From drum and bass sets on Arthur’s Seat to blues guitar solos on white sandy beaches, for the past year, Alastair Curtis-Walcott and Hannah Vanhoof have been bringing music and dancing to the great outdoors. The pair formed Liminal to create a free, inclusive, and sustainable alternative to rave culture, vowing to leave every location as pristine as they found it. They speak to us about the right to roam, facing pushback from landowners, and avoiding ‘destructive’ partying.
In February of last year, Alastair was in Wellington, New Zealand, where he attended an event at the summit of a hill in the city centre.
‘It was on top of a hill. It was off-grid. And it brought people to a place that they wouldn’t normally be able to dance at,’ he recalls. Along with his partner, Hannah, Alastair had also witnessed a similar outdoor party culture in Sri Lanka, and a plan fell into place to take something of this ethos back to his hometown of Edinburgh. ‘So the plan was – is – basically to run [outdoor music events] and ask for forgiveness, just to show that they can be done.’
Since their inaugural party last spring, the duo have taken Liminal to the beaches of the north coast as well as hosting numerous events closer to home, for example on Arthur’s Seat and in the Meadows in Edinburgh. For Hannah, it was always important to avoid the carelessness that characterises a lot of raves. ‘They’re often a bit destructive. Like, the place isn’t left in a nice way or it’s just such a big crowd that it’s hard to manage.’
From the start, Liminal has made respect for the natural spaces they visit a defining value. Early on, Hannah and Alastair decided to run their events on renewable energy, using a battery-powered sound system. They also undertook an environmental impact assessment for their outing to Durness last year, and ensure they stay out of nature reserves.
‘I think our whole motto is, if we go to a place and we run an event there a thousand times, the place shouldn’t look different,’ Hannah explains. ‘That’s the bottom line, and if we fail to do that, we’ve got to rethink what we’re doing.’
But now that their reach is growing, and their WhatsApp group of friends has developed into an Instagram following of over 700, are they worried about their events getting out of hand? Alastair isn’t too concerned. ‘[We found] if we set the tone with a core group of people that fully embody how we act in the outdoors, and with music, and with drinking or drugs or whatever it is, then as long as we’ve set that tone nicely with a core group of people, that will attract the right group.’
But Liminal’s events haven’t all run without a hitch. In April 2025, the team were forced to move their one-year anniversary party in the north-west Highlands after the landowners found out about it just as they were setting up. ‘They just wanted to be kept in the loop and if we ever want to do it again, they want us to ask for permission months in advance so we can collaborate,’ Hannah explains.
The relocated gathering was still a success but the incident, as well as the growing numbers at their events, has changed the way that the pair will operate from now on. ‘We’ve surpassed the point of being a bit clandestine and under the radar as of the last time,’ says Alastair. ‘I think from now we’re going to have to be just a bit more open and engage with people about these things.’
Ironically enough, April’s event was promoted under the tagline of ‘right to roam’, a legal protection that both Alastair and Hannah clearly cherish. ‘As soon as you go to somewhere where it doesn’t exist, you realise how important it is that we have it,’ says Alastair. ‘In England, you sit in a field and you get pulled out for trespassing.’ He recalls, ‘Somebody messaged us going ‘the right to roam is not the right to rave’. And I was like, it’s really funny because it is. I mean, it’s the right to responsible access.
The Scottish Outdoor Access Code permits access to most of Scotland’s land provided people behave responsibly by respecting people’s privacy, safety and livelihoods, and Scotland’s environment. And with a reverence for Scotland’s outdoors, it’s clear that Alastair and Hannah are aware of the responsibilities that come alongside these rights. ‘We always say to each other that if we’re not doing this right, we have to stop… because we don’t want to ruin this for other people. We don’t want to ruin this for the culture. We don’t want to ruin this for music. We’ve realised we’ve got a bit of a responsibility to make sure it’s done right,’ Alastair says.
Emphasising the need for a strong, DIY, communityled cultural scene in Scotland, Liminal are demonstrating that outdoor spaces can offer the perfect setting for taking events off-grid. But with a motto of ‘leave no trace’ that they hope might resonate with their attendees beyond the events themselves, they’re making clear that music and culture also offer an opportunity to foster respect for, and connection to, the land itself.
Liminal announce details of upcoming events on their Instagram @liminalevent
All images courtesy of Liminal
