Cultural highlights 2025: The last Elvis Festival at Coney Beach fairground

Amelia Jones 

I have lived in Porthcawl most of my life, and until this year, I had never been to the only thing it’s famous for: The Elvis Festival.

Once I was tasked to write an article about it, I walked briskly into the town centre, had a quick look around, and then promptly left before I got lost in the crowd.

This year was different. After my English friends at university said they wanted to see what all the fuss was about, I decided to invite them along.

Recently, I’ve found myself frustrated by the way Porthcawl has been represented in Ruth Jones’ mini-series about her hometown. While it put the town in front of a national audience, its contents felt smoothed down to the point of unreality.

It didn’t capture the Porthcawl grit and grime I grew up with –  and if we’re honest, it probably didn’t reflect her childhood experience either.

Instead, the town was presented through a lens so polished it was almost blinding. I found myself shouting at the television as she drove back and forth along the seafront, as if that were the only road Porthcawl had, as if the rest of it didn’t exist, or wasn’t worth showing.

One thing she couldn’t twist, though, was the Elvis Festival.

There’s no flattering way to film hundreds of men in sweating polyester jumpsuits staggering down John Street at midday. No soft-focus lens that makes fake sideburns dignified, or sequins subtle.

This is Porthcawl at its loudest and least apologetic, a town that doesn’t need a filter to be memorable.

And that’s why, when I walked into the festival for the first time, I felt a familiar twinge of teenage second-hand embarrassment. But the longer I stayed, with the music thumping and the crowd laughing, that embarrassment slowly gave way to fascination.

Everywhere I looked, people were singing and dancing, and just up the seafront the fair at Coney Beach, a ghost town on any other weekend, was in full swing. It was the last year it would be part of the festival.  

The rides spun, and the smell of candy floss and doughnuts mingled with the salty air. It was chaotic, loud, and completely alive.

At first, I couldn’t stop noticing the absurdity: a man in a gold jumpsuit tripped slightly on the uneven pavement while still holding a perfect Elvis pose; a dog in sunglasses and fake sideburns was being pushed through the crowd in a pram; toddlers clutched blow-up guitars like miniature rock stars.

Every corner seemed to offer a moment that was equal parts ridiculous and brilliant.

As I weaved through the crowds, it dawned on me that this town, my town, was celebrating itself on its own terms. Locals mingled with visitors, school friends reunited, and performers threw themselves into the spectacle with a dedication that couldn’t be manufactured.

It was impossible not to smile. People clapped, sang along, and cheered for performers who clearly weren’t professional entertainers but were giving it everything they had anyway.

In that chaos, I began to understand why the festival has such a loyal following. It wasn’t about polish or perfection, it was about participation, community, and just having a good laugh.

Walking past the tents packed with people screaming the words to Elvis classics, it hit me that this was the end of an era.

Although the Elvis festival itself has by no means died with the regeneration plans, the rides, stalls and flashing lights of the fair had been a part of the festival’s charm for years.

It would now be replaced with modern buildings and water fountains that most people suspected would never arrive. There was a certain nostalgia in the air, a bittersweet sense of witnessing something that would never be quite the same again.

By the end of the night, I was no longer embarrassed. I was a little proud.

Across from the new Aldi, which had opened to red ribbons and a crowd-filled ceremony, stood the only club left in Porthcawl, another place marked for closure under the regeneration plans.

It was packed. Inside, they played Sweet Caroline four times in a row, but nobody seemed to mind in the slightest.

It was the kind of scene you only find in a Welsh town like this: small, stubbornly joyful, and unwilling to hide its quirks, even as change looms.

The Elvis Festival does not pretend to be glamorous, it does not need to.

It’s a celebration of music, and of a town that knows how to have fun on its own terms. I only wish I had made the trip sooner.