Dimitria Festival
The city's own cultural institution, rooted in the Byzantine fair of its patron saint and revived in 1966.
The Dimitria is the most genuinely local event Thessaloniki has. It wasn't imported and it wasn't designed for tourists: it comes straight out of the city's history and the name of its patron saint.
The roots
The original Dimitria was the great trade fair held outside the Golden Gate, the western gate in the walls, around the feast of Saint Demetrios. In Byzantine times it was among the most important commercial events in the empire: merchants from the Balkans, Italy and the East came down to Thessaloniki, and for days the city became market and festival at once.
The 1966 revival
The institution returned in 1966, on the initiative of the Greek tourism organisation's events service. The opening ceremony took place on 4 October 1966 and the programme comprised eleven events: concerts, theatre and dance performances, and painting exhibitions.
That first edition involved the State Theatre of Northern Greece, the Greek National Opera and the Lyceum Club of Greek Women, while the artists included Manos Katrakis, Spyros Vassiliou and Polykleitos Rengos. The institution has since passed sixty editions.
What it is today
The Dimitria is organised by the Municipality of Thessaloniki and spreads across the whole city: concerts, theatre, dance, visual arts, performance and neighbourhood events. Its character is deliberately open, many of the events are free and take place in public spaces.
It is not a single-genre festival like the film or documentary festivals. It is an umbrella under which the city presents what it is making artistically within one season.
Thessaloniki's October
The Dimitria falls in the most Thessalonian month of the year. On 26 October the city honours Saint Demetrios — the same date on which, in 1912, the Greek army entered the city — and two days later comes the great 28 October parade along the waterfront. Those three days compress religious feast, national anniversary and culture into one.
Good to know
- The programme and exact dates are announced each year by the Municipality of Thessaloniki.
- Many events are free to attend, but popular performances need booking.
- Combine it with a visit to Agios Dimitrios, the city's largest church and a UNESCO monument, and its crypt.