Free for Kids: La Vang Mid-Autumn Festival Takes Over Fair Oaks Mall September 19 and 20, With Lion Dance, Live Bands and Vietnamese Food

The La Vang Mid-Autumn Festival returns to Fair Oaks Mall in Fairfax on Saturday, September 19 and Sunday, September 20, 2026, with lion dance on the main stage, live bands both days, Vietnamese street food, a kid zone, a bounce house, games with prizes, a vendor market, a lotto and free lanterns for children. It runs outdoors in the mall’s parking lot, 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Saturday and 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Sunday.

The host is Our Lady of La Vang Mission, a Vietnamese Catholic community based in Chantilly that has grown from about 35 families in 2006 to 550 families today, and the festival doubles as its fundraiser for the church it plans to build. The organizers call it the largest Mid-Autumn celebration in the DMV and say they expect more than 25,000 people over the weekend. Both are their numbers, but the scale of the setup, the mall-lot footprint and the two-day stage schedule back up the ambition. Official festival site.

What to expect at the Mid-Autumn Festival

The layout is a fairground in a parking lot: a main stage, food row, a market of vendors, a game area and a kids’ corner with inflatables. The organizers list eight things on the program, and they cover most of what a family will spend the day doing.

Lanterns are the through-line. The Eventbrite FAQ says free lanterns will be handed out to children while supplies last, and lantern activities are part of the program, so the lot gets more photogenic after sunset on Saturday, when the festival runs until 9 p.m.

What to eat

The festival site pitches the food row as a way to “eat your way through the weekend,” and its vendor gallery is specific: phở, bánh mì with roasted pork belly, grilled pork or grilled chicken, grilled meats with bánh bột lọc and nem nướng, beef kushiyaki skewers with crunchy garlic, a fried stand with fish, chicken wings, shrimp and bánh khọt, chè and boba for dessert, and nước mía sugar cane juice and Vietnamese coffee to drink. The featured vendor this year is Temaki Live, a hand-roll bar that torch-sears made-to-order temaki in front of you and passes them over the counter one at a time.

Bring cash for the smaller stands and the lotto. Most food vendors at mall-lot festivals take cards now, but the church booths are volunteer-run, and a line moves faster when nobody is waiting on a card reader.

Bringing kids

This is a children’s holiday at its root, and the festival is built that way. Kids 10 and under get in free, youth 11 to 17 pay $5, and the kid zone, bounce house and games sit together so parents can stay in one spot. Strollers and wheelchairs are fine on the lot, re-entry is allowed with the wristband you get at the gate, and pets are allowed, per the organizers’ FAQ. The free lanterns go to children first, while supplies last, so an early arrival on Saturday is the safer bet if a lantern is the point of the trip for your kid.

Tickets and prices

Tickets are sold on Eventbrite, which adds its own fees at checkout, so the total you pay online will be a little above the base prices above. The flyer lists September 15 as the early-bird cutoff, but the organizers told DC Spot on September 15 that the $10 price stays available online through Friday, September 18. You can also buy at the gate, and the organizers say ticket sales support the mission’s church-building fund. Eventbrite lists the event as no refunds.

Hours and the weekend schedule

Saturday, September 19 runs 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday, September 20 runs 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Those are the hours on the official site and the flyer; the Eventbrite listing shows 9 p.m. both days, so treat Sunday evening as a soft close. The organizers have not published a stage timetable. Saturday evening is the best window for the lion dance and lanterns because it is the only night session, and Sunday afternoon is the calmer choice with small kids.

Parking and directions

Fair Oaks Mall is at 11750 Fair Oaks Mall, Fairfax, VA 22033, at the junction of I-66, Route 50 and Fairfax County Parkway. Parking at the mall is free, per the organizers, and the mall’s lots and garages surround the property, so drive around to the side away from the festival footprint if the closest lot is full. Directions in Google Maps.

By transit, Fairfax Connector routes serve the Fair Oaks Mall transit center from the Vienna Metro station on the Orange Line. Check the county’s schedules for weekend headways, which are longer than weekdays.

Tết Trung Thu, and who is behind the festival

Mid-Autumn Festival, Tết Trung Thu in Vietnamese, falls on the fifteenth day of the eighth lunar month, when the moon is at its fullest. In 2026 that is Friday, September 25, so the Fair Oaks weekend lands six days ahead of the actual moon. In Vietnam it is a children’s festival above all: paper lanterns in the shape of stars and carp, lion dance troupes going door to door, mooncakes, and songs about the moon. The Fairfax version keeps the lanterns, the lion dance and the sweets and adds the fairground.

Our Lady of La Vang Mission takes its name from a Marian apparition reported in 1798 at La Vang, in central Vietnam, by Catholics hiding in the jungle from persecution, and it remains the most important Marian devotion for Vietnamese Catholics. The Chantilly community started in 2006 with about 35 families under a Dominican priest, was formally recognized as a mission by the Diocese of Arlington in 2017, and now counts 550 families with more than 1,200 people at three weekend Masses, according to the Arlington Catholic Herald. The diocese bought 33 wooded acres at Herndon Avenue and Pleasant Valley Road in Chantilly in 2021 for the mission’s future church, and the flyer says ticket revenue goes toward building it. Our Lady of La Vang Mission.

The festival is open to everyone, and the crowd reflects that. If you go to one Vietnamese cultural event in Northern Virginia this fall, this is the one with the scale to feel like a holiday rather than a booth at a fair. For the rest of the weekend, see things to do in Northern Virginia this week and our guide to fall festivals in Northern Virginia.

The official flyers

The mission posts the festival flyers, a VIP details sheet and a Vietnamese-language version on the festival site, and its Facebook page carries the day-of updates. Our Lady of La Vang Mission on Facebook. Questions go to the organizers at (703) 894-7975 or lavang@cttdva.com.

Frequently asked questions about the La Vang Mid-Autumn Festival

Lead photograph by DC Spot, taken at a DMV Asian Night Market in the Fair Oaks Mall parking lot earlier this season, the same lot the festival uses. Flyers courtesy Our Lady of La Vang Mission.

Published September 15, 2026. Dates, hours, the address, activities and the featured food vendor come from the festival’s official site and the organizers’ 2026 flyer. Ticket prices are the organizer-listed base prices on that flyer; Eventbrite adds its fees at checkout, and the organizers told DC Spot on September 15 that the $10 early-bird price stays available online through September 18, past the flyer’s September 15 cutoff. Parking, pets, re-entry, accessibility, the beer garden and the free lanterns come from the FAQ on the festival’s Eventbrite page. Eventbrite lists both days as ending at 9 p.m.; the official site and flyer end Sunday at 7 p.m., and we use those. Attendance figures and the “largest in the DMV” description are the organizers’ own claims. Background on Our Lady of La Vang Mission comes from the mission’s website and the Arlington Catholic Herald’s April 30, 2026 report. The 2026 lunar-calendar date for Mid-Autumn is September 25. Schedules can change; confirm with the organizers before you go.