Everyone has their own favorite season in our region. There’s the incomparable beauty and coolness of Fall. The ethereal quietude of Winter. The magic and miracle of spring. Then the festival season will start.
Actually, Clevelanders love a festival so much that the “season” has expanded its reaches well into every part of the year with events such as Kurentovanje and Brite Winter Fest. But the “something every weekend” season starts in May (with a few choice events in April) and then it gets hard to keep up.
We’re dropping this annual guide a little earlier this year because, with the exception of a handful of festivals in September, everybody’s got their dates set and planning is underway. As usual, there are some new events (Akron’s StageFest in June, for instance, and the debut of Akron Pride in August) and some are gone (Cudell’s Clifton Arts & Music Fest is taking the year off due to construction in the area). Others are going stronger in their 40th or 50th year —or in the case of the Great Geauga County Fair, going on two centuries!
Publishing our list early also gives you readers the chance to fill in any we’ve missed. We’re looking for festivals that people would travel from outside the community or neighborhood to attend, and this list isn’t intended to capture recurring weekly concerts or monthly events — that’s a whole other subject!
We hope you’ll plan to get out and about this summer, and be adventurous. Put something on your calendar that you’ve never attended before!
*****
Mon 4/17: Dyngus Day
Sat 4/22: Earthfest
Thu 4/27-Sun 4/30: Geauga County Maple Festival
Sat 4/29: Ramp Up Peninsula Ramp Fest
Sat 5/13: The Hooley on Kamm’s Corners
Sat 5/20-Sun 5/21: Cleveland Asian Festival
Sat 5/20-Sun 5/21: Rooms to Let
Thu 5/25-Sun 5/28: Chagrin Falls Blossom Time Festival
Fri 5/26-Mon 5/29: Berea National Rib Cook-Off
Fri 5/26-Mon 5/29: Tremont Greek Festival
Sat 6/3-Sun 6/4: Art in the Village Art Festival
Sat 6/3: Summit StageFest
Sat 6/3: Pride in the CLE
Sat 6/3-Sun 6/4: Hessler Street Fair
Sat 6/11: Taste of Lakewood
Wed 6/7-Fri 6/9: AHA! Festival at Cleveland State University
Fri 6/9-Sat 6/10: Canton Blues Festival
Sat 6/10: Put-in-Bay Music Festival
Sat 6/10-Sun 6/11: Chagrin Falls Art by the Falls
Sat 6/10-Sun 6/11: Crocker Park Fine Art Fair
Sat 6/10-Sun 6/11: Hale Farm Sow and Grow Farm Festival
Sat 6/10: Parade the Circle
Sat 6/10-Sun 6/11: LaureLive
Fri 6/16-Sun 6/18: Vermilion Festival of the Fish
Fri 6/16-Sun 6/18: Avon Heritage Duck Tape Festival
Sat 6/17: BayARTS & Music Festival
Sat 6/17: Larchmere Porchfest
Thu 6/22-Sat 6/24: Tri-C JazzFest
Fri 6/23-Sat 6/24: Ohio Scottish Games
Fri 6/23-Sun 6/25: Rock The Docks, Akron
Sat 6/24: Waterloo Arts Fest
Sat 6/24-Sun 6/25: Mulberry Creek Herb Fest
Fri 6/30-Sun 7/2: Italian American Summer Fest at Berea Fairgrounds
Fri 6/30-Tue 7/4: Rib White and Blue, Akron
Fri 7/7-Sun 7/9: Cain Park Arts Festival
Sat 7/7-Sun 7/9: Harborfest Tall Ships Adventure
Sat 7/8-Sun 7/9: Music in the Valley Folk & Wine Festival
music-in-the-valley-folk-wine-festival/
Thu 7/13-Sat 7/15: Summit County Italian American Festival
Fri 7/14-Sun 7/16: Painesville Party in the Park
Sun 7/16: Taste of Tremont
Fri 7/21-Sun 7/23: Cleveland Irish Cultural Festival
Fri 7/21 & Sat 7/22: Uncorked Medina Wine Festival
Sat 7/22: Mentor Headlands Beach Fest
Sat 7/22-Sun 7/23: African-American Festival at Lock 3 Live
Tue 7/25-Sun 7/30: Lake Country Fair
Fri 7/28-Sat 7/29: Avon Annual Summer Market
Sat 7/29: The Signal Tree Festival at Lock 3
Thu 8/3-Sun 8/6: Pro Football Hall of Fame Enshrinement Festival, Canton
pro-football-hall-of-fame-enshrinement-festival
Thu 8/3-Sat 8/5: Ohio Burlesque Festival
Fri 8/4-Sat 8/5: Vintage Ohio at Lake Metroparks
Fri 8/4/-Sun 8/6: Latino Arts & Culture Celebration and Puerto Rican Parade
latino-arts-and-culture-celebration-and-puerto-rican-parade
Fri 8/4-Sun 8/6: Twins Day Festival in Twinsburg
Sat 8/5: Lakewood Arts Fest
Sun 8/6: Warehouse District Festival
Mon 8/7-Sun 8/13: Cuyahoga County Fair
Sat 8/12: Cleveland Dragon Boat Festival
Fri 8/11-Sun 8/13: Ohio Celtic Festival
Sat 8/12-Tue 8/15: Feast of the Assumption
Sat 8/12-Sun 8/13: National Hamburger Festival
Thu 8/24-Sun 8/27: St. Constantine & Helen Greek Festival
Fri 8/18-Sat 8/19: Burning River Fest
burningriverfoundationfestival
Fri 8/18-Sun 8/20: Weapons of Mass Creation
Sat 8/19-Sun 8/20: Second Annual Flats Festival of the Arts
Sat 8/19: Highland Square Porch Rockr
Sat 8/26: Akron Pride
Sat 8/26-Sun 8/27: Cleveland Pagan Pride
Sat 8/26-Sun 8/27: Cleveland Garlic Festival
Sat 8/27: One World Day
Thu 8/31-Mon 9/4: Great Geauga County Fair
Fri 9/1-Mon 9/4: Cleveland Labor Day Oktoberfest
Thu 9/7-Sat 9/9: Heights Music Hop
Thu 9/7-Sun 9/10: Thunder on the Strip, Geneva-on-the-Lake
Fri 9/8-Sun 9/10: NEOCycle
Sat 9/9: Skunkfest
Sat 9/16: Blue Sky Folk Fest
Sat 9/16-Sun 9/17: Tremont Arts & Cultural Festival
tremont-arts-cultural-festival
Sat 9/16-Sun 9/17: Chalk Festival
Fri 9/22-Sun 9/24: Ingenuity Festvival
Sat 9/23: Music on the Porches, Peninsula
Sat 9/23-Sun 9/24: Mulberry Creek Garlic Festival
Sun 9/24: Ohio City Street Festival
Fri 10/6-Sat 10/7: FireFish Festival
Sat 10/14-Sun 10/15: Ashtabula County Covered Bridge Festival
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5 Responses to “Here’s Our Summer Festivals Guide for 2017!”
Greg
You forgot the Ohio Scottish Games held at the Lorain County Fairgrounds on June 24! http://www.ohioscottishgames.com/
olga
THE EVENT SERIES NIGHT MARKET CLEVELAND IS A DYNAMIC NIGHTTIME EXPERIENCE WHICH CONNECTS PEOPLE TO THE DISTINCTIVE CULTURE, COMMUNITY AND CREATIVITY OF THE ST. CLAIR SUPERIOR, CAMPUS AND ASIATOWN DISTRICTS, TO ANIMATE A CREATIVE ECONOMY, SPARK INTEREST AND INSPIRE FURTHER EXPLORATION.
The series is a balanced mash-up of farmer’s market, meets maker’s market, meets food festival, meets entertainment series, with each aspect pulling from local and regional talent and treasure.
Anastasia Pantsios
Those are great events. However, this round-up is just single-shot festivals, not series events. That would be unwieldy! We will cover those as they start their seasons.
Elizabeth Dashiell
Thank you so much for including our special art festivals! Just wanted to let you know we added Hathaway Brown Festival of the Arts June 17-18 and Lake Norman Arts Festival June 24 – 25. Both are free to the public. http://www.artfestival.com Thank you again!
JR
The fourth annual Cleveland VegFest is June 3rd at the Huntington Convention Center. https://www.clevelandvegansociety.org