There’s a new bridge coming to West Vancouver, though this one’s more suited to connecting cultures and traditions than providing a thoroughfare for cars and commuters.
In a bid to transform the municipality’s long-standing annual Community Day event into something that better reflects the diversity of the region, a rebranded and new multicultural celebration is slated to kick off its inaugural run tonight and tomorrow in Ambleside Park.
The first annual Bridge Festival, the evolution of the 40-plus-year-old Community Day event, will offer visitors an eclectic array of food, live music, performances, cultural displays, and much more, according to Christie Rosta, events and festival manager with the District of West Vancouver.
“I have learned so much about all the different cultures we have here in the community,” says Rosta. “I’ve worked so closely with the volunteers who’ve created the China pavilion, or the Korean pavilion, or the Iranian pavilion, and all the different stories that they want to share and tell – it’s been really fun.”
In an effort to showcase and celebrate West Vancouver’s diverse mix of cultures, pavilions – including ones representing Mexico, the West Coast, Canada’s Indigenous peoples, the Philippines, the U.K., in addition to Korea, Iran, and China – will offer visitors a unique way to experience these cultures through art, music and interactive performances.
In the case of Iran, for example, visitors to Ambleside Park will notice the pavilion has been transformed into an Iranian courtyard, replete with Persian carpets and a selection of nuts and wine for purchase.
And those looking for an outdoorsy pavilion adventure – and a taste of the West Coast lifestyle – are invited to check out the Bridge Festival’s zipline, which will propel thrill-seekers across Ambleside Park’s Field F. “We’re going to have a zipline that’s part of our West Coast experience. Who doesn’t love a 250-foot zipline?” says Rosta.
Following an eight-month consultation last year with a group comprised of West Vancouver citizens, “one of the key decisions that the citizen group made was that it needed a new profile or a new name change,” explains Rosta, adding that there had been a decline in attendance in recent years at Community Day and the working group wanted to make sure the annual event “still speaks to everyone that lives here.”
“The Community Day has been so important to West Van for so many years, and will continue to bring people together,” says Rosta. “The Lions Gate Bridge is iconic to West Vancouver and it’s a way to come over and visit West Van, it’s place-making, and it’s about bridging people and cultures and ideas and new experiences.”
New this year will be the Bridge Festival Cultural Beach Parade, with the parade slated to begin Saturday at 1 p.m. at John Lawson Park with schools, bands, cultural groups and businesses showcasing their community spirit as they slink along Argyle Avenue into Ambleside Park.
“We’ve traditionally gone along Marine Drive and this year we knew it was important to keep the parade, and so we’ll be going along the waterfront and the parade will then meander into the centre of the site at the main stage. It’ll bring everyone together at the endpoint where we continue to celebrate and share experiences together,” says Rosta.
In a return to form from previous years, the festival will feature plenty of great food and music at its centrepiece – though with more of a multicultural focus – with two full evenings of free concerts scheduled on the main stage in Ambleside Park, according to Rosta.
On Friday, starting at 4 p.m., viewers can catch Mariachi Los Dorados followed by Kow Kanda and then cap off the evening with headliners TANGA, a world-fusion group which mixes tropical dance beats, East African marimba and Cuban jazz.
On Saturday at 11 a.m., Rosta is pleased to announce a “remarkable performance” featuring the Eagle Song Dancers and the West Vancouver Youth Band. “It’s a collaboration and they’ll be playing two pieces that they have composed together.”
Other live concerts on Saturday will include Amir Haghighi & Amy Stephen, Herbert Kwan, and the closing musical act for the festival will be The Starbirds, who blend folk, Celtic, gospel and Latin music.
Attendees are encouraged to visit westvancouver.ca/arts-culture/festivals/bridge-festival for more information about the festival, including a schedule of events and full festival lineups.
Asked what the best way to experience the Bridge Festival might be, Rosta says visitors should try and get in as much as they can during the free two-day event.
“Definitely come down early on Friday – there’s 11 food trucks, so come hungry, come have dinner, and then go on your journey exploring all the different pieces of the festival. And, of course, you’ve got to take a zip on the zipline.”
