Yardworks Festival 2025
Yardworks Festival returned for 2025, on Saturday 3 and Sunday 4 May. With glorious sunshine, more artists, from more countries than ever before, and the usual assortment of top-class food and drink, it will live long in the memory.
Since launching in 2017, Yardworks Festival has become a leading showcase of contemporary urban art, and has made itself a firm fixture on the urban art and graffiti scene, attracting artists from around the globe – and 2025 was our most spectacular year yet.
This year, the yard was transformed into a vibrant hub of large-scale murals, live painting and artwork spanning walls and stacked shipping containers. For the first time ever, there was also a dedicated programme of free workshops and talks celebrating Glasgow 850 – exploring the city's rich history of graffiti, street art, and hip-hop culture.
We welcomed an internationally acclaimed selection of artists for this year's edition, each bringing their own distinctive style to Glasgow. Amongst the standouts year's line up were Sofles (Australia) known for his intricate large-scale murals and viral videos Limitless and Infinite, Bacon (Canada) who creates hyper-realistic murals featuring detailed animals and natural elements, showcasing a masterclass in aerosol techniques, Zurik (Colombia/Spain) who is celebrated for her WildStyle-inspired graffiti, blending intricate lettering with bold 3D effects, Nuno Viegas (Portugal) who merges graffiti culture with fine art, known for his photorealistic depictions of masked figures and draped fabrics.
Jeks (USA), a self-taught muralist recognised for his hyper-realistic monochrome and full-colour portraits, Kitsune (Belgium) who brings an emotionally driven style to the festival, incorporating mythology, folklore, and nature into her vibrant murals. Peachzz (UK) who creates large-scale works that blend organic textures with bold urban aesthetics, inspired by abandoned industrial spaces, and Smug (Australia/Scotland), one of Scotland’s most esteemed muralists, has transformed Glasgow’s streets with hyper-realistic works such as Saint Mungo and The Swimmer also appeared.
After taking a break in 2024, Mia McGregor returned with The Cube, inviting festival-goers to explore an ever-evolving, multi-dimensional graffiti installation, where visitors of all ages left their mark on an interactive graffiti wall, while those looking to push their creative limits took part in an ambitious world record attempt, aiming to break Mr. Doodle’s 203-metre doodle record.
2025 also marked the beginning of an exciting new development, where Yardworks will now become part of the world’s largest street art platform, Street Art Cities. This partnership will see a dedicated Yardworks site launched, mapping all of its public artworks and creating street art walking routes through Glasgow, giving visitors the chance to experience the city's vibrant urban art scene year-round. This collaboration firmly places Yardworks—and Glasgow —on the international street art map.
About Yardworks Festival
Since launching in 2017, it’s safe to say the word is now very much out, with the annual Yardworks festival now attracting the global elite of the street arts and graffiti scene. Highlights so far have included the graffiti maze (200 metres of super smooth concrete and steel, painted live in front of the audience), Mia McGregor’s global-participation art project Cubes, a talk from author, photographer and subway artist Martha Cooper, the commissioning of the huge, Classical-art-inspired mural by PichiAvo that you see today in our Galvanizers, and the launch of Yardworks Studio.
For local artists, it’s a chance to learn from the best, meet their heroes, and get inspired by what people are doing elsewhere. For the audience, it’s a weekend of witnessing murals being created live, from scratch, in front of you, child-friendly art workshops and activities, or just drinking it all in with a pint and street food in hand. For Glasgow, it’s a visual celebration of the city’s artistic ambition, its style, and the importance it places on nurturing — and sharing — the joy of creativity.
Outside of the festival, it puts the city on the map as a stomping ground for international artists, who drop in to SWG3 year-round to mark a piece of our territory in their own inimitable style. For local artists, it represents something absolutely essential to the community: a place to express themselves in a safe and legal space.