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44th Cabbagetown Festival
By Dimitrije Martinovic
Dimitrije is a community journalist with FOCUS MEDIA ARTS CENTRE
The Cabbagetown Festival returns for the first time since 2019, and what a celebration!
The festival began in 1976 and is the longest running festival in Toronto. This year the festival took place on September 9th and 10th, featuring more than 200 vendors. Organized by the local BIA, it stretched from Wellesely St. to the north and Gerard St. It continued along Parliament St. with a short extension on Carlton St.
Parliament St. was crammed with stages for musicians, food stands, handcrafts, and numerous not for profit organizations.
The opening ceremonies took place on Saturday. The hosts were Matthew Mohan, Executive Director BIA, and Bill Renieris Chairman of the Cabbagetown BIA. Guest speakers included Cyrus Pourmoslemi, Assistant Branch Manager TD Bank Cabbagetown, and local politicians Marci Ien MP Toronto Centre, Kristyn Wong-Tam, MPP Toronto Centre, Chris Moise, Councillor Ward 13. Newly elected Mayor of Toronto, Olivia Chow also came out to support the festival and speak to the crowd.
While the Cabbagetown Festival resembles many of the other 23 street festivals in Toronto, it is one of the most culturally diverse. Parliament Street does not have a specific cultural identity. For example, the Roncesvalles Polish Festival, Toronto Ukranian Festival, TD Salsa on St. Clair Street Festival, The Taste of Little Italy, and the Taste of the Danforth all celebrate the uniqueness of one general community. Its food, fashion, crafts, and music. The Cabbagetown Festival does not have a common or unifying ethnic character. Instead, it is a mash-up of many different communities cohabiting this one neighbourhood.
Parliament Street has a long history in Toronto stretching back to the early days of Canada when it was originally named after the parliament buildings that were once located in that area. Today, Parliament Street is a go-to place for shopping and dinning for a vast cross section of people living in St. Jamestown, Cabbagetown, Regent Park and Moss Park neighbourhoods – and this demographic mix shinnes in the current make-up of festival vendors and festival attendees.
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FOCUS Media Arts Centre (FOCUS) is a not-for-profit organization that was established in 1990 to counter negative media stereotypes of low income communities and provide relevant information to residents living in the Regent Park area and surrounding communities.
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