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8 Renaissance fairs in & around North Carolina in 2025

By Ryan Pitkin

January 15, 2025

A guide to all the Renaissance fairs and festivals like them planned around North Carolina and the surrounding area in 2025. 

Hear ye, hear ye: There’s never a bad time to travel through time. 

If you have an interest in medieval history, cosplay, turkey legs, or just love a good festival, you must know by now that one of the best times of the year comes when your local Renaissance fair rolls into town. 

Unfortunately, North Carolina doesn’t have a ton of Renaissance fairs spread throughout the state. The selection has slimmed down even further in recent years, as we’ve lost the Mountain Warrior Renaissance Faire in Lansing to the west and the Fort Bragg Renaissance Faire in eastern North Carolina. 

Fret none, those in search of a cup of mead and a bread bowl while browsing medieval vendors still have options, including one of the biggest fairs in the country, which will kick off our list. To make up for the short list of official Renaissance fairs, we’ve thrown in some bonuses, including a few Renaissance-adjacent festivals here in the Tar Heel State and the Ren fairs that are just a short drive across the borders of South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia. 

8 Renaissance fairs in & around North Carolina in 2025

Jousters at the Carolina Renaissance Festival. (Carolina Renaissance Festival)

Carolina Renaissance Festival

16445 Poplar Tent Road, Huntersville

Saturdays and Sundays in October and November 

Named one of the best Renaissance festivals in the United States by the Travel Channel, this enchanted village located in the Charlotte suburb of Huntersville emerges from the woods as if from the pages of a fairytale. 

For eight continuous weekends every October and November, guests of all ages immerse themselves in the splendor of the annual Carolina Renaissance Festival and Artisan Marketplace. Come dressed in casual attire or join the thousands who visit the village donning costumes. In addition to those in Renaissance attire, you’re bound to see characters from space, superheroes, villains, anime, tabletop games, and video games, all of whom are welcomed as “time travelers” to the Carolina Renaissance Festival.

Each festival weekend has unique themed activities, including costume contests with prizes and discount admission opportunities. Longtime favorites include Halloween Daze & Spooky Knights, A Pirate’s Christmas, and Time Travelers’ Weekend. Though this year’s themes have not yet been announced, last year saw new themed weekends like the Opening Weekend Invasion Celebration with Vikings, barbarians, crusaders, orcs, raiders, and more, and Wizards & Revels Weekend, which included a Sorcerers & Spell Casters contest. 

Sixteen stages offer an abundance of continuous music, dance, comedy, and circus entertainment. Many of the shows are spontaneous, with performances on stage and off. The most popular entertainment is surely the jousting between armored knights on horseback, held three times daily in the Queen’s Tournament Arena.

Be sure to check out the more than 140 merchants in the artisan marketplace; the time-honored demonstrations of weaving, glass blowing, blacksmithing, jewelry, pottery, candle making, and the like; an endless array of food for feasting; and interactive exhibits such as the Torture Museum, tomato throwing, and a rock climbing wall.   

Eastern North Carolina Renaissance Faire

401 Fairgrounds Road, Kinston

April 12-13

Back for a fourth annual festival in 2025, the Eastern North Carolina Renaissance Faire in Kinston is quickly building a name as a go-to event for Renaissance festival fans in the spring.

With a goal to bring the community together in revelry and merriment while recapturing the spirit of the Renaissance era and supporting local businesses and homegrown talent, lords and ladies alike will converge on Kinston for this year’s event. 

While the 2025 schedule has not yet been released, last year’s festival included nonstop performances throughout each day from performers including Misfits of Fortune, the Cockatoo Experience, and the Giant Bubble Show (which included an attempt to get into the Guinness Book of World Records for most people in a bubble). 

There are four stages located on the grounds, as well as the Field of Honor, where jousting takes place three times a day. 

Festival of Legends

Sugg Farm, 2401 Grigsby Ave, Holly Springs

April 26-27

Fairy festivals are a bit different from Renaissance fairs, as they celebrate mythology, folklore, and fairy tales (with a dose of current popular fiction) and passionately present an eclectic blend of artistry, music, dance, fantasy costuming, and play. 

The mission statement for Festival of Legends, located just below the Triangle in Holly Springs, declares that organizers strive “to provide an escape from the world while working to improve it at the same time.”

The 12th annual celebration of this fairy festival has a theme: Journeys. So if you were thinking about making a long drive to make a first-time visit this April, there’s your sign. 

This year’s vendors include Crimsonmoon Costumes and Embroidery, Eli Rainwater Books, jewelry from TK Eyecatcher, Reyen Design Studios, and Holy Smoke Incense, among many others. 

Detroit-based Wakefire, a blend of Celtic rock, Slavic punk, and Americana pop, will perform at this year’s festival as well. 

The Viking Experience

1045 Walnut Grove Rd, Oxford

March 22-23 & March 29-30

The Viking Experience NC is a historically inspired entertainment group that provides an immersive experience, allowing fans to interact with its characters and camps. Though they host a variety of events throughout the year and are even available for private affairs, the festival, held each March on the group’s own grounds, is the real experience. 

Modeled on the Viking lifestyle of 1,000 years ago, the Viking Experience Festival takes place on 15 acres of partly wooded land and features interactive characters, reenactors, music, fairy glen, dancing, games, vendors, food, classes, axe throwing, mead tasting, fight pits, skits in the Village Drekhiem, and the After Hours Show.

Add-on tickets are available for additional experiences such as Battlefield Training by The Misfits of Fortune ($20), Adventure Quest by Caverns and Campfires ($20), Dragon Hunting by Ed’s Dinosaur Live ($10), The Mead Experience ($12), a Persian Dance Class by Ethereal Ginnie Fae ($15), and more. 

Loch Norman Highland Games

Historic Rural Hill, 4431 Neck Road, Huntersville

April 12-13

The Loch Norman Highland Games is a traditional Scottish festival that takes place annually at Historic Rural Hill, located near the shores of Lake Norman in North Carolina, where competitors take to the fields to compete in games that can be traced back as far as 4,000 years. This year marks the 31st anniversary of the event. 

Visitors can enjoy traditional Scottish music and dance performances, athletic competitions, cultural demonstrations, Scottish food trucks, Celtic vendors, historical reenactments, and educational presentations about Scottish history and culture.

Make a weekend out of the three-day festival by camping on the groundsallowing you to partake in the whisky, bourbon, and scotch tastings without worrying about who’s your designated driver. 

Bonus Renaissance Fairs over the Border

Upstate Renaissance Faire

Piedmont Interstate Fairgrounds, 575 Fairgrounds Road, Spartanburg, SC

Sept. 12-14

Located just an hour and 20 minutes down I-85 from Charlotte, the Upstate Renaissance Faire launched in 2021 to revitalize small businesses after the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. It has since evolved into an integral part of Upstate culture.​

Harvest Faire

Breezy Hill Meadworks, 15981 Breezy Hill Lane, Smithfield, VA

Sept. 6-7

Springtime in the Shire: May 3-4

The autumnal Harvest Faire, a modern interpretation of a late-15th-century European fall harvest celebration and tournament, has been so successful that this year, they’re introducing a springtime event with archery, sword fighting, merchants, games, food, and more. Located near Norfolk, it’s a 45-minute drive from the northeastern NC border.   

Appalachian Renaissance Faire

520 Doc Hawkins Road, Greeneville, TN

First weekend of November

The story of the Appalachian Renaissance Faire is an exploration into an alternate history where folklore meets fantasy, centered on the story of two twins born to Mary Queen of Scots who fled to Appalachia after their mother’s beheading. It’s about a 40-minute drive from the NC border on Highway 70. 

This article first appeared on Good Info News Wire and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.8 Renaissance fairs in & around North Carolina in 20258 Renaissance fairs in & around North Carolina in 2025

Author

  • Ryan Pitkin

    Ryan Pitkin is a writer and editor based in Charlotte, where he runs an alternative weekly newspaper called Queen City Nerve. He is also editor of NoDa News, a community newsletter in the neighborhood where he has lived for 15 years.

CATEGORIES: THINGS TO DO
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