Feast Of Lanterns

We love Feast! The park and neighborhood is alive with fun and filled with love. Great event

First time attending the Feast of Lanterns. Great selections of vendors and entertainment. I love how can go with your family and friends to enjoy the weather, company, and booths of vendors. Would recommend visiting it if you are in town or just want a chill night out.

My favorite Indy festival! It always has amazing, creative craft booths, so many food and beverage choices, and you can feel how community driven the event is. It is lovely with all the lanterns, especially at night. An annual tradition that I've come to love.

A truly precious neighborhood festival. This free event is held in Spades Park, just east of downtown (a few minutes walk from Circle City Industrial Complex). It's free to attend and offers several food trucks, beer trucks, a stage with music and lots of local vendors selling items in their individual tents. There were lots of families and people enjoying the music and dancing around. Such a fun atmosphere.The best part is the rows and rows of beautiful, colorful lanterns that are strung throughout the park and vendors. Even some of the neighboring homes put up lanterns on their front porches to join in the fun. There's a countdown around 9pm when they turn all of the lanterns on at once. It was a warm and fuzzy event and I was super happy that we got to attend. We only spent about an hour here (the beer/food lines were really long), so we made our way over to 8th Day Distillery and Centerpoint Brewery, and got to support these other great, local bizs.

I've had this neighborhood festival on my summer bucket list for years. Alas, 2019 was the year to make it happen. First off, I adore the dreamy and whimsical vibes of the lanterns swaying in the breeze throughout Shades Park as well as the neighboring porches being adorned with special lighting decor in celebration of the festival.Fun fact before we dive in: The festival's earliest "incarnations in the late 1800s were of small gatherings and decorated front porches in nearby neighborhoods like Woodruff Place. By 1909 these neighborhood events had morphed in to a single, larger festival that took place in Spades Park." More history on the festival can be found here thanks to Historic Indianapolis: http://historicindianapolis.com/the-feast-of-lanterns-1898/What to expect:-neighbors and Hoosiers pouring out to soak in the live music, local artisans (at least 30 booths) and at least 15 food and drink trucks featuring local brews, wine, Mexican, Brazilian, pizza, etc. AKA no one will go hungry at this festival-live music with a rotating schedule throughout the day that runs through 10pm-We arrived around 8:30-9PM and that seemed to serve us well with shorter lines and easy-to-find parking-Very impressive work for a neighborhood festival created by volunteers. I know firsthand that this is no easy feat to pull off! Great work!

I think that before attending this neighborhood festival, it's important to have some realistic expectations. When it first started a few years ago, I had these Disney-like expectations and ideas going through my head of everyone lighting a candle-lit floating lantern and letting hundreds of them fly into the air at once. Ya know, celebrating lanterns and stuff. That's far from this event. It's mostly about the vendors and musicians, at least that's the vibe that I get from it. Is it benefiting an organization or a cause? I'm not sure. Hopefully so, but, I've not heard who it benefits so that's probably not a good thing. Maybe make that more known at the actual event? That aside, it's a nice annual summertime festival. The weather is usually always nice, the food truck options are nice, and the vendors are always there to satisfy any hippie-bone in your body. They've got it all: homemade soaps, wooden wands, tapestries, nonprofits/services, etc. It's a nice event, don't get me wrong. But it would be nice to see some more emphasis on the lanterns. Maybe have a create-your-own or design-your-own lantern? Pay $5 and you get to light a lantern and watch it float into the air? I don't know. Some sort of activity centered around the lanterns would be a nice touch.

This is more of a neighborhood festival. They have goods to sell, food and music. Lines are long for food but all and all fun evening if you don't have any plans.

This is a neighborhood festival, and if you go not expecting too much, you will probably enjoy it. The crowd ranges from families to singles. This event is the opportunity to stroll through a few vendor booths; grab some eats at the food trucks; sit down with a beer or wine at the community tables or in your chairs by the stage; listen to the live music; and talk with the friends in your group or the people you meet along the way all with the backdrop of the beautiful colors and twinkling lights of the lanterns. This festival has already grown somewhat since its origin, but I still would like to see more vendor/booths, and I would like to see even more lanterns. This is a 31 acre park, so there's room to hold more.

It's been years since I've been to the Lantern Festival and I've been waiting patiently! Love the community. The food trucks are the best, even better than the fair. Although you can't get elephant ears, you actually get delicious food! I do miss the silent auction!!!!

After hearing so much about the Feast of Lanterns the past few years, I was excited to take a car full of girls and meet up with some friends. The decor was festive and there was enough to keep us busy as we checked out the vendors, live music stage, food trucks and beer garden. The downside was the limited number of 'potties' and long lines. Overall, it was a beautiful night full of smiles.