Around 3,000 people attended the first weekend of Brantwood Farms’ seventh annual Sunflower Fest, which ran from Saturday, August 2, to Monday, August 4, 2025.
Farmer Andrew Pate said there were plenty of family-friendly activities taking place throughout the weekend.
“We have about 300,000 sunflowers spread out over a ten-acre field, well, we started out with that many but there’s probably a little less now that we’re through our first weekend,” said Pate with a laugh. “We have some big trails that go through the field so people can come out and walk through, and everyone’s allowed to go home with three of their cut-your-own sunflowers.”
Upon arrival, visitors hopped on one of two different wagons for a scenic ride out to the main sunflower field. While there, people spent their time listening to live music, visiting friendly farm friends, playing a few lawn games or grabbing some refreshments.
“We had a local brewery out here, Paris Beer Co., as well as a local food truck and so our visitors got to come out here, hang out, eat some food, have some local brews and walk around the sunflower patch,” said Pate. “We also had our playground open up front, so people with kids got to go and check that out before or after as well.”
After visiting the sunflower patch, visitors hopped back onto the tractor-pulled wagon with their sunflowers in hand, and headed over to the farm’s wildflower field.
“We have another four-acre wildflower field by the front of the property with up to 70 different varieties, and so people have a couple options to pick their own bouquets at different price points, and there’s some more photo opportunities up there too,” said Pate.
Parthvi Patel, Swapnil Mistry, Urvi Brakash and Keval Mistry, said they travelled from Hamilton to spend their holiday Monday at the farm.
“I’ve never seen this many sunflowers in my life, and it’s great that we get to pick our own to bring home too,” said Swapnil. “We’ve really enjoyed it so far and we’re excited to see more.”
The group said that since it was their first time visiting the farm, they were looking forward to returning later in the season to its other attractions.
Pate, who mentioned that this was the last year at the farm’s Powerline Road location in Brantford before the family officially moves the operation to St. George, said he was happy with the weekend turnout.
“It’s actually been really incredible,” he said. “Weather is always a big factor for us and I mean, we had perfect weather this weekend so we’ve been really happy with the turnout.”
For those who may have missed the event, the Sunflower Fest will take place again this weekend.
“We’ll be open again on Thursday, August 7 from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m., and then we’re open again on Friday, Saturday and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.,” said Pate. “I should mention that last entry is at 5 p.m. so if people are thinking of coming by, they should keep that in mind.”
Kimberly De Jong’s reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative.The funding allows her to report rural and agricultural stories from Blandford-Blenheim and Brant County. Reach her at kimberly.dejong@brantbeacon.ca.
