Chatham-Kent’s Crowfest Returns for a Second Year

By Rylee Livingston

Chatham-Kent is opening its doors to all things crow for second year in a row.

Crowfest, which began in 2022, is running for four days from Oct. 11- 14 on King Street in Chatham Kent.

Andrew Thiel is the manager of Abstract Marketing and is also one of the festival organizers. He says the festival was invented as a solution to the area’s crow problem.

“We had been talking about the idea of having something to celebrate the crows,” said Thiel. “Up until a few years ago they were kind of perceived as negative. We decided to say, you know what, the crows outnumber the people in Southwestern Ontario, so we might as well turn this into a positive.”

According to organizers, the event had a very successful start last year, with around 20,000 people in attendance. This year they are on track to doubling that number, with 100 vendors booked, more than 50 businesses participating and some generous sponsors.

“The community has been super supportive,” said Thiel. “We’ve got some great sponsors. Our title sponsors are St. Clair College, Waste Connections of Canada, Abstract Marketing and the Municipality of Chatham-Kent.”

Featuring art classes, a costume contest, vendors, food and beverages, Crowfest offers little bit of everything. The festival kicks off on Wednesday with the Old Crow’s Tea, followed by a Murder Mystery Gala on Thursday. But the main draw of the festival are the buskers.

“Can’t say enough about them,” said Thiel. “They are word renown. They are the absolute best at what they do and it’s a lot of fun to watch.”

With everything from musicians, jugglers and magicians to aerialists, sword-swallowers and fire-breathers, Crowfest has attracted the best of the best when it comes to unconventional performers.

One of these performers is Jack Wise, a magician based in Dublin, Ireland. He travelled to Chatham for the festival for the second time. Wise said he hopes that Crowfest will become part of the Canadian busker festival circuit, attracting even more performers.

“I think Canada’s really lucky in that you’ve got a long-standing circuit of brilliant festivals,” said Wise. “You’ve got Halifax, Waterloo and now Crowfest is going to probably follow suit because the community is really supportive of it.”

In addition to the buskers, live performers in character costumes will be wandering King Street as part of the entertainment. These costumes, including three crows, a pirate and a river troll were created by Michelle Boots of Kobbled Characters. New this year is the more than six-foot-tall river troll.

“This last summer we made a troll,” said Boots. “His name is Boots. He has these giant feet that he wears and he’s got these big mittens with claws that he wears. The actor can see through the hump on his back.”

Boots said it is amazing to see her creations come to life.

“I have built this relationship with this character or with this device,” said Boots. “Then to see someone look at that and say, ‘Oh, I’m going to make it behave this way, this is my crow in my brain.’…It’s really fun. It’s really rewarding to see.”

Crowfest is running from Wednesday Oct. 11 to Saturday Oct. 14.

For more information, including a full schedule of events, visit www.crowfestck.com.