Can Boston winter like Canada? This year's 'Frostival' will test it out

Editor's Note: This is an excerpt from WBUR's Saturday morning newsletter, The Weekender. If you like what you read and want it in your inbox, sign up here. 

Bostonians have long lamented the city’s annual “hibernation.” Faced with winter’s inclement weather, darker days and a dearth of outdoor events, many of us hole up rather than bear the elements to socialize with others.

This isn’t the case in all cold-weather cities. As Cognoscenti contributor Miles Howard wrote in 2024, five hours to our north, Montreal holds lively multi-week festivals through the depths of winter with live music, food and activities to bring locals together, even in freezing temperatures.

Boston’s tourism board has been taking notes.

This year, Meet Boston is presenting the city’s first ever “Frostival,” their take on a Canadian-style winter festival. Its two largest activations, a 75-foot Ferris wheel on Rose Kennedy Greenway and the “Frostival Lodge” in newly renovated Copley Square will be unveiled next week, on Wednesday, Feb. 4 and Friday, Feb. 6, respectively.

“We saw what a lot of other cold destinations did well,” Dave O’Donnell, a spokesperson for Meet Boston, told me. His colleagues researched winter festivals and nightlife in Scandinavian countries and Quebec. (They even did a field trip north of the border for ideas.) Much of what they saw involved fun events like ice skating and light shows, along with a central, cozy lodge for the public to retreat to, he said.

Meet Boston has already brought some of those ideas home this winter, such as holiday drone shows on Boston Common and the third annual Winteractive public art exhibition downtown. Here’s a look at what the Frostival has in store next:

Frostival Ferris Wheel | Rose Kennedy Greenway, Feb. 4 - March 8

A carnival ride might not be the first thing that comes to mind when you think of a “winter festival,” but Meet Boston is willing to bet this diversion may be one of your favorites by the end of the season. A single ride on this 75-foot Ferris wheel costs just $4. You’ll get sweeping views of the North End, waterfront, Faneuil Hall Marketplace and other downtown landmarks from the top, said O’Donnell. (Just a heads up, the Ferris wheel’s cabins are open, so you might want to pack a scarf.)

Hours vary depending on the day of the week. You can catch a ride from noon to 8 p.m. on Sunday, Wednesday and Thursday, and noon to 9 p.m. on Friday and Saturday. The Ferris wheel is closed on Monday and Tuesday, with the exception of Feb. 17 and 18 during Massachusetts school vacation week, when it will be open from noon to 8 p.m. It will also be free to ride that Friday, Feb. 20.

If it’s popular enough with the public, O’Donnel l says the city might even consider making a Ferris wheel a permanent part of Boston’s skyline, like the London Eye. “If it works and it's something that we see helps the destination really resonate with new and different audiences and home-based audiences, then I wouldn't count out the idea of something of that magnitude happening permanently,” said O’Donnell.

The Frostival Lodge | Copley Square, Feb. 6 - Feb. 28

 The Frostival Lodge is meant to be more than just a reprieve from the cold. “It's one of those third spaces … it's not work, it's not home, it's not your typical social area,” O’Donnell said.

It’s free to visit the tented lodge, which can accommodate up to 350 people. The space is set up with six fully furnished “living rooms,” and will host craft sessions, weekly trivia nights, tabletop games like Scrabble and watch parties for sporting events, like the Winter Olympics in Italy. Food and drink from Eataly will be available for purchase, too. (“It’s completely coincidental that there’s an Italian theme there,” said O’Donnell.) They also plan to have curling lanes, firepits and kids’ movie nights.

The lodge will be open seven days a week from 11 a.m. to  9 p.m. during its run. O’Donnell hopes that people will feel encouraged to come stop in with friends or even solo. “This is a space that, as you enter, you'll feel those kind of convivial vibes right away,” said O’Donnell. “It's something unique for Boston.”

P.S. — Frostival’s final hurrah will be a women-owned wine festival on Feb. 28. “Femme Fȇte,” the brainchild of haley.henry wine bar’s Haley Fortier, will hold a five-hour tasting at the Boston Center for the Arts at Cyclorama, followed by an afterparty at the South End restaurant Shore Leave. Tickets to the tasting are $60, but the afterparty is free. What inspired this activation, you ask? Apart from MeetBoston’s longstanding partnership with Fortier, “Who doesn’t love wine?” said O’Donnell.