Don't Make a Mess-tival

With festival season upon us, we've teamed up with the UK's leading etiquette expert to reveal the dos and don'ts of using portaloos

With Wireless, TRNSMT, and Reading Festival all taking place throughout July and August, the toilets at these events can sometimes be less than pleasant and can make you not want to step foot in a portaloo again!

To tackle this problem, we have teamed up with the UK’s leading etiquette expert William Hanson to shower the world with knowledge on how to behave in festival portaloos this summer.

Below are William Hanson’s TOP TIPS for this summer of festivals. So, feel free to have a read, screenshot, and share with any friends and family who are heading to festivals anytime soon.

Top 10 tips by etiquette expert William Hanson

1. Passing comments about sights, sounds or smells of the lavatory environment is very vulgar and never appropriate, therefore keep these comments to yourself. If you are expecting gleaming loos, a festival is perhaps not the best place to look.
2. Should you find a lavatory in a less than fresh condition, don’t be afraid to find a festival organiser and politely tell them so they can do something about it. Words to the effect of, “Cubicle four needs some love and attention” or “May I ask you to freshen up the fourth loo?”
3. Should you glance at a bare front or back bottom by accident, swiftly avert one's gaze and don't stare. Exercise some discretion and pretend you haven't noticed - a dying art in the modern age.
4. Similarly, if your urinals don’t have any privacy dividers at eye level, do not make eye contact with the people on either side - whether you know them or not. Look straight ahead or directly down (if you want to) smile sweetly and think of Britain.
5. As with any lavatory anywhere, festival loos are not private spaces: any conversations may well be overheard - so save whinging about your boyfriend or the annoying so-and-so who latched onto you at the gig last night as you never know who's listening. Long drop loos are not the place for a long gossip.
6. Carrying your own anti-bac gel is always a good idea for festivals, especially as the soap dispensers can run dry quite quickly. Sharing it with others is always good manners, should they ask - but ideally, you’ll offer first.
7. The idea of urinals (for any gender) is that they speed up the process and make the loo queue move a lot more swiftly. Thus, try to be as quick as possible when using them and keep efficiency the name of the game.
8. Rarely is there ever a good reason to queue jump. Telling those ahead of you that your friend is 'absolutely desperate for a wee' is not sufficient reason to cut in. Everyone is in the same boat.
9. Festival lavatories are not the place to be taking photos. Although many restaurants now deliberately pimp up the loos to look camera-ready, a festival loo is definitely not somewhere for a selfie.
10. Finally, a shewee is never to be shared. Never offer and never ask.