Wasteland Weekend
Wasteland Weekend began in 2010, when three Mad Max fans who had attended other, smaller fan gatherings decided to start their own. The original three founders of Wasteland Weekend are Karol Bartoszynski (who had organized some of the first Mad Max meetups in the early 2000s), Jared Butler (a Los Angeles screenwriter and voice actor), and James Howard (a veteran of San Diego nightclub promotions).
Joined by other Mad Max fans (including military re-enactor Paul Denton, who would almost single-handedly create the temporary sets and structures for the first event), they set out to create something that had never been done before: A fully-immersive fan event that would really feel like living inside a movie.
Wasteland Weekend was the result. A desert festival taking influence from the iconic “Mad Max” films, while incorporating other pieces of post-apocalyptic pop culture. The 2010 event attracted approximately 300 people, as well as media attention. They even received a video greeting from “Mad Max” director Dr. George Miller, who sent along a sneak peak from the pre-production of “Mad Max: Fury Road” from Australia.
2011
In 2011, James Howard moved on from the event, and Karol and Jared were joined at the senior management level by photographer Adam Chilson, who not only brought his background in visual arts, but also a decade of tradeshow set-up experience. Adam became the event’s art director / build supervisor.
The event nearly doubled in size, and included large new set pieces such as the iconic Wasteland Gates, as well as the now familiar layout that separated a completely themed “Wasteland City” from a less-strictly enforced camping and parking area for those attendees who may have had their costumes ready, but did not possess fully-themed cars or campsites.
Perhaps most importantly, 2011 introduced the “tribe” concept. The first de facto tribe had been a group of teammates playing Jugger (a post-apocalyptic version of armed football/rugby, based on a cult 80s movie) and camping together at WW2010. Tribes became an officially-encouraged aspect of the event, and attendees ran with the concept. (One notable tribe from 2011 were the Last Chancers who began operating the Last Chance Casino at Wasteland that year.)
2012
This year saw attendance increase to around 1,000 people, and the combined effort of staff and volunteers started to finally bring to fruition the founders’ dream of a fully-immersive, movie-like environment. The Atomic Cafe bar was also introduced that year, built from discarded car parts.
2013
The live music aspect of the event began to come into its own as well, with a full lineup of bands playing on a custom-built Wasteland main stage in both 2013 and 2014. (You can check out all the bands that have ever played a Wasteland Weekend event on this page here.)
2014
The following years saw more growth, and more spectacle, as attendees began to unveil campsites, vehicles, and costumes that they had worked on for years, inspired by their first visits to the annual gathering. In fact, by 2014 there were over 100 custom-made vehicles driven out to the event, from all over the continent.
Other ongoing fixtures of the environment also emerged over the years, including the car cruise, bounty hunting games, Film Festival, fire spinning area, a Post Office, RC car battles, the complimentary beauty parlor known as the Body Shop, and more. Co-founder Karol Bartoszynski left the organization after the 2014 event.
2015
The long awaited release of “Mad Max: Fury Road” in theaters created new fans. Wasteland Weekend saw even more growth with attendance topping out around 2,000 people!
Not to mention more costumes, camps and tribes, and post-apocalyptic cars than could be seen anywhere else in the world.
2015 also saw the addition of the Death Guild Thunderdome, taking its natural place among the revelers of Wasteland City. For the first time, tickets to the event sold out!
2016
This was the final year at Wasteland’s original location in H-Park/Camp H in California City, a spot the event was rapidly outgrowing. The theme zones were expanded significantly, with a large amount of themed camping by major tribes now taking place outside the walls of Wasteland City, as well as inside.
Tribes went on a building spree, expanding camps and building towers, taking the city vertical and lighting it up more at night. The security and medical stations were upgraded to military-grade air-conditioned all-weather tents (which came in handy when Wasteland experienced its first ever dust storm on Thursday). Tickets to the event sold out, and the total population hit 3,200 people.
2017
This year marked a new beginning and a new home. The event purchased a large piece of land in in Edwards, CA to help guarantee future Wastelands, just a few miles from the original location. The event wasn’t just bigger, it was longer; expanding to five days (Wednesday-Sunday).
Tickets sold out for the third consecutive year, and the total population hit 3,800 people. Bigger Main Gates with new guard towers were built, with the new and now iconic flaming “Wasteland” sign across the arch. Two side stages (run by the Nuclear Bombshells and the Wasted Saints tribes) were officially incorporated into the entertainment zone to host acts outside of the main stage. 11 live bands played (a new record), and an aerial performance rig was added near The Pit dance area. The official Car Cruise had become so large that several smaller cruises were split off from it. This also included the during-event Car Show.
2018
This was the second year at the new location, and Wastelanders were beginning to get familiar with the beautiful Mojave Desert plain sheltered by the rocky Twin Hills, soon to be known as Wasteland Valley. 2018 featured a major upgrade to the Wasteland Film Festival movie theater, now located next to the main stage and showing films during the day in an AIR CONDITIONED theater. The official Archery Range returned after some years away, and a THIRD entertainment zone was added in the newly built area known as THE DEN (anchored by the veteran Road Rash tribe). The Command Center got a much expanded crew lounge that doubled as a workshop / instruction space. World-renowned post-apocalyptic costume and prop makers Mark Cordory (from the U.K( and Dmitri Zaitsev (from Germany) both flew over to teach workshops at the event.
And on top of all that, actor Nathan Jones (Rictus Erectus from “Mad Max: Fury Road“) made a special appearance, wearing his actual costume from the film, sent over personally by director Dr. George Miller.
2019, the 10th Wasteland Weekend!
Ten years. Hard to believe the end of the world lasted so long. Year ten had an overall population of approximately 4,300 people. Another sold-out, bigger and better event. It saw the triumphant return of band 3Teeth, as well as other popular acts, both returning and new.
Special nods to the 10th year were everywhere: Some of the most popular music acts from past years returning (such as 3Teeth and Aesthetic Meat Front) alongside new performers like Hocico. Ten tribes, one representing each year of the event, paraded through main gates on opening day. Previous souvenir items were brought back with special “year ten” crests added. A wrecked car was dropped by forklift in front of the main stage on Saturday night for the crowd to dance on top of.
Sadly, it was also the final year of the filming miniature salvaged wreck of the Exxon Valdez from “Waterworld” that had served as the Deez Stage for years. The structure had deteriorated to the point where it could no longer be used/transported and retrofitting it was simply not viable. On the downside, unseasonably cold weather rolled in by the weekend, and high winds curtailed fire performing and pyrotechnics that would normally take place at the main stage.
But many attendees still declared it the “best Wasteland ever.”
2020 was an…”interesting” year.
In February, we hosted the 4th annual Wastelander’s Ball at the historic Globe Theater in Downtown Los Angeles. A community favorite, the 2020 Ball was unique because we introduced a second theme for the night- cyberpunk! While the upstairs area remained post-apocaylptic in decor, we turned the downstairs area into a neon-noir nightclub. (Watch the highlight reel from the 2020 Ball here!)
The choice to include the other theme became clear once we announced our plans for a second fully immersive festival, the sci-fi cyberpunk event Neotropolis, which was to take place in April of 2020. But, as you no doubt remember, the world had different plans.
We were beginning the process of packing for what was going to be the first Neotropolis in early March when everything suddenly changed. A world-wide pandemic was declared, and the shutdown began. We had no choice but to postpone both Neotropolis and Wasteland Weekend 2020. Which, as you can imagine, was a blow to everyone. During this lull, we launched an online store, something we’d never done before (or will do again). This allowed the community to continue to support us in a small way; purchasing t-shirts, posters, our iconic patches, and other items.
By September of 2021, things had evolved enough to where were were able to have Wasteland Weekend again! The event marked a triumphant return, even with the pandemic still on everyone’s minds. Yes, attendance was smaller than in 2019, but spirits were high as everyone felt a sense of relief the event had survived at all. (Sadly, many other events and business shuttered during 2020 and 2021.)
2022
By 2022, Wasteland was growing again. One of the most significant changes for the community (and the Wasteland World team) took place early in 2022 with the inaugural Neotropolis finally happening.
We were absolutely overwhelmed by the support and positive response for the cyberpunk and sci-fi event. While similar to Wasteland in many, many ways, Neotropolis soon evolved into it’s own living, thriving community which continues to expand each year. (We just celebrated our 5th NEO in 2026!)
2023
In the spring of 2023, Adam Chilson retired from the Wasteland World organization, leaving Jared Butler as majority owner, and the sole remaining founder.
YouTubers People Make Games came to the 2023 event, and the resulting video which so wonderfully showcases how welcoming and kind Wastelanders are, has 2.2 million views on YouTube.
2024
In 2024, as part of promotion for Dr. George Miller’s “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga,” Wasteland Weekend was contacted by Warner Bros. Pictures to provide vehicles and costumed Wastelanders for a special ‘stunt’ on Hollywood BLVD that coincided with Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth being delivered by our custom-built chariot to “Jimmy Kimmel Live.” Miller was heard exclaiming, “I feel like I’m back on set.” (You can see more about that here.)
We welcomed professional wrestling for the first time! They brought their own ring, and entertained the city with high-flying moves and brutal take-downs.
Our long-running Friday Formal event at Main Stage added a “Fallout” theme! (“Fallout” has been a part of Wasteland Weekend since the beginning, you can read more about that here.) We welcomed DJ Little Red, who not only played some great tunes, but also taught our attendees how to swing dance before her set!
Wasteland Weekend 2025 (Year 15!!!)
2025 was a pretty big milestone for us- we celebrated our 15th anniversary! One of the big things we did in celebration was the creation of the Wasteland Museum, which showcased items from the history of the event. There were pieces on display from the very first year, as well as curated highlights from the decade-and-a-half collection of memories.
Maybe not a highlight, but, we DID have something historic take place- the first rain to ever fall during Wasteland! (Yes, that *is* a freaking rainbow over Death Guild Thunderdome!)
The amount of inspiration and positivity from 2025 was just what we needed to launch into planning the next event.
2026
Tickets for Wasteland Weekend 2026 (our 16th year!), happening September 30th-October 4th, are on sale now.
We can’t wait to welcome you back to Wasteland. You are awaited!
