Fredericton to Host Night Market Next Summer
FREDERICTON– The City of Fredericton announced on Thursday that it will be hosting a weekly night market starting next June.
The Garrison Night Market will take place on Carlton Street. It will be an Asian-style night market featuring local and imported handmade products, art and fine craft, locally-grown farm products, food, local micro-brews, ciders and spirits, musicians and youth entrepreneurs.
The market will be held every Thursday evening starting on June 21 until September 6 and will run from 4:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.
“We think people are going to love this concept,” said David Seabrook, manager of Fredericton Tourism, in a release. “It’s going to add tremendously to the dynamism downtown next summer. Pedestrian street markets are common in other parts of the world, particularly throughout Asia. They bring everybody out with an exciting and eclectic mix of products that are constantly changing. It’s a perfect match for Fredericton with its creative culture, its startup mindset and its increasingly diverse population.”
“If you’ve got a creative local product to sell, this is going to be the place to give it a test run,” says Seabrook. “First at foremost, we want to showcase local products.”
The Garrison Night Market is a tourism and cultural development project of Fredericton Tourism, designed to attract local residents and visitors, and leverage the city’s investment in Carleton Street, which was recently redesigned.
“The new Carleton Street is designed to be a festival street, an important element of the new City Centre plan and part of a long-term development vision for the Historic Garrison District,” said Seabrook. “With a unique paver design, electrical infrastructure that will be installed in the spring, and the shared street model with extra width, it’s perfect for a market.”
Fredericton Tourism says it consulted with the existing Saturday markets in the city to ensure the new market will add to the current offerings.
“This market won’t be in competition with the other markets. It’s seasonal and outdoors. No one is going to move their business from a year-round market to this summer market,” said Seabrook. We hope it helps vendors at other markets become more sustainable; adding an additional source of distribution and revenue to their small business.”
Fredericton isn’t the first New Brunswick city to experiment with a night market. This past August, Saint John hosted a one-night market called the Moonlight Bazaar that was very successful.