ELFINGROVE has been cancelled less than 24 hours after tickets went on sale for its long-awaited return to Glasgow.
Organisers have announced that the festive attraction will no longer go ahead this year, despite unveiling plans for a new £2 million immersive experience at Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum only days ago.
In a statement shared on social media, the Elfingrove team said all tickets purchased would be refunded automatically.
The post read: "We're really sad to share that Elfingrove won't be going ahead this year and want to be open about it.
"Everyone who has bought a ticket will receive a full refund automatically. Our team will begin processing these within the next 24 hours and you'll receive confirmation directly."
The attraction, which was due to run from November 26 until December 13, marked the first return of Elfingrove in four years.
As previously reported, organisers had planned to transform Kelvingrove's Centre Hall into a giant railway station through immersive projection mapping, accompanied by a specially commissioned score and festive village experience.
The cancellation comes despite organisers saying thousands of people had purchased tickets on the first day of sales.
Explaining the decision, the team said: "We've worked incredibly hard over the last few years to create and launch something we believed would be special, and thousands of you bought tickets in the first day.
"Putting on major events of this scale is a huge financial risk and sadly the level of early demand is below what we need to confidently take the event forward.
"As a small independent business rooted right here in Glasgow, we have to be practical as well as ambitious."
Organisers added that the decision had been "incredibly tough" and stressed that it would not affect any of their other events.
The announcement prompted disappointment from many Glaswegians who said they had intended to buy tickets but had been waiting until payday.
One person commented: "It's a shame you have taken this decision so quickly, you only started advertising it 10 days ago so not a lot of people would have known about it, a lot of people wouldn't have budgeted buying tickets in this pay, so maybe like myself waiting for the next payday next week."
Another added: "I was likely going to book but would have been a bit later. Only found out about it last week."
A third wrote: "Bit of a quick decision there, I was intending on booking but waiting until end of the month (payday)."
Another commenter said: "Payday is next week most people (myself included) would be waiting until then."
The attraction had been billed as the biggest immersive projection show ever staged in Scotland, using 24 projectors to create an 8K visual display across Kelvingrove's famous Centre Hall.
The original announcement saw itison founder Oli Norman describe the event as "the Christmas experience Glasgow deserves".
However, just days after sales opened on September 16, organisers have now confirmed the event will not go ahead.
Signing off the statement, the team said: "We're hugely disappointed and very sorry to everyone who was looking forward to coming.
"Thank you for backing the idea and for all the lovely comments over the last few weeks.
"We'll be back with more exciting things in the future."
