New York City is a multicultural hub with dozens of museums, hundreds of parks and millions of people. The number of potential things to see and do can feel overwhelming, but NY1 has you covered with some of the highlights taking place this weekend across the five boroughs.
Hong Kong Dragon Boat Festival
Aug. 8 and 9 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day
Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Queens
More information here
The 36th annual Hong Kong Dragon Boat Festival honors the Year of the Horse with dragon boat races that bring together culture, competition and family-friendly fun, according to organizers.
Dragon boat racing dates back thousands of years in China, and this event features nearly 200 teams of paddlers racing in tune with the rhythm of a drum.
The free rain-or-shine festival will also host performances, food and music.
STooPS Summer Festival
Saturday, Aug. 8 from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m.
Decatur Street, Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn
More information here
Bed-Stuy’s free annual block party and art crawl features all kinds of live performances, from music to dance to theater.
The 13th annual festival also spotlights visual art and hosts activities for children. The main action takes place on Decatur Street between Lewis and Stuyvesant avenues.
(Spectrum News NY1/Roger Clark)
Celebrate the Caribbean
Saturday, Aug. 8 from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Brooklyn Children’s Museum
More information here
Dancing, food and arts and crafts all come together to celebrate the culture of the Caribbean’s island nations at the Brooklyn Children’s Museum on Saturday.
From designing carnival headdresses to playing steelpans, there will be different activities throughout the day for families to enjoy.
Chalk on the Wild Side
Sunday, Aug. 9 from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.
Clawson Playground, Staten Island
More information here
NYC Parks rangers will teach attendees about the different ecosystems where the various animals of Staten Island live.
Kids and families can then use chalk to draw an ideal enviornment for any number of the local urban wildlife.
8/9 🎨 Take a chalk on the wild side to visually explore ecosystems, biomes, and food webs with the Rangers: https://t.co/iZ5jY6P3LO
— NYC Parks (@NYCParks) August 6, 2026
‘Summer Streets’
Saturday, Aug. 8 from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Various Manhattan streets
More information here
Summer Streets continues this weekend with more car-free plazas for pedestrians and cyclists to enjoy.
The walk- and bike-friendly spaces will include music, activities and other family-friendly fun.
The following streets will be closed to car traffic from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday:
Lafayette Street and Park Avenue between Brooklyn Bridge and East 110th Street
East 110th Street between Park Avenue and Broadway
Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard between West 110th Street and West 113th Street
Broadway between West 110th Street and Dyckman Street
Head to the Beach
Open for the summer
Across the city
More information here
Beaches across the city will stay open through the weekend after Labor Day.
Lifeguards will be on duty every day from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Swimming is prohibited during their off-hours.
Mark your calendars: NYC beaches officially open for the season on May 23. Get ready for boardwalk walks, post-swim snacks, ocean breezes, and long summer days by the water! pic.twitter.com/VI7ZXboNL8
— NYC Parks (@NYCParks) May 12, 2026
Luna Park
Open for the season
Coney Island, Brooklyn
More information here
Luna Park in Coney Island is open for the season, with its full lineup of rides, treats and “high-flying excitement.”
Visitors can ride the iconic Cyclone roller coaster, play arcade games, get food or shop around.
Queens Night Market
Saturdays from 4 p.m. to midnight through Aug. 22
Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Queens
More information here
The Queens Night Market has returned for its 11th season.
The market is a family-friendly, open-air event that features 100 independent vendors selling merchandise, art and food. There are also performances that organizers say, along with the vendors, celebrate “the rich cultural diversity and heritage of NYC and Queens.”
Smorgasburg
Open for the season
Thursdays and Fridays: World Trade Center
Saturdays: Marsha P. Johnson State Park, Williamsburg
Sundays: Prospect Park, Brooklyn
More information here
The city’s annual warm weather food frenzy is back, and organizers say it features one of their biggest lineups yet.
More than 70 vendors offering global bites, longtime favorites and experimental new concepts will set up in Manhattan every Thursday and Friday — and then in Brooklyn every weekend — through October.
If you can’t make it out to one of their sites, you can still enjoy dining al fresco at a restaurant near you, as the city’s roadway dining program has officially returned for the season.
Movies Under the Stars
Events throughout summer
Across the city
More information here
Movies Under the Stars is back at NYC Parks. The city agency is putting on more than 150 family-friendly film screenings across the five boroughs.
Bring your own blanket, chairs and snacks and find a free event near you here.
Join us for a free flick near you! Bring your blankets to cozy up to one of our Movies Under the Stars across the five boroughs all summer long! pic.twitter.com/pkBmRu4COJ
— NYC Parks (@NYCParks) May 28,
2026
SummerStage
Shows through Oct. 1
Across the city
More information here
More than 60 shows — most of them free — will take place at 13 locations across the five boroughs this summer as the city’s annual SummerStage program returns for its 40th year.
Central Park’s Rumsey Playfield hosts many of the shows, including benefit concerts that support the City Parks Foundation.
For those interested in the history of the annual event, a new exhibit at the Arsenal Gallery in Central Park showcases photographs dating back to the concert festival’s founding. It will be open until Aug. 21.
‘Greater New York’
Open through Aug. 17
MoMA PS1, Queens
More information here
MoMA PS1 calls its annual “Greater New York” exhibit a “signature survey of artists living and working in the New York City area.”
This year’s sixth edition spans all levels of the museum’s school building and features the work of more than 50 multidisciplinary artists.
Whitney Biennial 2026
Open through Aug. 23
Whitney Museum, Manhattan
More information here
The Whitney Museum says its biennial exhibit is the “the longest-running survey of contemporary art in the United States.”
The 82nd edition features the work of 56 artists and reflects the current moment by examining “interspecies kinships, familial relations, geopolitical entanglements, technological affinities, shared mythologies, and infrastructural supports.”
Sotheby’s ‘Botero in New York’ Exhibit
Jul. 22 to Sept. 7
Sotheby’s Breuer Building
More information here
Presented at one of the “world’s most vibrant art capitals,” the exhibition will include important works of art on loan from The Botero Foundation until Sept. 7.
In addition, a collection of work featuring Fernando Botero’s voluminous, ironic figures will be available for sale.
‘Self-Made: A Century of Inventing Artists’
Open through Sept. 13
American Folk Art Museum, Manhattan
More information here
This exhibit at the always-free American Folk Art Museum on the Upper West Side takes a look at how artists without formal training have depicted and defined themselves on their own terms.
There are 60 artists featured, with paintings, sculptures, photos and other forms, all on display. The selection showcases those who have worked outside the lineage of artistic networks.
(Spectrum News NY1/Roger Clark)
BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn!
Events through Sept. 19
Manhattan venues and Brooklyn Bowl
More information here
A slate of annual free performances at Prospect Park has returned for the summer as the BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! festival enters its 47th season.
There will be 15 free shows and three benefit shows, all of which support Prospect Park. This year’s lineup includes Common, Patti LaBelle, Katie Yamasaki, Lady Wray, Victory Boyd, and Reggae with Wayne Wonder and Lila Iké.
(Courtesy Edwina
Hay)
‘Flower Power’ at NYBG
Open through Oct. 18
New York Botanical Garden, the Bronx
More information here
This recently-opened exhibit at New York Botanical Garden celebrates flowers as a cultural symbol of peace and love.
In addition to flowers, visitors can expect to see all things related to the “flower power” movement — like art and fashion from the ’60s, including works from Andy Warhol and Milton Glaser. There are also painted Volkswagen vans, giant peace signs and large hand-painted fabric canopies.
Plenty of activities are scattered throughout the exhibit, including friendship bracelet-making and ticketed liquid light shows with live bands.
Flower Power is a new exhibition at the New York Botanical Garden, opening May 23. (Spectrum News NY1)
‘Uptown Visions’
Open through Nov. 1
Hispanic Society Museum & Library, Manhattan
More information here
This year’s selection for the Hispanic Society Museum & Library’s “Art on Audubon Terrace” exhibit, “Uptown Visions” by Harlem-based painter Tom Sanford is meant to capture the “joy, rhythm, and layered experience of Uptown summer life.”
Featuring scenes of basketball, cart vendors and communal energy, the work was inspired by Joaquín Sorolla’s mural series, “Vision of Spain,” which depicted the people and customs of the country.
MoMI LAB
Now open
Museum of the Moving Image, Queens
More information here
Queens’ Museum of the Moving Image has opened a free new space for people to check out newly emerging technology.
The MoMI LAB is located in the museum’s lower level, and welcomes the public to “discover, create, and reflect in this space where people from varied backgrounds can interact with new technologies and each other.”
‘For the Win’
Now open
American Museum of Natural History
More information here
A new exhibit at the American Museum of Natural History celebrates “the objects that define athletic greatness.”
There are more than 70 items covering over 150 years of sports history, including gold medals, trophies and championship rings.
New Museum
Open Tuesday to Sunday
235 Bowery, Manhattan
More information here
The New Museum in Manhattan has reopened following a 60,000-square-foot expansion. The new space features twice the gallery size, new elevators, new venues, an entrance plaza and an atrium staircase, among other additions.
Alongside several new commissions, “New Humans: Memories of the Future” will be the inaugural exhibition. The museum says it showcases “works by more than 200 artists, writers, scientists, architects, and filmmakers to explore how dramatic technological and societal changes have spurred new conceptions of what it means to be ‘human.’”