For two days every September, the wide thoroughfare of St Giles' closes to traffic and fills end-to-end with waltzers, helter-skelters, dodgems, and the smell of frying onions. St Giles' Fair is one of the few large English fairs still held on a major city-centre street, and its run continues a tradition that has been documented in Oxford since the 17th century.

The fair takes over St Giles' from the war memorial at the south end up to the junction where Banbury Road and Woodstock Road split. Rides spill into Magdalen Street and a short way up both arms of the junction. On a busy evening the noise carries down to Cornmarket.

When it happens

The fair always falls on the Monday and Tuesday after the Sunday that follows 1 September — in other words, the first full Monday and Tuesday after St Giles' Day (1 September). The dates therefore shift each year. The 2026 fair is provisionally scheduled for Monday 7 and Tuesday 8 September; check the Oxford City Council events page closer to the date for confirmed timings.

It typically opens around lunchtime and runs until late evening on both days. Rides are individually priced; admission to the fair itself is free.

A short history

The fair has a connection to St Giles' Church, which sits at the north end of the street. The church was completed in 1120 and consecrated in 1200 by St Hugh of Lincoln; the fair appears to have begun as part of the commemoration of that consecration. The earliest written reference comes from the Session Rolls of James I, and the event evolved out of the parish wake first recorded in 1624.

Queen Elizabeth I, visiting Oxford in early September 1567, is said to have watched the fair from windows at St John's College, on the east side of St Giles'. By the late 18th century the fair had become a toy fair of cheap goods; by 1800 it included stalls and rides, and from the 1830s it absorbed the adult amusements that gave it its rowdier reputation. Victorian railway excursions brought day-trippers in from Birmingham, Cardiff, and beyond.

Oxford's city corporation — now Oxford City Council — took over the management of the fair in 1930, and the council still runs it today in partnership with the London and Home Counties section of the Showmen's Guild of Great Britain. The poet John Betjeman, writing of the 1930s fair, recalled that it filled "the whole of St Giles' and even Magdalen Street by Elliston and Cavell's right up to and beyond the War Memorial" with "freak shows, roundabouts, cake-walks, the whip, and the witching waves." Most of those names have gone; the scale has not.

The fair paused in 2020 during the pandemic and returned the following year.

What to expect on the day

The format is a traditional travelling funfair: large rides at the centre (waltzers, the chair-o-planes, drop towers, occasional white-knuckle imports), smaller children's rides at the edges, and a long line of stalls running between them — hook-a-duck, coconut shy, candy floss, doughnuts, toffee apples, hot dogs.

St Giles' is unusually wide for an English street, which is why the fair fits along it; even so, the central run between rides can be tight when both nights are busy. Evenings are louder and more crowded than afternoons. Families with small children tend to come early on the Monday.

Getting there and road closures

St Giles' is closed to through traffic for the two days of the fair, with closures usually extending from Magdalen Street up to the Banbury Road / Woodstock Road junction. Side streets including Pusey Street and Beaumont Street remain open but are heavily affected by diverted buses.

Walk — the easiest approach. St Giles' is a five-minute walk north from Carfax via Cornmarket and Magdalen Street.
Bus — most northbound services from the city centre divert to alternative routes for the two days. Check the Oxford Bus Company or Stagecoach website for revised stops.
Train — Oxford station is a 15-minute walk via Hythe Bridge Street and Beaumont Street.
Drive — not realistic. Park-and-ride sites at Pear Tree (north) and Thornhill (east) are the practical options.

Nearby food and drink

The fair itself is full of stall food, but the immediate area has several good options if you want a sit-down stop before or after:

The Eagle and Child on St Giles' itself — reopened after a long closure; the building sits within the fair footprint.
The Lamb and Flag, opposite, is another long-standing St Giles' pub.
The Ashmolean Museum on nearby Beaumont Street — its rooftop restaurant and ground-floor cafe are useful if you need a quieter break.
The Covered Market, a short walk down Cornmarket, for cheaper food and a less crowded room.

One fact worth knowing

It is unusual, by English standards, for a fair on this scale to be held on a major city-centre street rather than in a park or showground. Most traditional charter fairs in larger English towns were moved off their original streets in the 19th and 20th centuries. St Giles' Fair never was. That is the main reason it feels different from a funfair held on a recreation ground — the rides press right up against the colleges and pubs that line the street the rest of the year.

Sources

Wikipedia — St Giles' Fair: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Giles%27_Fair (Monday/Tuesday rule; 1930 council takeover; Betjeman quote; 1567 Elizabeth I visit; 2020 hiatus; Session Rolls of James I)
St Giles' Church, Oxford — consecration history
Oxford City Council events listings — annual fair announcement

St Giles' Fair in Oxford