The tent's packed, the wellies have been hosed down, and there's still a strip of woven fabric round your wrist. If you're looking for festival wristband ideas, you're probably deciding three things: when to cut it off, how to do that without ruining it, and what to do with it afterwards. This guide covers all three, plus how to keep the whole festival together rather than just the band.
When to take your wristband off
Not until you've left the site for the last time. Your wristband is your ticket, and a band that's been cut, stretched or tampered with usually won't get you back in. Check your festival's terms, but assume there are no second chances.
After that, it's up to you. Plenty of people keep theirs on for a week or two as a badge of honour. Take it off when it starts catching on things, looks grubby or simply stops being comfortable.
One job first if your band had a cashless RFID chip: log in to your festival account and check for leftover credit. Refund windows can be short, and it's easy to forget once the band is in a drawer.
How to take off a festival wristband and keep it intact
Most woven festival wristbands close with a small one-way plastic clasp. Teeth inside grip the fabric so the band slides tighter but not looser, which is exactly why it's hard to remove in one piece. Here's the careful way to do it.
- Don't force the clasp. Levering it open with a key or a knife is how clasps snap and fingers get nicked. Steady, gentle handling works better than yanking.
- Try easing the clasp back. One wristband supplier suggests twisting the two loose fabric ends together, then gently pushing the clasp back along the twist towards your hand. It doesn't always work. If the clasp won't move, leave it.
- If it's loose, try sliding it off. A band with plenty of slack can sometimes be eased over the hand with a little liquid soap. If it's tight or it hurts, stop. Don't squeeze it over your knuckles.
- Otherwise, cut it in the right place. For a festival wristband keepsake, the woven design is what matters, so cut through the band right next to the clasp, not through the middle of the artwork. You'll be left with one long strip, design intact, with the clasp still on one end.
- Keep the blades away from your skin. Ask someone else to do the cutting, use small round-ended scissors, and slide something flat and blunt (the handle of a teaspoon works) between the band and your wrist. Cut on top of it.
- Leave the chip alone. If there's an RFID tag, cut well away from it so it stays part of the souvenir.
Festival wristband ideas
Once it's off, here's what to do with old festival wristbands so they don't end up tangled with phone chargers in a kitchen drawer.
Drop it into a memory box with the ticket and a photo
A wristband on its own is a nice souvenir. With the ticket and a photo from the weekend, it tells the whole story. Our Memory Box is a square shadow-box frame with a slot in the top edge: tickets and photos go in through the slot and collect behind the clear acrylic front, under a thin black wire outline of the world map. If the clasp won't fit through the slot, release the tabs on the back, lay the band in and close it up again.
A frame for a festival-every-year collection
If you go back to Download or TRNSMT every summer, or tick off a different festival each year, the bands start to look like a timeline. For a neat festival wristband display, use a deep box frame: lay the bands side by side in date order, as flat strips or loops, and hold them in place with a few stitches or pins through the fabric ends rather than glue. Add a small card with the year and who you went with, and leave room for the summers to come.
If you'd rather they pile up together than line up, a Large (30 x 30cm) box from our memory box collection keeps bands, tickets and photos in one place, and the back opens so each new band can join the rest.
On a bag strap, camera strap or keyring
A cut band can be knotted or stitched round a bag strap or camera strap, or looped through a keyring. It'll fray and fade with use, which is part of the charm for some people. If you'd rather keep it pristine, display it instead.
A pin board with photos from the weekend
A cork board in the hallway or bedroom makes an easy festival wall. Pin the band in a loop, surround it with printed photos and the ticket, and add the clash-finder you scribbled your plans on. Put pins through the fabric ends only, and tuck the ticket and photos behind a ribbon stretched across the board rather than pinning through them. For more layouts, see our guide to displaying concert tickets.
Keep the whole festival together
The wristband is only one piece of the weekend. Before everything scatters, gather it in one place:
- the ticket, or a printout of your e-ticket
- the wristband, plus any campervan or car park pass
- three or four printed photos
- the programme or clash-finder
- small extras: a badge, a plectrum, a drinks token
Do it within a week, while you still remember who's in which photo, and jot the year, your highlights and who you went with on a small card to keep with them. For more on what's worth keeping, see our travel memory box ideas.
Looking after fabric and RFID wristbands
- Muddy? Let the mud dry completely, then brush it off gently with a soft old toothbrush.
- Still grubby? Hand-wash the fabric in cool water with a drop of mild washing-up liquid, keeping any RFID tag out of the water where you can. Rinse, then lay it flat to dry away from radiators. Don't tumble dry or iron it.
- On display? Keep it out of direct sunlight, which fades bright dyes over time.
- In storage? Lay it flat or loosely coiled rather than tightly folded.
- Sharing a box with paper? Tickets printed on the spot are often heat-sensitive thermal paper, and thermal paper makers warn against contact with soft PVC. If you've got a vinyl wristband, keep it from pressing flat against those tickets. Our guide on how to preserve tickets explains why.
FAQs
Are festival wristbands waterproof?
Fabric wristbands are meant to stay on for the whole festival, so they're made to cope with rain and showers: they get wet and dry out again. One wristband supplier describes vinyl bands as waterproof and Tyvek bands as water-resistant. If yours has an RFID chip, check your festival's own guidance on looking after it.
What do people do with old festival wristbands?
Plenty of people keep them. Popular festival wristband ideas include framing a collection from every year, dropping a band into a memory box with the ticket and photos, pinning it to a cork board, or tying it round a bag or camera strap. The best ideas keep it with the rest of that weekend's memories.
How do you take a festival wristband off without cutting it?
Only if it's loose or the clasp will ease back. Try twisting the loose fabric ends together and gently pushing the clasp back along the twist, or, with plenty of slack, easing the band over your hand with a little liquid soap. Don't lever or force the clasp. If neither works comfortably, cut it next to the clasp instead.
Keep the weekend
The mud washes off and the playlist gets replaced, but the wristband, the ticket and that one blurry photo are the weekend. Give them a proper home with the Wandersake Memory Box, and leave room for next summer.