A "fayre" in every sense of the word, it featured a host of different types of performances, media, experimental theatre and rock, punk, folk and reggae music.
The first Fayre was tiny, attracting only 1500 or so, but the attendance increased over the years as the organisers booked better known acts, such as Siouxsie and the Banshees, The Cure, and The Fall.
[1] In 1980 a small festival which had outgrown its site at Polgooth in mid-Cornwall approached the Port Eliot estate and asked if it could be held in the idyllic grounds.
[2] The festival ran from 1981 to 1986, beginning with some 1,500 visitors over four days, and featured a mix of music, theatre and visual arts.
The burning down of the oldest tree in the park, looting of the village surgery and the robbing of stall-holders prompted Lord Eliot and fellow organisers to make the 1986 festival the last.