There’s Truly Nothing Quite Like A Renaissance Faire

If you’re like me, you’re constantly looking for a nice day out for the family, one that’s got a little something for everybody. You know all the go-tos already, I bet: swimming and amusement parks in the summer, hiking and apple-picking in the fall. My advice? Don’t forget about your local renaissance faire.

They’re a good time for just about everybody, really, whether you’re a family that loves tabletop gaming and Lord of the Rings or just comically huge turkey legs and great people-watching. And there are ren faires all over the country, too. I’m pretty sure it actually works a lot like state and county fairs, where many of the vendors work a circuit over the course of the year, going from spot to spot. (Here’s a map of festivals and faires all over the country and the world.)

If you need further convincing, here are nine reasons why you should check yours out and take the kids. Just be sure to arrive early — the very modern problems of parking and traffic can be horrible — and bring plenty of cash (like so much else, these days don’t come cheap) so you don’t get stuck all day waiting at the ATM.

1. The joys of dress-up, for your kid and you

Kids love costumes, as anybody who’s ever tried to talk their child out of wearing one to school on a regular day knows. And a ren faire is an absolutely prime opportunity for your kid to wander around in costume for hours and hours. It’s a little like Halloween, in that tons of other people are also in costume and you’re basically wandering around a gigantic village of playhouses all afternoon. And if you, the parent, enjoy costumes, it’s an even better opportunity than Halloween. Don’t worry if you don’t have anything lying around that’ll work, either — there will be plenty of places to buy one at the faire. (We’ll get to that!)

2. The snacks

Our first stop upon arriving at the faire this past weekend was a booth selling cinnamon roasted nuts. Before we left for the day, I’d eaten a good chunk of a blooming onion and a bunch of chicken nuggets, and if I’d had the patience to wait in more lines, I could have kept snacking my way through the day, and I really regret not getting a Scotch egg and donuts. Can’t forget the comically large turkey legs, of course. My big note is that apparently when my husband was a teen they had meat pies — they need to bring those back and add a couple more thematic items. Soul cakes, maybe? Anyway, every faire is different, so half the fun is poking around yours and finding what’s there and what’s good.

4. The rides

As we approached the faire, I laughed listening to a mom explain to her kids that no, there would not be roller coasters, and they really needed to get into the spirit of the thing and accept that they didn’t have roller coasters in the Renaissance. That’s not to say there’s no rides, though! My kid particularly enjoyed something called a “whirly burly,” which is essentially a human-powered carousel where you ride in a hammock chair. Personally, it would take 48 hours for my head to stop spinning queasily, but kids love it.

5. It’s actually a pretty good intro to live performance for kids

Ren faires are famous for their jousting shows, which really are very fun. But there’s always tons of smaller performances, too. There always seems to be a birds of prey show, plus lots of acts on smaller stages scattered throughout the fair. Not all of them will be kid friendly, but lots of them are. It’s pretty low-stakes; when my kid got hot and restless watching Robin Hood do battle with the Sheriff of Nottingham, it was easy to bail without making anybody mad.

6. You can’t beat the people-watching

Within 15 minutes of arriving, my child had high-fived somebody wearing a fursuit, who was good with kids and did an absolutely charming little hop in the air afterward. Which is to say, your fellow faire-goers are absolutely part of the pleasure of attending. These things are a lovely mix of ages and backgrounds and subcultures. You’ll get a bunch of kids in Amazon-bought costumes, somebody in a meticulously researched, hand-crafted historically accurate ensemble, and then somebody in a Napoleon Dynamite getup, for some reason, all crossing paths. Also, a non-zero number of boyfriends dressed in ACOTAR or Fourth Wing costumes.

There’s also a huge age range, with a ton of gray-haired folks who’ve been attending since long before the enormous success of HBO’s Game Of Thrones and also plenty of attendees who were probably too young to be watching when Game Of Thrones first appeared. A couple of years ago, a nice older man patiently explained the art of making stained glass to my then-5-year-old; this time, I enjoyed listening as a 20-something guy quickly cut off a friend from saying something inappropriate in front of my now-7-year-old. (This was, of course, unnecessary, since she’s spent her life periodically walking around New York City overhearing God-knows-what, but still heartwarming and appreciated.) In my experience ren faires aren’t kid-centric, but they are the kind of kid-friendly that’s really important, too, treating them as part of the fabric of a bigger community.

Oh, and I heard a cape-wearing college kid behind me admit that he’d maybe never used an ATM before and wasn’t entirely sure how. I, of course, remember being dragged on errands involving actual bank tellers. You don’t get that kind of intergenerational WTF moment just anywhere!

7. Mead and more

I’m not sure they’re even allowed to call it a “ren faire” if there’s not mead being sold somewhere on the premises. In my experience, ren faires love to honor the fact that water was downright dangerous to drink for much of human history by selling lots and lots of beer, mead, and cider. The New York Renaissance Festival even has a pub crawl.

8. The shopping is a blast

The artisans are one of the biggest attractions at these faires. They all have stalls and stalls of vendors selling whimsical creations. In the age of mass-production and Temu, some of the stuff you can find here is pretty amazing. It’s the kind of shopping where you won’t find a single thing you need, but you’ll find lots of things you never realized you wanted (and maybe didn’t know existed). If they ever add a yarn vendor at the New York ren faire, I’m going to be broke. You could probably knock out most of your Christmas shopping in a day at one of these things, if you really focused.

9. The nostalgia is top-notch

This one is specifically for the nerds: There are few pleasures in parenting quite like the feeling of having successfully gotten your kid into the stuff you like. Every time my child ventures an opinion on Gandalf, I am thrilled to my core. Watching her select a souvenir necklace-holder for a twelve-sided die made of chainmail? Priceless.