The Town of Festivals

Photos by Joan Valera

Logo de Turisme de Sitges

La Blanca Subur, or what is today, Sitges. A town known to be a place to holiday, to attend a conference, take weekend trips or enjoy a festival. Disused today, it was back in 2008, when the Ayuntamiento (Town Hall) commissioned a Barcelona based company to design a logo for the branding of Sitges as Sitges, Vila of Festivals. Why?

Because a town like Sitges, steeped in tradition, over time annually held many celebrations. There were celebrations for certain seasons, religious saints and artistic endeavours. Festivals are vital because they can help us understand our history. They also record patterns of cultural importance and change, and even highlight social trends, most recently, the Sitges Gay Pride. Events of a festival also allow opportunities for communities to come together and can broaden our cultural horizons.

In Sitges we see them as making a valuable contribution to the development of our tourism industry. Local businesses in town definitely benefit from new business that a festival brings and we see the event as good for the local community overall.

In the SQ, what we try to do in the In Season (En Temporada) section–is to demystify them. We research the festivals origin, we discover and learn what relation it has with the town and “pay it forward”, or share it with all who observe or participate in the festivities and read the content of our pages.

This Year 2015, in addition to several holidays, we celebrate:

   February 12^th-18^th Carnival of Sitges

   The Parades are on Sunday, the 15^th and Tuesday, the 17^th

   

   March 12^th–15^th International Patchwork Festival

   April 9^th–12^th Jazz Antic Sitges Festival (J.A.S.)

   June 6^th and 7^th The Corpus Festival

   Sunday 7^th, the street carpets made of flowers are on display

   June 18^th-22^nd Sitges Gay Pride

   June 26^th–28^th The Poetry Festival

   August 20^th—25^th Festa Major de Sitges

   Sitges’ main annual fiesta in honour of Saint Bartomeu,

   one of the town’s patron Saints.

   September 22^nd—23^rd Festa de Santa Tecla

   Sitges’ main annual fiesta in honour of Santa Tecla,

   one of the town’s patron Saints.

   October 1^st–31^st Tasta Sitges (A Gastronomic Festival)

   October 4^th–5^th The 53^rd Festa De La Verema—

   Grape Harvest Festival & 8^th Wine Tasting Experience

   October 9^th–18^th

   The 48^th Sitges International Fantastic Film Festival of Catalunya

And of course, we celebrate the festivities of Christmas on December 25^th, continuing through to the Three Kings Parade (La Cavalcada de Reis or La Cabalgata de Reyes) in January.

Although the authorities have decided to build the local economy on tourism, personally, I believe a better way forward for Sitges would be to diversify its economy. It would better carry us through times of global crises and slumps in the travel trade… putting that aside, what better way is there to spend your time in Sitges, a “vila of festivals”?