Thousands descend on Shediac for sold-out, first-time Renaissance faire

Hannah Rudderham · CBC News

· Posted: Aug 21, 2026 5:00 AM EDT | Last Updated: August 21

Tourists in medieval attire will be flocking to southeast New Brunswick this weekend for the first Shediac Renaissance Faire.

Tickets for both event days are sold out and campgrounds and many local accommodations are booked up.

Andrew Barriault, from just outside Corner Brook, N.L., is travelling to Shediac for the festival. He bought a resale ticket since the event had already sold out — and he still doesn't have a place to stay.

"The whole town is pretty well booked out," Barriault said.

"I might be sleeping in my car in my costume, but, you know, if it was actually medieval times, then you'd end up sleeping outside in the woods, so it's not so bad."

The Shediac Renaissance Faire is a two-day festival at the Neptune Drive-in for the first time. It will include a marketplace of vendors, live entertainment, live-action role-playing, hourly workshops and more.

Sébastien Després, the owner of the company putting on the festival, Shediac Wonderland, said there are thousands of people who have messaged or called to see if there are more tickets still available since selling out.

Després said his team knew the idea would be a hit, but they didn't know to what degree.

"We knew it would go over really well, but to say we expected the numbers that we're going to get, no, nobody would have expected that."

The idea was first floated when the Shediac Wonderland team was in the middle of planning its Bazar Neptune — a sunset market at the drive-in. They were discussing ways to make every weekend attractive and a mini Renaissance faire was suggested.

"We quickly realized that it wouldn't be a mini Renaissance faire — it would be a small-scale Renaissance faire," Després said. "And then, when we announced it and when we started promo-ing it, the numbers just absolutely exploded."

Després said roughly two-thirds of the weekend's crowd are coming from away.

He said that after le Quinzou, or National Acadian Day, on Aug. 15, tourism season in Shediac starts to die down a bit. So he thought that by adding a weekend festival in between National Acadian Day and Dieppe's YQM Country Fest, it would keep the tourism momentum in the region going.

And he's not worried about the town's ability to adapt to some added tourists, noting that other big events, such as the Shediac Lobster Festival, also bring in business to local vendors. 

"So I'm adding a large-scale event at the end of the summer," Després said.

"Shediac will do fantastically. Shediac is built for this."

Michel Mallet, the park manager with Parlee Beach Provincial Park, said the park partnered with Shediac Wonderland to host some of the evening events and provide parking. Mallet said that with nearly 6,000 tickets sold for the events, parking is crucial and the park has space to accommodate that.

The Parlee Beach Provincial Park campground is also nearly full for the weekend, indicating to Mallet that people are coming to the region for the event and will be taking advantage of other tourism operators, such as other accommodations and restaurants. 

"The popularity of it is definitely surprising in terms of numbers, which is positive," Mallet said. "I think [Després] understood there's a market for that type of event, and I'm glad he is bringing this type of traffic in our region."

Meanwhile, Barriault has a ferry ride and long drive ahead of him before he gets to Shediac for the event. 

But he's excited, as a solo attendee, to meet like-minded people on the weekend.

"We're kind of moving into a world where people aren't embarrassed for their hobbies anymore," Barriault said. "You're allowed to be a complete nerd over whatever you want to be. If that's [Dungeons and Dragons] and Renaissance faires, or that's certain video games, or it's crochet.

"There's a community now for anything, and that's a good thing, and it lets people flex their creative ... muscles a little bit."