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Address for easy reference: Unite Students (Salisbury Court)
104 St Leonards St, Edinburgh EH8 9RD
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Goodside @ Fringe 2025

We’re excited to have you join our group of friends and friends-of-friends for Edinburgh Fringe 2024 where we have a housing block from July 26 to August 25, 2025 (30 nights) at ​​St. Leonard’s St & Lutton Pl, Edinburgh EH8 9RD, UK. The rooms are basically nice dorm rooms with private baths in a very central location. Edinburgh housing rates have sharply jumped because of new Airbnb regulations in the city. Note that the festival ends August 25, so people will need accommodations the last night.

If you’re confirmed, don’t forget to:

Who Are We?

We’re a community of some 200 friends from around the country – primarily NYC, DC, LA, SF, Boston – brought together by our enjoyment of movies, literature, comedy, and theater, and our interest in art that serves society. We’ve been hanging out since 2007, grew over time, and even have a website now! We come from different backgrounds; many of us are creatives – filmmakers, writers, producers, editors, musicians, performers, etc. – but we’re also journalists, techies, business people, doctors, politicos, academics, and students.

The main way we meet up is at festivals. Our biggest get-together is at Sundance, but we also go to Cannes, Telluride, SXSW, and more. We often host events and parties at these festivals. And of course we hang out in between festivals and keep in touch via a big WhatsApp group where we share everything from baby photos to hot takes.

We also happen to be really well-organized and inclusive. People in our group have a penchant for logistical efficiency and making new friends from all walks of life. As a result, group housing at festivals is one of the things we organize for our community. We find that shared accommodations lowers overhead and cost for everyone, and also creates more opportunities for bonding. We almost always open up our housing to new people who we know will be responsible, considerate of others, and low-maintenance. Many of us also have an interest in supporting underrepresented and underserved artists, especially those who share our passion for serving society. We do this primarily by providing subsidized housing and mentorship via our Goodside Fellowships.

We should also clarify that many people mistake us for a business, or service, which we are not (the requests for a confirmation code and to book a driver made us realize we had given the wrong impression).

It might sometimes seem like we are, because our operations look quite professional. But we run everything at or even below cost, with many members of the Goodside community contributing their own time and money to organize great experiences for everyone. Everyone runs through personal PayPal and Venmo accounts to keep costs low.

Ultimately, we’re a very well-organized group of friends who want to share great experiences. We do go out of our way to help strangers, e.g. with housing and festival tickets, all we ask is that they pay it forward. And of course, many of these strangers become a part of the Goodside community :)

What is Edinburgh Fringe?

You can do your own research via the official site or Wikipedia, but in a nutshell, Edinburgh Fringe is the world’s largest arts festival, with something like 55,000 performances of 3,500 different shows in 300 different venues throughout the city of Edinburgh over the course of the month of August. That makes it the 3rd largest event by ticket sales after the Olympics and World Cup. After being canceled in 2020 and massively scaled back in 2021 it’s finally rebounded to something like normal.

Fringe is best known for comedy, but also has theater, dance, circus, cabaret, children’s shows, musicals, opera, music, physical theater, spoken word. It’s an open access / “unjuried” festival, meaning there is no selection committee, and anyone may participate, with any type of performance, hence it being an alternative or “fringe” festival, as it has been since its founding in 1947, when eight theater companies showed up uninvited to another festival happening in the city at the time. Recent alumni include Phoebe Waller-Bridge whose one-woman show debuted at Fringe later became the BBC show Fleabag; the Broadway musical Six; and NYC-based Catherine Cohen whose cabaret won Best Newcomer at Fringe 2019 and is now a Netflix special. Other alumni include Alan Rickman, Rowan Atkinson (Mr. Bean), Graham Norton, Rachel Weisz, and Robin Williams.

Unlike Sundance or Cannes, most shows at Fringe play every day at the same time, same place, for most if not the entire month of August. So for performers, Fringe is quite the marathon. For attendees, this is great, as it’s rare that you won’t be able to see a show that you want to, so long as you book tickets in advance. Plus tickets are very reasonably priced at £5-£15 per show. This also means that the performers are living in the city for the month, and chances are you’ll bump into them on the streets, in the pubs, and at other shows at some point. Essentially, the entire city of Edinburgh is taken over by the festival for the entire month, with performers on every street, in every restaurant and bar.

Logistics

How do I get to Fringe?

You have a few options. Most people fly into Edinburgh (EDI). You can also fly into Glasgow (GLA) and take a short train ride to Edinburgh, or fly into London (LON) and do a very pretty ~5 hour train ride.

Once in Edinburgh, it’s ~20 minute walk to our accommodations from Waverly Station, or 20 minute drive from EDI Airport.

What about food?

There will be lots of festival food. It’s fun, festival food, e.g. different variations of loaded fries, burgers. There are some if not an abundance of vegetarian/ vegan options.

Edinburgh also has lots of restaurants, including many ethnic places. We especially love Dishoom.

We will also have a kitchen, so you can cook. There are lots of affordable grocery stores within walking distance, e.g. Tesco or Sainsbury.

What should I wear?

Whatever you want!

How do I buy tickets

Tickets are very reasonable, often £5-£15 per show. Most shows play every day at the same time, the same place, with a break in the middle of the month.

What is our housing like?

Our address this year will be:

Salisbury Court

102 St Leonards Street

Edinburgh

EH8 9RD

We’ve rented three flats with 10 bedrooms, and each bedroom has a private bath from July 26-August 25, 2025. The beds are full-size, so can fit one person, or two small-medium people who are OK with being very close together. Each flat has a shared kitchen and common space for each flat, shared between the 10 rooms.

Our suites are A102, A301, and C112. All these flats are in the same building complex, which comes with a front desk, security, laundry (paid separately), common space, courtyard, and bike parking. These are student dorms that the university rents out during the festival, and by no means luxurious, but functional and clean. Fresh bedding and towels are provided.

We chose these rooms for four main reasons:

  1. Location - We are roughly a 5 minute walk from the closest Fringe venue, and between 10-15 minutes from most of the other main venues. From experience, being within walking distance to shows is key.

  2. Cost - Especially for good locations, Fringe housing can cost hundreds of dollars a night. We wanted something affordable.

  3. Functionality - The set up works well for our group, so that everyone has the privacy of their own bedroom and bathroom – not always the case at Sundance, as some of you may know – but also the space to mingle with others in a shared kitchen/ common room.

  4. Availability - Fringe accommodations in good locations can be very difficult to secure, especially at our scale, e.g. 30 rooms all in the same place. We booked these places nearly a year in advance.

What about practical stuff?

*

  • Internet in the suites? uS-glide - works across the entire complex, no password

  • How do I make coffee? There is an electric kettle in each suite - so it’s supremely easy to make tea - for coffee there is a ubiquity of very excellent cafes dotting the Edinburgh landscape - if there is enough collective interest, we can invest in coffee making equipment.

  • Ironing? - Yes, there should an ironing board and an iron in each kitchen.

  • Mirrors? - A full-length one in each suite, and a generous one above the sink in each private bathroom.

  • Elevator? - There is a small elevator inside each of the access doors to the dormitory. There are also easily accessible stairs if you prefer.

Housing costs

The base price for a room for a performer for 30 days has jumped to USD$3,000 (oof!) in 2025 (up from USD$2,500 in 2024) from July 26 to August 25, 2025. Please note you have to check out the morning of the official last performances, so many people get hotel that night. But thanks to donors, we have a limited number of Goodside performance fellowship subsidies that can bring housing down to USD$2,000 and USD$2,500 (down from USD$3,000).

Why the jump? We are told the Oasis tour dates in Edinburgh between August 8-12 has resulting in landlords who are asking for 7- and 14-day minimums around those dates, which has screwed housing everywhere for Fringe. But hopefully the subsidies will take the edge off.

It’s actually less terrible than it could be as the dollar is strong right now (6-8% higher than in September). The $3,000 is priced to just about break even, pending what happens with the pound-dollar exchange rate later in the year. There may be a slight discount if you can help take photos of performers for WikiPortraits project (ask!) and also if you commit and send in money early while the dollar is strong so we can lock in the prices.

Half time will be around $1,650-$2,000 depending on what days (though you can do an even split of the $3,000 if you arrange it yourselves and do the cleaning). We are reluctant to do single weeks, but those would likely be $1,000.

​*Note that we are only coordinating housing. Everyone is responsible for their own travel, food, tickets, etc. The reason we coordinate housing is because, as mentioned in Who Are We, we think that shared housing is key for creating a sense of community. Again, think of this as a group of friends who are coordinating a trip together.

Goodside Fringe Fellowship

Our Goodside Fringe Fellowship is our merit-based program to provide subsidized housing to mission-driven artists that comes and goes with financial support. Our goal is to create more equal opportunity, to amplify unique and talented voices, and to enable altruistic visions in the arts.

You’re a good fit for the fellowship if you have a:

  • Demonstrated dedication to the arts, whether comedy, theater, music, or something else – we love experimental, never-done-before stuff!

  • A thoughtful and altruistic vision for why your art matters. Why do people need to see it? How does your art help others?

  • Financial need for subsidized housing

As a Goodside Fringe Fellow, you will be expected to:

  • Help with the check-in check-outs

  • Help turnover the rooms between stays

  • Help tidy the kitchen and common area and take out the garbage on a regular basis

What we provide through our fellowship:

  • Subsidized housing (depending on your need and housing availability) at the festival