Granville Island

Granville Island is a trendy district with restaurants, theatres, art studios and a Public Market on the south side of False Creek in downtown Vancouver.

Lots of events happen at Granville Island including the Vancouver International Boat Show, PuSh Festival shows and Lantern City activities in late winter.

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The District of Granville Island

Granville Island has an interesting set up. The place includes industrial activities (like a cement plant) and streets of parking combined with boutiques, art studios, places to eat and theatres scattered around. It’s an eclectic neighbourhood and one of the Lower Mainland’s most popular tourist destinations.

If you like shopping, especially for unique gifts and handmade artisan products, you’ll love Granville Island. It’s also an exceptional place for restaurants, live theatre and waterfront views of the Vancouver skyline.

Granville Island at Night

Getting to Granville Island

Granville Island is located in False Creek on the edge of downtown Vancouver under the Granville Street Bridge. The address for the Public Market is 1680 Johnston Street. The area is most easily accessible by car, but there is also fairly decent public bus transit.

During normal times, you have to pay for parking in the area between 11:00 am and 6:00 pm. The cost is $3 per hour until September 30th. After that, and until May, the winter rate of $2 per hour applies. Before 11:00 am and after 6:00 pm, though, year-round, parking is free.

For the official Granville Island website visit granvilleisland.com.

Enjoying a Treat at Granville Island — Enjoying a Treat in the Public Market

Granville Island Things to See & Do

Granville Island is a popular place year round. In the summer the place is especially vibrant and there is often live entertainment outside. Around Christmas there are festive lights, and throughout the year there are plays to watch, events to enjoy and restaurants to eat at. The views of the city across the water are spectacular 365 days of the year.

At Granville Island there is a world-famous indoor Public Market with vendors selling everything from fresh fruit and fish, to cheese, pastries and maple syrup. There are also boutiques selling beautiful and unique artisan products in the Net Loft, in Railspur Alley and all around the area. Granville Island is also home to a wide variety of art studios, galleries, restaurants and theatres.

To learn more about the shopping opportunities, and to see a couple of videos about some of the area’s most interesting stores, see our article about Shopping on Granville Island.

False Creek from Granville Island at Night — City Views from Granville Island

Granville Island Entertainment

Granville Island is full of places for entertainment. In addition to the bars and restaurants, and the buskers in the summer, there are a number of theatres on the island. There’s the Arts Club’s Granville Island Stage, the Waterfront Theatre, and The Improv Centre.

The Arts Club Theatre Company hosts high quality live shows. The Improv Centre is also a fun place featuring comedy improv.

Other performing arts venues include The Nest, Revue Stage and Performance Works. The Vancouver Fringe Festival is a popular live theatre festival that takes place on Granville Island in the fall.

To learn more about live theatre in the area, see our articles about the Arts Club and The Improv Centre.

Granville Island Stage Theatre at Night — Granville Island Stage at Night

Where to Eat and Drink

Granville Island is full of great places to eat and drink, from fine dining restaurants to unique take-out places in the Public Market‘s food court area. Below are a few places that stand out for us.

Bridges Restaurant – a pub-style restaurant with an outdoor patio by the waterfront.
Dockside Restaurant – a popular casual yet upscale restaurant at the Granville Island Hotel at 1253 Johnston Street. They have a really nice patio at the back in the summer.
Granville Island Brewing – a brew pub located across the street from the Kids Market at 1441 Cartwright Street.
Liberty Distillery – located at 1494 Old Bridge Street at the entrance to Railspur Alley, this is a great place to enjoy locally-made organic craft spirits. They also give tours of their distillery.
Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts (Blue Hat Bistro) – a restaurant that’s also one of the city’s finest culinary schools. It’s near the entrance to Granville Island at 101-1505 West 2nd Avenue. (Note: This restaurant closed temporarily in 2020 and remains closed as of January 15th, 2021.)
Tony’s Fish and Oyster Café – at 1511 Anderson Street near the entrance to Granville Island, it’s a good place to get fish & chips, clam chowder and oysters in the half shell.
Vancouver Fish Co. – next door to Tony’s, this is a popular and fancier place for fish and seafood.

The above are just a few of the many restaurants in the area. There are lots of other great places in the Public Market too. For a more comprehensive list of places to eat and drink, see our article about Granville Island Restaurants.

Dockside Restaurant Outdoor Patio — Dockside Restaurant Patio

Market Food Vendors Video

To give you an idea of what to expect with respect to food vendors at the Public Market, check out the following video. It features many of the places where you can find things to eat right away, either in the market or outside by the waterfront, or take with you for a picnic somewhere else.

The focus of the following video is on the food vendors selling ready-made items. As you’ll see there are stalls selling everything from pizza to Chinese, fresh-squeezed juices, salads, Mexican and bubble tea. To see a video about other types of vendors in the area, check out the video in our article about the Granville Island Public Market.

Granville Island Events

Granville Island hosts a number of special events during the year including the following:

Arts-Related Events

Winter Jazz – live music at various venues in February (although not in 2023). Shows in recent years have been free and taken place at Performance Works at 1218 Cartwright Street.
Flamenco, Tango and Wine Night – one of several events that’s part of the Carnaval del Sol festival in the summer.
Vancouver International Flamenco Festival – a dance festival with both free and ticketed events in September.
Vancouver International Jazz Festival – a large music festival in late June and over the Canada Day long weekend. Both free and ticketed concerts take place all over Vancouver, including at Granville Island.
Vancouver Fringe Festival – a multi-day event featuring all kinds of live theatre performances. It takes place at various venues on Granville Island as a well as a couple of other places in Vancouver in September.

FOXTRAIL ADVENTURES ON GRANVILLE ISLAND

If you ever see teams of 2 to 6 people running around Granville Island looking for things, they might be doing a Foxtrail Scavenger Hunt. The adventures are a lot of fun. They start in Yaletown and then make there way around the region. If you are looking for a fun activity, check them out!

Other Events on Granville Island

Vancouver Boat Show – marine equipment and vessels at both BC Place Stadium and Granville Island in February.
Vancouver International Children’s Festival – a multi-day event featuring kid-friendly shows and activities in late May.
Spot Prawn Festival – a seafood-related event at Fishermen’s Wharf in May. (It doesn’t take place at Granville Island itself. It’s just a short walk away though.)
Christmas & Holiday Lights – from mid-November until the beginning of January the neighbourhood gets decorated with festive lights and illuminations.
Winter Solstice Lantern Festival – lantern-making workshops, fire-spinning performances and a procession of people around Granville Island as well as at a couple of other Vancouver locations on December 21st each year.

The above are some of the largest and most well-known events that take place in the area. To see what’s coming up soon see the Granville Island Events Website.