The Lao Cai Red River Festival 2025 opens a colorful picture of the first festival season of the year, where indigenous culture, trade flows and the spirit of connection are naturally placed side by side. Nothing is too ostentatious. Everything comes from the enthusiasm of the people, the initiative of businesses and the vitality of a land that is always moving on the banks of the upper reaches of the Red River.
Red River – the flow that opens a festival season
For Lao Cai residents, the Red River is not just geography. It is a memory, a way of life and also an opening that leads people out of the high mountains that are used to fog. Therefore, Lao Cai choosing this river as the center of a cultural and trade festival is a choice that is suggestive rather than a performance.
This year’s festival is arranged along both sides of the river, where visitors can walk, listen to the sounds of the market, watch traditional performances, and then just one step away from the product display areas of businesses. There are no hard boundaries. No area is completely separate. The spirit of the festival is like the flow of water – constant contact, natural encounters, and guided by the curiosity of the participants themselves.
The artisans of the Tay, Dao, Mong, Nung, Giay communities appear not as “performing” entities but as themselves: telling a story, introducing a song, opening up a way of life. Visitors can stand and watch the Khen dance, but can also accompany the artisans to the brocade stalls to watch them weave the patterns that take hours to create.
The genuine excitement of the local people
In many major festivals in the provinces, people often stand in the role of “witnesses”. But at the Red River Festival, they appear as hosts welcoming guests.
A Red Dao woman selling herbs shared that this year she prepared more than usual because “customers will ask carefully and like to hear explanations, so I have to tell the truth.” The careful preparation of the people does not come from anyone’s request, but from the desire to introduce their culture, products, and profession to tourists.
Homestay households are almost fully booked during the festival. But what makes them happy is not only the income but also the feeling that “their home is known”. Many families organize small experiential activities for tourists: making cakes, soaking wine, picking wild vegetables, taking photos in traditional costumes.
Meanwhile, the young generation of Lao Cai showed a different color of the festival: creative, technological and proactive. Many groups of young people filmed vlogs, made mini maps of check-in points, and even created street art along the riverside. This is an interesting addition to the cultural picture of this year’s festival: traditions go with generation Z, not overlapping but blending together quite naturally.
Trading space: where businesses find each other
Unlike many trade fairs that are separate from the cultural space, the Red River Festival 2025 gives businesses a very “real” setting: right in the middle of the crowd, next to the sound of the flute, behind is the smell of food. This creates a sense of closeness, making the connection less formal and less “negotiating”.
About 150 businesses in many fields participated in the product exhibition. The most prominent were agricultural products – processed foods, medicinal herbs, brocade, OCOP products and tourism. A young business making honey said: “Here, buyers want to try, want to ask about the origin, want to hear about the exploitation method. Selling feels like telling a story about your hometown.”
Businesses from Hanoi, Hai Phong, Thai Nguyen, etc. also consider the festival a good opportunity to expand the Northern market because the flow of tourists to Lao Cai is always stable and tends to increase. The open space of the festival makes it easier to approach customers than the traditional closed exhibition model.
Many meetings between local businesses and businesses from other provinces take place naturally right at the booth. No long presentations, no grand signings. Just small, short exchanges, but enough to open up a cooperation opportunity.
This is the “light business” nature that many festivals today lack: businesses meeting each other as if they were colleagues, sharing honestly about what they have and what they need.
Cultural activities: keeping the traditional spirit but not outdated
One thing that is easy to see at the Red River Festival 2025 is that all activities are moderate. Not too grand, not following the big stages, nor trying to recreate culture rigidly.
The main highlights are the small areas: a brocade road a few dozen meters long, a traditional musical instrument performance area right next to the river, or exchanges without fences, so that viewers can sit down and listen to the artisans tell stories.
The lantern releasing ceremony on the water surface is held in the evening, and although the number of lights is not much, the scene of hundreds of lights gently drifting along the water creates a very peaceful feeling, carrying the color of wishes for the beginning of the year. It is not a feast for the eyes, but a feeling of calmness.
Some modern art programs are also included to suit the youth. However, the clever point is that they do not overwhelm the culture but play a connecting role. For example, the performance combining electronic music with cat flute is considered interesting, just enough to be different without losing the “highland” quality.
The role of festivals in expanding Lao Cai tourism experiences
By placing the festival at the beginning of the year, Lao Cai is shaping a new way to expand its tourism picture: not just limited to Sa Pa and Fansipan.
The Red River Festival brings viewers back to Lao Cai city – a place that has long been rarely mentioned in tourist itineraries but plays an important role in culture and trade. Many visitors shared that this was the first time they spent time exploring the city, and recognized very real corners: old markets, walking streets, ancient churches, riverside food courts.
Travel agencies quickly took advantage of this opportunity to design new tourist routes, combining cultural exploration – river experiences – community exchange. This is a positive sign, because it creates a new flow of tourists instead of pushing all tourists to Sa Pa, which is already overloaded.
Conclusion: A festival without pretentiousness but with depth
The success of the Lao Cai Red River Festival 2025 is that it does not try to show off anything. It lets people speak through their own activities, lets businesses meet naturally, and lets visitors experience at their own pace.
The excitement of the local community, the initiative of businesses and the blend of culture – trade – tourism are factors that show that the festival is on the right track: maintaining the local spirit but still opening up to new trends.
Regarding the Festival, the feeling of a moderate, warm, and rich festival season still remains in many people. That is what any cultural – trade event hopes to aim for, and the Red River Festival 2025 has done it in a gentle, natural and very Lao Cai way.
