First-Ever Sunset Night Market Exceeds All Expectations

By Supervisor Joel Engardio

More than 10,000 people showed up to the first-ever Sunset Night Market on September 15. Longtime residents said they’ve never seen that many people gathered on Irving Street or anywhere in the Sunset before.

What explains such a large crowd? Certainly people wanted a night market experience. But I believe the overwhelming response was because we needed it.

We need to bring people together, make streets safer, and give small businesses a boost in San Francisco. This is what a night market does.

We need a space to create joy and a night market celebrates all the fun things in life — food, music, and art. 

We need to demonstrate San Francisco is not destined to the doom loop we see on the news. Even when 10,000 people gathered on Irving Street, there were no reported incidents during the night market.

At the opening ceremony, my husband and I explained what the night market means to our community:

News headlines also told the story:

The event opened with a rousing performance by the Lowell High School drum corps and an entertaining cooking demonstration by celebrity chef Martin Yan.

Celebrity Chef Martin Yan gives a cooking demonstration

For the next five hours, there were musical and dancing acts on three stages. There was literal dancing in the street with a DJ at the intersection of 21st Avenue and Irving.

A kids zone featured a giant inflatable slide and games. There was something for all ages. Families with young kids could get an early dinner when the night market opened at 5p and teenagers could hang out enjoying boba tea and music until 10p.

The mayor spoke and gave Chef Yan a proclamation. But my favorite speech was by my husband Lionel Hsu.

He was the inspiration for the night market. Lionel’s family lives in Taipei, which has some of the world’s most famous night markets. We attend those night markets every year. I always thought the Sunset deserves its own night market and now we do. 

Here’s what Lionel had to say:

“I immigrated from Taiwan to America many years ago, and people have been asking me why I love San Francisco so much. I said because it is such a unique place, so inclusive, that everyone can call it home! To me, home is a place with lights and food at night, and the night market is exactly like that — it feels like home! I hope you feel the same. So, please make yourself at home, and have a great time!”

By all accounts everyone had a good time despite the immense crowd and long lines. We simply never could have anticipated 10,000 people showing up, even in our wildest dreams.

There was a positive energy as folks marveled at a community gathering we’ve never seen in the Sunset before.

The first night market was a pilot. Thank you to everyone who showed grace with the experiment. It was just the beginning. The goal is to learn from the pilot and then improve upon the idea. We hope to have monthly night markets next year that rotate to different areas of the Sunset.

We’ll have a lot more food next time and expand the night market two or three more blocks. We will also offer more traditional snacks found at the night markets in Taipei. My husband wants to make sure we have his favorite item: stinky tofu!

Starting something new isn’t easy. Here’s one example: I asked a city department if they could streamline a permit process. They said “no” because a state law was in the way. So I called up Assemblymember Matt Haney and said “we need to change state law!” 

Thanks to Assemblymember Haney, future night markets will be easier to produce across the state.

Another example of overcoming a hurdle was the effort to put the booths in the center of the street. Typical street fairs in San Francisco place the booths against the curb with people walking in the middle of the street. This creates a wall of booths against the physical businesses, which discourages exploration and discovery of everything a merchant corridor offers.

With booths in the center of the street, people can move freely between the booths and the businesses along the sidewalk. This configuration required approval from the fire marshal. We met on Irving Street and measured the street to figure out how we could make center-street booths work while still maintaining a fire lane. 

Thanks to the center-of-street booths, all the brick-and-mortar restaurants along Irving had record business for a single night with lines out the door for hours.

We owe a big “thank you” to all the innovators who made our history-making night market a reality. Angie Petitt and Carol Lau from the Sunset Mercantile curated the entire event. Their colleague Kevin North booked all the musical acts. Avenue Greenlight and the San Francisco Parks Alliance helped get it funded. 

Thank you to all the vendors and brick-and-mortar storefronts who pioneered something new. Many reported their businesses had one of the busiest nights on record. I'm so proud to partner with everyone who believes in the vision.

Thank you to the 10,000 people who showed up to support joy.

This is how we will create our best San Francisco.