FAM: Food. Art. Market

FAM stands for Food. Art. Market, and it is Karangahape Road doing what it does best on a mid-month Saturday. Beresford Square sits at the centre of it, filled with stalls, music and activity, and the rest of the morning fans out from there — along Pitt Street, through St Kevins Arcade and into the independent shops and galleries that make up the road.

For families it works because there is no single queue to join and nothing to book. Children can eat their way along the stalls, watch the music, and be steered into an art tour or a craft activity if the mood takes. It is free to come, it runs through most of the year rather than as a one-off season, and it suits older children particularly well — there is enough going on to hold their attention, and the surrounding street is part of the outing rather than a corridor to get through.