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Dear Friend,
If you can indulge me: close your eyes for a moment, and think back to life in 2013 — What was it like pre-pandemic? Pre-crypto, pre-work-from-home?
This was the year we started Daybreaker. The year Obama was inaugurated for his second term. The year “selfie” became a recognizable term. And Vine was the social media site of the year. (side note: what happened to Vine?)
It was the first snowfall in NYC that year — December 10th, at Coffee Shop in Union Square where it all began.
Feels like a different lifetime in many ways.
180 FYFs (F*ck Yeah Friends) gathered for the first time at sunrise to courageously wake up and dance for the first time.
Sans alcohol or drugs. To remind us that we could break our co-dependence between having fun and escaping ourselves — and return to ourselves instead.
What if we could in fact feel high just by wiggling our bodies, moving together in unison, to great music, on the dance floor?
It was a risk - I mean, it’s Gotham City! The City that never sleeps and a city known for its hard charging citizens.
We were in our mid 20’s and early 30’s at the time when we started this social experiment and were getting sick of all the late night partying and wanted to bring more wellness into nightlife. To merge green juice and glitter — wellness and culture.
And by golly! You took to the substance-free sunrise dance like wildfire. It spoke to so many of us. There was so much energy, so much love it was dizzying!
We grew fast and furious across the world and before we knew it, we were in 31 cities and 6 continents around the world and millions either came to dance or heard of this mischievous community through whisper sharing. We never advertised, if you knew, you knew.
In 10 years, we also never took 1 dollar of investment to stay true to the values of our community and only raised our ticket prices once. We grew organically, saving enough from ticket sales to make our first hire, then our next, then our next. It’s been a real labor of love.
Has it been hard? Hell yes - this “business” is not for the faint of heart, it’s for cultural masochists and social practice artists who understand the vital importance of coming together. These are our community of producers, volunteers, artists, creatives and partners who answered the call.
We have all learned first hand that experiences matter far more than fancy things — and post covid, we value moments of gathering even more. Humans are spectacularly social creatures, we cannot survive or thrive without connection.
And dance continues to be one of the most healing and ancient celebratory technologies that exists to connect us all. It’s the medicine that moves and transmutes the pain into pleasure. Seeing others dancing next to us allows us to see things from new perspectives. To forgive each other. To learn. To build resilience. To remind ourselves that we’re not perfect. No one is.
We’re all here to wiggle our bodies and learn.
Our best life moments that we recall often happen on the dance floor: New years, weddings, graduations, concerts, parties — and the sunlit energy adds a whole new circadian, serotonin boosting twist.
Wild to think that Studio 54 was around for only 2ish years and Daybreaker has now been around for 10. What will the future generations say about us, about this wildly mischievous community? Are we the Merry Pranksters of today?
All this to say, we will keep showing up for you so long as you keep showing up and showing out as you have been. Your participation with your costumes, dance floor energy, and trusting us with all our wild ideas has kept the creative flame inside our hearts burning bright.
The next 10 years are in some ways make or break for humanity. We have to figure out climate change, we have to decide if we’re going to let AI and technology fully take over (hello chatgpt), and we are in a pivotal moment for culture, creativity and our sense of belonging as a species.
We have so many things to work on…but in our little corner of the world at Daybreaker HQ, our sole purpose is to keep the daytime dance alive and well and give us space to release, find awe — and eachother.
And here's some of what's in store for the next decade:
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We’re announcing our 10-year Together Tour soon (stay tuned!)
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We're working on several secret projects (you’ll find out soon enough…;))
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And my team and I have spent the last four months writing a teaching curriculum on Community Architecture, Community Leadership and Experience Design so that we could support the next generation of magical community enthusiasts who want to devote their lives to bringing people together.
If that’s you, and you want to learn how we did it for 10 years across the world, and how we kept the lights on and the flame of the community burning bright, sign up to learn more here. We’re curious to know what you want to learn specifically (don’t hold back!) so we can best support you.
And if you want to share/donate a video from your camera roll from a Daybreaker event that meant something to you, please add it to our Google Drive here - we want to capsule this for our 10-year archives and if you’re open to sharing a story, please reply here - we want to read your stories!
Gathering to dance and connect and celebrate life is one of the few ancient rituals we have left.
And there are so few *truly* good dance floors left in the world. Let’s protect them together.
That you continuing to show up fuels this ritual again and again. Without your commitment, and your investment in participating in the communities you live in, there would be no us.
So thank you for 10 glorious years. For your guardianship and devotion to the sunkissed dance floor.
To 10 more years of dancing with reckless abandon.
Happy Holidays, Family. ❤️
With love & mischief,
Radha, Eli, Tim & Team Daybreaker
