Save The Date! Hello Wood Festival - Builder Summit will be held between July 6 - 15, 2023, in the lovely postapocalyptic crater of Zalahaláp, Hungary. Read the Open Call and apply for participation.

Hello Wood returns this summer with a cultural festival of all arts.

The Builder Summit will focus on demolition-building, with participants building not only installations but also the community and themselves over the 10 days of the festival. This is the first time since the last Hello Wood Carnival 2019 builders' camp in the region that the organizing team has addressed an international audience of builders again.

Expecting more than ever before with at least 200 participants and international architecture stars, Hello Wood, with the support of the European Capital of Culture Veszprém - Balaton 2023, will take place in a post-apocalyptic crater in the closed basalt quarry of Haláp hill near Zalahaláp.

The concept of the festival

"We are organizing Europe's most unique architecture festival next year with the support of the European Culture of Capital, we plan to invite foreign architects to give lectures and we will jointly build the "Monument of Builders" installation as a sanctuary of construction, a spiritual space and a space for events, as the center of the festival and the closed basalt mine. The Builder Summit carries the values of the Builder Method, our alternative educational methodology based on participation and action, which we are currently developing. Based on the three pillars of the Builder Method, we build projects, ourselves and community." - Dávid Ráday, 2022

The Builder Method methodology

Using Builder Method’s toolkits students, teachers, architects and anyone interested in innovative and non-formal educational approaches can apply the Builder Method and experience the process of creation, collaboration and self development. With the help of these tools they can organise events such as Hello Wood’s international summer schools & festivals.

From coming up with the concept, through reaching out to the students, to putting the finishing touches on the project, the Builder Method will help during the whole process.

During the 10-day "builder camp", teams of students from architecture, design, fine arts, and design will create permanent installations, in addition to the central installation, under the guidance of experts. The installations will then be used as a year-round tourist attraction in the basalt quarry of Zalahaláp in the Lesence region.