from the deepest Thair desert in western Rajasthan, India, as well as Mevlevi Sema’s practice of whirling dervishes. 

Starting at 2:30am at The Quarry

Catch innovative producer and DJ Objekt in an expanded Quarry. Look up into the wormholes and be transported through rings of lights and lasers in a visual feast by Jiro Endo.

Starting at 5am at Solar Village 

If you are pushing through to sunrise, a full-fledged Molam party lands at Solar Village with a first-ever sunrise performance by Paradise Bangkok Molam International Band as well as an appearance by Wandering Kitchen. Antto Melasniemi and Friends present Molam Dew Point Breakfast Club with bowls of nourishing grains full of umami flavors—no reservations needed, limited servings available.

Or catch the first sunrises at Enfold and Neramit, running until 7am

At Enfold, Hanoi-based DJ Tobes performs an experimental, live-mixed set to welcome in the day quietly and gently. 

At Neramit, sit down, enjoy a refreshing drink and listen to Sampology debut a track from his EP Ripen Vol.1 during a cosmic sunrise set. 

6–9am at Wonder Kitchen

Eat a wholesome Japanese breakfast of onigiri or ochazuke with healthy sides and a traditional dessert. Hikari no Asa: Light of the Morning is open for all walk-ins.

Starting at 9am in Neramit

Our very first Saturday Disco Brunch kicks off with sun-soaked house, disco, funk and feel-good grooves, featuring breakfast-brunch-lunch style plates served at each of the elevated dining options within Neramit.

Or, if you’re feeling brave, join the WILDER Training Club: HIIT in The Fields. Register at 8:30am to start a 45-minute workout starting at 9am—and finishing with an easy 15-minute run across the grounds, ending with a mindful cool-down and optional swim at the Bath House.

You can discover more daily programming in the Wonder App. If you haven’t already, download the App from the Apple Store or from Google Play.