Taste of Park Ridge Returns With Live Music, Global Bites and Free Admission for a Three-Day Downtown Summer Tradition

PARK RIDGE, IL — The annual Taste of Park Ridge is back this weekend, bringing three days of food, music and family-friendly entertainment to the city’s Uptown district. The festival has been a summer fixture for nearly 30 years and remains one of the community’s biggest warm-weather gatherings.

Visitors can expect food from a wide range of vendors, along with free admission and free parking. The event also offers drink and alcoholic beverage sales, making it a full-scale street festival for attendees who want to spend the day browsing, eating and listening to live music.

Live music leads the weekend lineup

The entertainment starts Thursday at 6 p.m. with Serendipity, a pop and rock band opening the festival in Uptown Park Ridge. The evening continues with the official opening ceremony and a set from 7th Heaven at 8:30 p.m., setting the tone for a lineup built around familiar crowd-pleasers.

Other scheduled acts across the July 9 to 11 weekend include Stonedrift, Hello Weekend, The Renditions, The Ginger Road and Kashmir, a Led Zeppelin tribute act, among others. Thursday’s programming is set to end at 10:30 p.m., while the rest of the festival runs later into the evening.

A festival with roots in downtown business district growth

Taste of Park Ridge began in 2000 as “Taste of Uptown,” created by then Uptown Park Ridge Business Association president Barbara Scharringhausen and Dean Patras to add energy to the annual Summer Sidewalk Sale. What started as a local business booster eventually grew into a signature city event.

Three years later, the Park Ridge Chamber of Commerce and the City of Park Ridge brought in a professional event planner to help run the street festival. In 2005, then Mayor Howard Frimark secured the seed funding that helped turn it into a permanent tradition.

What festivalgoers will find in Uptown Park Ridge

The food side of the festival mixes classic American fair staples such as barbecue and burgers with Mexican, Japanese, Indian and Italian offerings. Organizers say the idea is to give attendees a broad sampling of local and regional favorites while keeping the event accessible to families.

Taste of Park Ridge takes place in Uptown on Summit Avenue between Touhy Avenue and Prospect Avenue, next to the Park Ridge Metra station. With music, food and family activities spread throughout the weekend, the festival is built for visitors who want an easy downtown outing without an admission cost.

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