New events and crowd favourites will attract more visitors into the city, creating jobs and boosting business – including an open-air live music series, a Portuguese festival and a floating entertainment experience.
The City of Melbourne will help to stage and deliver 48 events in 2023, allocating more than $1.4 million, and an additional $430,000 in-kind support.
The Event Partnership Program provides a total of $2.5 million each year to boost the city’s vibrant events calendar and entice more people in.
Highlights from the 2023 Event Partnership Program include:
- District Live: Open-Air Series – an outdoor live music and entertainment series showcasing emerging and established local artists from Melbourne and regional Victoria.
- Taste of Portugal Festival – a day-long festival highlighting the best in Portuguese food, language, music and dance, and culture.
- Uniquely Melbourne – a floating entertainment experience in Docklands.
- Lunar New Year – a celebration of the Year of the Rabbit in Chinatown, featuring lion and dragon dancing, live performances, street food, cultural and educational activities, and more.
- Melbourne International Student Week – a week filled with events and activations to showcase Melbourne and the students who choose to call it home.
- Holi Festival – a two-day multicultural celebration of harmony, colour, music and dance.
- Melbourne Whisky Week – a unique, city-wide event showcasing a range of traditional and diverse spirits and whiskies.
Crowd favourites such as the Night Noodle Markets, Vida Melbourne Latin Festival, Kids Day Out, International Dumpling Festival and NGV Kids Summer Festival will also return as part of the 2023 program – drawing hundreds of thousands of visitors to the CBD.
The Event Partnership Program supports dozens of events each year which bolster the city’s vibrancy, as well as driving visitation and spend.
A number of City of Melbourne supported events are still to come this year, including the Melbourne International Jazz Festival, Fringe Festival and a new Alexander McQueen exhibition at the NGV.
Planning is also underway for an extraordinary Christmas Festival in the lead up to New Year’s Eve celebrations.
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