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There’s a good chance you’ve yet to hear of Ondalinda, the Mexico-based music and arts festival that’s entering its second year. If you were to look at the face paint and costumes donned by last year’s attendees, you’d probably think of Burning Man. But other shots of the area’s tropical environs, emerald water, and colorful folk art paint a uniquely bohemian Mexican picture. Los Angeles–based entrepreneur and Apple and iTunes vet Lulu Luchaire is behind Ondalinda, which runs November 8 to 12 and seeks to unite like-minded creative people through art, music, and Mexican culture. At its core, the fest endeavors to support native Mexican communities, and each year, Luchaire donates a portion of proceeds to a different one. Ondalinda 2017 honors the Purépecha, a group which hails from the southwestern state of Michoacán. “There are more than 53 existing indigenous tribes in Mexico,” says Luchaire. After leaving Apple, she moved to Todos Santos, about an hour north of Cabo San Lucas on Mexico’s western coast. Through her subsequent travels around the country, she learned about Mexico’s “deeply inspiring” pre-Hispanic people, and it was her fascination with these societies that inspired her to embark “on a mission to help them preserve their culture.” Enter: Ondalinda.
Luchaire planted her festival in one of the world’s most exclusive resorts, Costa Careyes, along Jalisco’s Pacific coast. The town was founded in 1968 by Italian banker Gian Franco Brignone. Since then, the Mediterranean-feeling beachy expanse has become a popular destination for the art world, attracting fashion designers and models like Giorgio Armani and Cindy Crawford. Costa Careyes was also where Heidi Klum and Seal famously married in 2005. It’s a rather unique, and especially beautiful, site to throw a five-day event.
Tickets to Ondalinda cost just under $1,400, and from there, attendees have to figure out lodging. Options range from luxe yurts ($2,500 per person for the whole fest) and glamping via Caravan of Light ($2,000 per person for the whole fest), to renting a bungalow or full-on castle (from around $550 a night for two bedrooms to $3,600 for six bedrooms).
The festival ticket gives you access to Ondalinda’s slew of events: gallery shows featuring Purépecha art, a daytime beach club, themed dinners (think “ultraviolet white” and “tribal illumination” attire suggested), and music-fueled nighttime parties with an open bar helmed by world-famous DJs such as the Brooklyn–based Bedouin. As is now de rigueur at music events, throughout the grounds you’ll spy various art installations, some of which may look familiar. “We are very happy to partner again this year with the Mayan Warrior, a wonderful group of people from Mexico City who own the beautiful art car usually seen wandering the playa at Burning Man,” Luchaire says.
And then there’s the whole wellness component. Luchaire, who’s also the cofounder of Los Angeles–based herbal elixir line Torii Labs, believes that happiness is inextricably linked to wellness. So, she’s organized yoga and meditation classes (gratis at the beach club), in-room and beach-side massage services, detoxing mud-healing therapy, and temazcal, an ancient Mexican steam bath ritual in which a shaman heats rocks in a small enclosed space, encouraging the body to sweat and purify.
While Ondalinda capped out at 400 guests during its inaugural year, Luchaire expects to widen her circle by 100 more this November. “For me, Ondalinda is a way to gather amazing people together to showcase and promote Mexican culture, support indigenous tribes, and build a community around . . . nature, compassion, [and] giving back,” says the founder of her mission. And though no concrete expansion plans exist at the moment, Luchaire is also mulling additional Ondalinda events around the world which would “help promote and protect other indigenous tribes and cultures.” But, for now, Ondalinda x Careyes is where it’s at.