Fall for Five Points

A neighborhood street festival in Raleigh's Five Points, run by the businesses around the intersection and free to attend.

Five Points is one of the older commercial nodes in Raleigh, a genuine five-way junction with independent shops, restaurants and the Rialto cinema around it. A street festival there works because the neighborhood is already walkable rather than because somebody closed a road.

Typical of the day:

• Vendor and craft stalls
• Live music
• Food from the surrounding restaurants
• Activities for children
• The shops themselves, open and busy

Our read: neighborhood festivals are the most useful kind to visit if you are considering a part of town you do not know. Seven hours in Five Points on a festival Saturday tells you more about whether you would want to spend time there than any number of weekday drives through it.

Parking is street parking in a residential area, which means arriving early or being prepared to walk several blocks. The residential streets around Five Points are pleasant to walk and the extra distance is not a hardship.

Free to attend.

The Rialto anchors this corner of Raleigh and the surrounding businesses are genuinely independent rather than chains wearing local signage. Treat the festival as an introduction and the shops as the reason to come back on an ordinary Saturday when you can actually get in the door.