The 2024 Sydney Festival, which officially closed on January 28, has been generally warmly received both by reviewers and patrons. Official attendance figures will be released next month. Last year’s festival drew more than 420,000 attendees to a broad range of venues, large and small, around the city.

“One of the comments that I hear quite a lot is an appreciation of the breadth of the program and the diversity on offer,” she said.

One innovation at this year’s festival was the adoption of the wharves at Walsh Bay as a festival hub dubbed the “Thirsty Mile”. Ansell hinted the precinct might be open for business again next year.

“We’re very, very thrilled with how the precinct went,” she said. “We’d love to be back there, bigger, bolder than ever, so watch this space. We do feel like we’ve found a wonderful new home that we can now expand and build upon.”

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