It won’t be raining confetti on Newmarket’s Main Street as the coronavirus pandemic has forced the cancellation of the annual York Pride parade and its many in-person June events, but organizers are hard at work on a bevvy of virtual soirees that will have you celebrating Pride Month all the same.
“We’re trying to stay positive, obviously we would have preferred the more social part where everyone is together, it’s an emotional time for people,” York Pride Fest development and communications director Jacob Gal said. “When you look at Pride festivals around the world, it’s about being there, seeing the confetti falling from the sky, and all the different faces, happy and sad.”
In addition to the Town of Newmarket, York Regional Police, and other strong local partners from festivals past, York Pride Fest organizers will this month team up with Market Brewing Company and Cachet Supper Club on some key events to celebrate the region’s LGBTQ2S+ community.
At least half a dozen fun and interactive digital events are on tap for June 12 to 26, including a special virtual celebration on June 20 in honour of the organization’s 20th anniversary and the day the Main Street parade was supposed to be held.
In partnership with Cachet and its new virtual restaurant experience known as Cooking with Cachet, a virtual Pride celebration on Saturday, June 20 will offer participants the chance to purchase an experience box that comes equipped with everything one needs to celebrate safely at home.
Some of the items delivered to your door in advance of the virtual event include face painting supplies, Pride kits, rainbow flags for your window, sparklers, clown accessories, a bottle of wine, and more.
The Pride Fest experience box is $60. A portion of the proceeds will go toward planning the 2021 parade and community events that, Gal hopes, will be back to the way it once was before the global pandemic hit.
Other notable events throughout June will be live-streamed to the York Pride Fest website from Market Brewing Company’s Leslie Street restaurant after hours when it has closed its doors for the day for curbside pickup of its brew and the hand sanitizer it started making recently to address a critical shortage during the pandemic.
The themed events include a partnership with the City of Orlando and the onePULSE Foundation around creating safer spaces, youth expression, and a united day for love and kindness in tribute to the 49 lives lost in the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting, a trivia night with prizes and giveaways, a Netflix watching party, personal Pride stories from several generations, and a June 26 virtual closing party with a band, drag queens, fire dancers, and more.
“One thing we work very hard to do in York Region is to unisolate individuals and put them into environments where they feel comfortable, where they can be themselves and flourish,” Gal said. “But with COVID, the biggest thing about flattening the curve is about staying at home, and it means people really have to ground themselves to one space, and that can be really hard on individuals that aren’t in spaces as supporting as others.”
For Gal and the events team, being at home more to do their part to help stop the spread of the respiratory disease has provided a bit of a “breather” in terms of planning.
“As a festival organizer, we don’t get a break,” he said. “You don’t get a second to breathe. This pandemic has been the best opportunity to breathe, and focus on how we can plan this year, and the next year to be bigger and better.”
“Newmarket, York Regional Police, and all the partners have been excellent in supporting us, being open to new ideas, programming and collaboration,” said Gal. “We’re really excited for 2021 and this is giving us some more time to do even more programming for residents and visitors to York Region.”
For now, York Pride’s 20 scheduled events for 2020 have been shelved due to COVID-19, except its well-attended February Family Day skate in Georgina before the pandemic.
“When we first started the festival in Richmond Hill, we never thought it was going to pick up because the crowds didn’t grow and business support wasn’t great,” Gal said. “When we moved to Newmarket, within the third or fourth year, we were at 65 per cent up in partnership with local businesses, compared to 10 per cent in Richmond Hill.”
One of the organization’s biggest goals, Gal said, is to normalize the Pride festival so visitors to Newmarket and York Region think about it the same way they would a Canada Day festival.
“It’s for everyone,” he said.
Check the York Pride Fest website for updates and more details on its June 2020 virtual events.
To order the Pride Festival experience box for the June 20 celebration, visit here.