The event
19 – 23 JUNE 2025
SCOUTINGLANDGOED, ZEEWOLDE
Join for build from Monday 16 June
You like to play with tools, you’re not afraid to use them and you want to help build up the various infrastructures needed to make the sheep happen? Or maybe you have a forklift certificate? Join the Build Team! If you’re a wizard with tools, we need you! We have many structures and artworks that need to be built and require a good pair of hands and some common sense.
Help with Strike! From Monday 23 June
Sorry, it’s over, all the beauty that has been created must also be taken away again! Help the team break down, clean up and pack away. This shift is so important, please don’t forget that many people have been preparing for months and really need many extra hands when it’s time to Strike.
By purchasing a ticket, you’re committing to participate in the ongoing creation of this community, under the guidance of the fundamental Burning Man Principles.
We don’t book acts or provide entertainment. What happens here is up to you! There is no corporate sponsorship. You are entering a “decommodified” space where participants value who you are, not what you have. There are no spectators! You are expected to participate, collaborate, be inclusive, creative, connective and clean up after yourself.
Where the Sheep sleep is is not a festival. Where the sheep sleep is part of the Burning Mancommunity and global cultural movement
Where it all began
In 2016 Burning Man Netherlands organized its summer event for the first time. It was held on the meadows of an estate near Kootwijk, a part of The Netherlands where the sandy soil shows at the surface so it can be considered somewhat of a desert.
The name of the very first estate where we hosted our event was ‘Caitwick’, a Gaelic name that translates to a place where the sheep sleep’. Hence the name ‘Where the Sheep Sleep’ for the event!
This first edition had about 750 participants and already had some theme camps and some impressive large-scale artworks. It also had a few unexpected challenges like overflowing toilets and outright sabotage of the electric supply, most probably by someone from the surrounding village as it was a bit of a noisy event smack in the middle of the Dutch Bible belt. Although the location was fantastic it was not possible to stay on these lands we moved the Apeldoorn, and now to Zeewolde.
In 2025 we are back!
Event Overview: Where the Sheep Sleep
A burn is a community-driven event where participants create a temporary space for art, self-expression, and collaboration, following principles like gifting, participation, and leaving no trace—everyone contributes, and nothing is left behind.