The Bellevue Arts Fair is Bellevue's best, annual event that occurs the last weekend in July. For…read moreart lovers in the Seattle area, it's a fair to visit and explore as there's a lot of artwork of all mediums to see and learn about. And it's always a fun time! The Bellevue Arts Fair occurs from the Bellevue Galleria area across the Bellevue Transit Center to the parking garage area by Bell Square, pass Nordstrom. Everything is walking distance, and they do block certain streets for where vendors are. With that said, I recommend taking public transit if you want to avoid the parking mayhem that can occur this busy weekend. However, you can still find parking in the mall and around the Bellevue Downtown Park if you get there early enough. As mentioned earlier, there's artwork of all mediums, so a lot of variety. The artwork also ranges in different price points and it's cool to see where the artists are from, as many travel from all around the West Coast to Bellevue, just to showcase their craftsmanship. In addition to the artwork to explore, there are food trucks and live music, and the Bellevue Arts Museum offers free admission all weekend and hosts a wine garden. Fun times. It's one of my favorite summer festivals to check out. Support the arts and small business!

The Bellevue Arts Fair is always a good time and makes for a lovely afternoon!…read more Presented by the nearby museum, this event offers a lot to do and see over a 3 day period! The museum is free of charge for all the days of the event, so it's a great time to go see something new and enjoy what the museum has to offer. There's a variety of live performances to see and it's always a good idea to check the calendar and decide what's the most interesting. I'm in it for what's in the parking garage: rows and rows and rows of artists, most of them local, where you can admire and purchase art. The art available spans a wide variety of mediums from art for your wall, your table (or the table itself!), jewelry, etc. etc. Some of the artists I see every year, but there's always new ones to look forward to as well. There are several food trucks on site so you can easily spend the entire day here!

Wow! What a lovely day. Pack with a lot of patience because parking was tough. We arrive not that…read morelate, but ut took us a bit yo get to a lot even when we already got a map for the available parkings. Slow movement but we got there.Some stress are closed. There are lots and lots of booths. Plenty of things to see, purchase, and eat along. We had some dumplings, lactose free dole (yaaay!), and cotton candy. Everything was great! I wanted some BBQ but lines were huge!!! We lost an hour for the cotton. Candy. Kids were playing in the meantime, but I suggest to keep an eye because there's gazillions of people! It is a fair!

Salmon Days!! Always a fun time while we watch our salmon friends move through the area (and you…read morecan eat them). This is the first year I've got in many, many years and I'm glad that I did. Like any other festival that shuts down a large area, the parking is pretty crazy. I got there nice and early to find a good spot and walked about a mile. Overall good selection of vendors! Most of them were artisanal and not something you can buy from a direct-from-China shop. The food court had a lot of great options, and, of course the Kiwanis salmon BBQ. They also had a large field section with games for the kiddos and a water dog competition! There were lots of salmon going through the ladder, so that was nice to watch for awhile. Overall Salmon Days is a great festival to get out and do something a little different!

This is a local carnival held every year with some rides, lots of vendor booths, food trucks/tents,…read moreparades, and love music/events. it's exactly what you'd expect from a local carnival, and they have some nice big open park space for everything so it's all close together. As you can expect, carnival vendors are of mixed quality goods/foods, but it's nice to get a chance to check new things out. The event is also extremely packed, so you'll be pretty much back to back with people most of the time. It's worth checking out at least once though.

Fun in the sun! There's also a park & ride nearby! Lots of booths with different types of food to…read morechoose from! A great place to be outside and enjoy the sunshine today! It's going on until 9pm 07/15/23

The garden is beautiful and it's a nice activity to do end of fall/early winter. It used to be free…read morethen they started tickets and now they've increased the price just like anything else. But it's worth going around the holiday time each year. I suggest going on a week day of you can to avoid lines and parking craziness. The first slot 4:30 is less busy also.

Wonderful, festive and pretty affordable for the holidays. Ticket cost $10 per person over 11 years…read moreold. Kids 10 and your gets in for free. The lights were fun to look at and had many floral and crops themed ones. It was also larger than I thought cause from the outside you can see a portion of it. The cafe was also open and I wish I can try all their drinks. Their white hot chocolate with whip cream was so good for the cool weather. Also very glad it did not rain on that day.

The Aki Matsuri Japanese Fall Festival is held at Bellevue college. There are performances and…read morelots of booths with Japanese items, businesses, foods and even the Japanese Consulate has a booth. The event is spread out across the campus so make sure to pick up a program and a map that will explain where everything is and the times of performances. In Building G is the main stage and the exhibit booths. There are some t shirts for sale as well as other items. They had some sweet looking ties! In the R building are some more exhibits including Bonsei, Manga, Nomi-no-ichi and Taiko workshops. In the L building is the Wagasa Japanese traditional umbrella exhibition and the Ikkan-bari, Rou Shippo/Rouga booth. In the L/R Courtyard is Kingyo Sukui, RTG Seattle Taiko booth and Hyogo Business and Culture Center booth. In the C courtyard are the Japan Business Fair booths. In the C building are more exhibits and the food court, Edo Yuzen Kimonos, Tatami stage, Bonsei workshop and more. D building, workshop for K-12 teachers, shakuhachi demonstrations and lectures and puppet shows in English for the kids! E building, puppet shows in Japanese and martial arts demonstrations. There is so much to do and it is a great time if you are into Japanese culture! Have fun everyone!

I didn't know what to expect, but I know I wanted to go to a chocolate festival as soon as I saw…read morethe poster. Parking: there's paid parking in the convention center but if you go on a Sunday, you can find street parking a little further out from the center. Event: there were a ton of free samples from all the vendors that were there. I don't think they advertise the samples enough. I feel like I didn't even go in expecting a ton of samples, but there were a lot so get ready to eat a ton of chocolate. Even though all the pieces were cut into small bites, after so many samples, you will definitely get your fill of chocolate. I like that they had variety from different countries and type types of chocolates and beverages as well. I appreciate it that there was a lot of different talks in different rooms on both days. You can almost spend the entire time listening to the talks. You get to learn a lot about chocolates, where it comes from, how to make truffles, and how to use chocolates. Lots of different topics for everyone. The price tag is pretty high, but I was able to find a Groupon so I'm very happy with that. As with any of these two day festivals, the first day is very crowded but you will be able to buy things that are not sold out. Sunday was super chill, but many things were already sold out . I will be back next time for sure!

First time attending this festival and there was definitely a lot that I enjoyed about it and some…read morethings I would do differently next time. The other reviews are from many years ago and mentioned issues with the location but it's in Bellevue now (not sure how long it's been there) but had no issues with the location. Obviously if you live in Seattle, that would be a different story but it was super convenient right next to the light rail station. SO much chocolate to taste. I appreciate the tables that have self service tastings where you can grab your own. The ones where you have to ask for them to hand you samples, is not efficient at all. Some of them were too crowded that you couldn't even see what was on the table because of others tasting and chit chatting with the employees. The presentations are interesting but they don't necessarily make enough samples for everyone so everyone on our side of the rows didn't get anything and had to watch the rest of the room taste their samples. So get a seat near the front, in the middle. They are an hour long so they do take up a good chunk of time if you do more than one if you are doing general admission (which is 11am-5pm). You can bring your own water bottles, there are refill stations, or your own snacks. Just know that your taste buds will be shot after all those samples and you will need a chocolate break for a while after the event. Bring a reusable bag for all the chocolate bars you'll end up buying!

The 2025 Redmond Lights was spectacular! A vast array of lights, luminaries, musical performances,…read moremarching band, booths, games for children, delicious food, yummy ice cream, and so much more!! I love our community!! To the City of Redmond and all of the amazing City Lights volunteers, thank you and job well done!! We had so much fun...it was magnificent!!!

The lights are so pretty and beautiful and the lighting colors are amazing too look at and it makes…read morefor a great night out with the kids and our friends

We were visiting from out of state and we didn't even know this was going on. We were super excited…read morewhen we learned that we just happened to be in Seattle while this festival was happening! The event was put on by Amazon which we thought was pretty neat and it was a food fair with so many unique things to try! The layout was divided into "blocks" and labeled on a few large handy maps so you didn't get turned around. It was not as large as we thought it would be but we definitely weren't disappointed. We appreciated all of the local businesses being able to get such heavy traffic because you don't see that too much in large cities. Our favorite food hands down was the gourmet deep fried PB & J. If you feel squeamish about trying it, you just can't go wrong. Now that we're back home, it's been months and we still talk about craving them frequently! I would pace yourself because just about everything is fantastic. If you need a break from all the food, there's a beer garden with live entertainment! You aren't required to purchase alcohol so it's a nice rest stop that also allows dogs. I can't wait to hear how this event does next year! Happy tasting! NO ENTRY FEE PET FRIENDLY (don't bring your dog if they aren't good with crowds) BEER GARDEN VEGAN OPTIONS

Food trucks for days, stands and even more food! If you're a big foodie, want to sample awesome…read morelocal eats or just hungry then you've found yourself in the right place. Finding parking will probably take forever to find unless you come early or Uber over here. The lines get long fast so if you come anytime after 12, it might be too late (unless you don't mind waiting of course). The Wow Wow Hawaiian Lemonade line and a couple desserts trucks were the longest, gotta be that summer heat. So good if you're lucky to try it tho! Oh and there's a beer garden if you're just tryna chill out. Tacos = amazing! Sandwiches = amazing! Poke = amazing! Raclette = amazing! Mangonada = amazing! Basically everything I ate at the food festival was bomb! Come hungry, leave with a food coma and maybe a couple extra pounds.

Kirkland Summerfest is a neighborhood summer event. It has everything from kids events, beer…read moregarden and live band stage, booths for sales and information, booths for food and drinks. The Kirkland Summerfest is one of the prettiest festivals, aesthetically speaking. Incorporating the use of beach, park, Heritage Hall, and the streets, there is a lot to appreciate the natural beauty in this area. It's moderate in size. Over the years, they have changed how many streets they close for this event. This year (2019) is more modest in size. The good thing is that they are open from Friday to Sunday so you can choose the convenient time for you to attend. Be sure to study the map so you're not missing out! Parking is street only, or library or city hall.

I participated in the Kirkland Summerfest in conjunction with the Sip Kirkland wine tasting event…read more I had a really great time here and even though there were a lot of people at the event it wasn't overly crowded unlike other food / festival events that are overwhelmingly busy and the lines are really long. The weather was perfect and this year it was located at the downtown Kirkland Marina Park and it is an absolutely beautiful park especially to eat and drink and enjoy the scenery for a social event like this.

The Redmond Arts Festival is an annual festival that occurs in the Redmond Town Center during the…read moresummer season. If you're into art, especially finding local art, the Redmond Arts Festival is an event that was created with you in mind. I'm in Redmond a lot, and while I was at the Redmond Town Center for other business, I checked out the Redmond Arts Festival while it was going on. The Redmond Town Center has vendors lined up along the town center, selling their artwork and there is live music that plays in the main plaza, by the water fountain. The selection of artwork is small, especially compared to other art festivals that occur around the area. But it's cool that Redmond has their own community event. Also, this year, they've timed this festival during Redmond Derby Days where Microsoft shuttles can take you to and from both events for free. Smart thinking! It was nice to see what was offered this year, but if you're not already in Redmond, I wouldn't go out of my way to visit due to how small the festival is.

An annual three-day weekend arts festival that's a fun addition to the Redmond Derby Days (and…read moredon't forget the seasonal Redmond Saturday Market)! The town center becomes lined with booths of various handmade goods, including the usual set of paintings, crafts, pottery, jewelry, and sculptures. Other activities are present as well: live bands performing all day, kid-friendly activities, and a couple of food trucks. Of course, this is not a large city like Seattle, so come with expectations set to what a nice, small town like Redmond would offer!