Why is Defected leaving Tisno?
Defected has confirmed 2026 as the last edition of its Croatian festival at The Garden, Tisno, the Dalmatian resort it has used since 2016. CEO Wez Saunders framed it as a deliberate close, not a collapse.
Croatia 2026 marks our final edition in Tisno, and we are closing this chapter with intention. Wez Saunders, Defected
The label says close to half a million people have passed through the site across nine years, and the 2025 edition was named Best Global Festival at the DJ Awards in Ibiza. Going out on a high, in other words, rather than fading.
What does the final lineup say?
The bill is built as a full circle. Dennis Ferrer, Sam Divine and Purple Disco Machine, all on the very first 2016 lineup, come back to close it out. Around them sit first-time Defected Croatia bookings that read like a map of where house sits now: Seth Troxler, Gerd Janson, DJ EZ, Jonas Blue, Joëlla Jackson, Jeremy Sylvester and Laidlaw. More than 90 acts spread across the Main Stage, the Beach Stage and the Olive Grove, plus the boat parties and the Barbarella's after-hours that turned Tisno into a rite of passage.
What does losing Tisno mean for house festivals?
The Garden site has been one of the last intimate, boutique corners of the European festival summer, the anti-arena: 5,000 people, a swim between sets, no wristband upsell to a VIP island. Defected leaving does not close the resort, but its flagship soulful-house week is the biggest anchor tenant to walk away, and boutique festivals have been drifting off Tisno for a while now. For a scene that keeps losing its mid-size, human-scale spaces to either arenas or spreadsheets, one more of the good ones calling last orders stings.
