The tent poles go up on Mainstreet the same week every July, and by Friday afternoon the block between 6th and 14th smells like grill smoke, sunscreen, and something raspberry. This is the 92nd year of it. If you already live in Hopkins, you don't need convincing to walk down. You need a plan for how to spend the weekend so you're not eating a pulled pork sandwich while your favorite chef's tasting menu sits three doors away.
The one thing that has changed since last July
The Raspberry Festival has been anchored to the third weekend of July for 92 years, and the bones of the weekend haven't moved. What has moved is what surrounds it. Mainstreet in 2026 is not the Mainstreet of 2022. Minnesota Monthly, writing about the arrival of Bar Siena earlier this year, put it plainly: Hopkins is where high-quality, high-talent kitchens are landing right now, on top of a base of quality bar-and-grills that have always been on Mainstreet.
That is the frame for this weekend. The festival is the old Mainstreet, kept alive by volunteers who work all year to support the mission. The dining row that now stretches from Pink Ivy at the east end to Brasa and Bar Siena at the west is the new one. For three days in July, they share the same three blocks. Plan across both, not one.
The weekend at a glance
| Day | Anchor event | Where |
|---|---|---|
| Wed, Jul 15 | Wine Walk, 4pm | Mainstreet |
| Thu, Jul 16 | Steel Bridges Band kickoff, 7pm | Downtown Park |
| Sat, Jul 18 | Marketplace Craft Fair, 9am–4pm | 6th to 14th Ave |
| Sat, Jul 18 | Raspberry Festival of Bands, 10am–4pm | Downtown Park |
| Sun, Jul 19 | Raspberry Run, 1pm | Shady Oak Lake to Mainstreet |
| Sun, Jul 19 | Grande Day Parade, 1pm | Mainstreet |
Dates and times come from the festival's own schedule and the Hopkins Westwind Concert Band's event listing for the Festival of Bands.
Wednesday and Thursday: the warm-up nobody uses
Most residents treat the festival as a weekend. It isn't. It opens Wednesday with the 2nd Annual Hopkins Raspberry Festival Wine Walk, and Thursday night is live music from the Steel Bridges Band at 7pm to kick off the 2026 festival. These are the two nights when Mainstreet is festive but not crowded, which makes them the best nights to actually sit down for dinner.
Two suggestions for the sit-down, both new to the street in the last year and change:
- Pink Ivy Kitchen and Bar, on the corner of 7th and Mainstreet. Chef Michael Shaughnessy's menu has been named a Star Tribune Minnesota's Best Gold Winner for Best New Restaurant, one of Mpls.St.Paul Magazine's Top 50 Restaurants, and Hopkins Business of the Year. This is the reservation night, not Saturday.
- K'kinaco Nikkei & Pisco Bar, the Japanese-Peruvian spot in the middle of Mainstreet that Minnesota Monthly grouped with Pink Ivy, Brasa, and Bar Siena as the new anchors of the row.
Skip Saturday for either of these. Both will be swamped.
Saturday morning: the Marketplace is bigger than people remember
Family Day on Saturday runs long. The Marketplace Craft Fair opens at 9am and holds Mainstreet from 6th Avenue to 14th Avenue and Central Park, with roughly 300 exhibitors and 20 food booths, admission free. A block away, the Hopkins Westwind Concert Band hosts the Raspberry Festival of Bands at Downtown Park, 40 9th Ave S, from 10am to 4pm.
If you have kids, the highest-density stop is the Mainstreet Clocktower, where Mess Hall Arts sets up craft tables and, per the festival schedule, kids age six and up can try pottery. The community Raspberry sticker mural is worth a walk-by even if you don't have anyone to color for you.
A note on the button. The festival sells a Raspberry Button every year, and the medallion hunt is real. As the festival puts it, a medallion about the size of your palm is hidden somewhere in Hopkins during the festival, and the person who finds it first earns a $300 cash prize. Buy a button from a Mainstreet vendor before Saturday if you want to be eligible.
The mid-Saturday eating problem
Here is the friction nobody warns you about. The Marketplace has 20 food booths, and they are fine. They are also the same booths you saw last year. Meanwhile, four of the most-talked-about kitchens in the west metro are within a two-minute walk, and half the crowd on the street doesn't seem to know it.
A working plan:
Lunch, casual. LTD Brewing throws the Berry Block Party from noon on Saturday, July 18, with SuperFrank on the outdoor stage at 6:30pm. This is the festival's unofficial anchor for anyone who wants a beer, shade, and to still be within earshot of the parade route the next day.
Lunch, sit-down. Bar Siena, at 1601 Mainstreet, is the newest opening on the row. Chef Rhett Roberts has cooked at Vincent, 112 Eatery, Surly's Brewers Table, Fig + Farro, and most recently Petite Leon. A quiet detail worth knowing: Minnesota Monthly reported that a legal challenge from a Chicago restaurant group means the name is changing to some form of Hendrix and Siena, reflecting both of the Roberts' twin 6-year-olds. If you go in July and the sign has swapped, that is why.
Dessert. This is the addition that changes the weekend. A to Z Creamery, at 705 Mainstreet, is the small-batch artisan ice cream company from Zach Vraa expanding from online-only pints to a soft-serve ice cream shop in spring 2026. The pint drop model continues, but per Mpls.St.Paul Magazine, the new storefront also offers soft-serve and baked goods for passersby who want to pop in for a twist, with weekend hours. In other words: soft serve on Mainstreet, mid-parade, for the first Raspberry Festival ever.
Saturday night: the old Mainstreet gets its turn
The new Mainstreet is not the whole story, and pretending it is misses the point of the festival. Saturday night, the schedule tilts back to the traditions that have carried this thing for nine decades.
Wild Boar Bar and Grill, which hosts the Hopkins Raspberry Association pull tabs and meat raffles and sponsors the annual fireworks show during Raspberry Jam in Central Park, runs Rockin Raspberry Bingo. The Raspberry Royalty Coronation and Royal Ball follow, with community members and dozens of visiting Royalty from around Minnesota. Mainstreet Bar & Grill at 814 Mainstreet, and Tuttle's up the block, both post live music through the weekend.
If you have never gone to the Royal Ball, go once. The Queen and Princesses selected there serve for a full year as ambassadors traveling to represent the community of Hopkins, and the coronation is one of the last civic rituals in the west metro that still fills a room.
Sunday: the race, the parade, and the sandwich
Sunday belongs to two events happening on top of each other. The Hopkins Raspberry Run was founded in 1964 by Twin Cities Track Club founder Patrick Lanin, and the 5-mile still follows the traditional route around Shady Oak Lake before finishing on Main Street prior to the parade. The Main Street Mile, added in 2010, runs the same finish. Both feed into the Grande Day Parade at 1pm.
After the parade, the festival's most durable food tradition takes over. Hopkins VFW Post 425 hosts a pulled pork sandwich, potato salad and beans lunch following the Grande Day Parade. It costs less than anything on the new row, the line moves, and the money stays in the post.
If you still have appetite by late afternoon, the Marketplace has cleared but the reunion cruise brings back memories of the glory days of cruising Hopkins Mainstreet in the 50s, 60s and 70s. Pull up a chair on a patio and watch it roll through. This is the moment the two Mainstreets are most obviously the same street.
What this weekend tells you about Hopkins
Every neighborhood in the west metro has a summer festival. Most of them are one thing: a farmers' market that grew, or a parade that got bigger. Hopkins is different because two economies are visibly stacked on top of each other for 72 hours. The VFW pulled pork and the Pink Ivy tasting menu are 400 feet apart. The Big Wheel race and the chef who came from Petite Leon share a sidewalk.
If you own a home here, that stacking is the story of your street's next five years. If you know someone considering a move into Hopkins, the third weekend of July is the weekend to invite them.
For residents thinking further ahead about what a changing Mainstreet means for their own next move, whether that is right-sizing to something smaller nearby or planning a move up in the west metro, Denise Sartor at Sartor Homes is available to talk it through. Let's Connect.
