Pete Lawrence, the co-founder of the Big Chill, resigned yesterday as a director of the pioneering boutique festival.

Lawrence conceived an idea for a new type of Sunday multimedia club back in early 1994, after seeing Hexstatics' regular nights up at the Jackson Lane community centre in North London. Together with Katrina Larkin, Lawrence set about creating their own multimedia environment in the back rooms at Union Chapel in Islington.

Going on to move it out of North London and into a series of festivals around the world, Lawrence has given early exposure by programming names such as Lily Allen, Goldfrapp, Gotan Project, Mr Scruff, Röyksopp, Zero 7 and Lemon Jelly, and was arguably the catalyst for the chill out boom at the turn of decade. More recent the Big Chill record label and The Big Chill Bar in Brick Lane, followed in autumn 2006 with the three storey Big Chill House in Kings Cross.

In his statement on his website, we can only gather he has made enough money not to bother working that much anymore, as he wants to read books and hang out with his kids more and learn the bassoon that he so tenderly misses from his youth (ok I made that bit up).