Capital City Pride Festival

Since 1991, Capital City Pride has hosted the annual Pride festival in Washington State's capital which draws nearly 15,000 people for a parade and festival in downtown Olympia. Pride serves as the annual watershed event for the LGBTQ and allied communities, offering entertainment, a vibrant array of food, craft and community booths, a family fun area and the ever-popular Pride Parade.  Perhaps more important than the all the rainbows, music and festivities, Pride is a weekend long gathering of friends and family, bringing us all together to celebrate our fabulous community.

The Olympia-based Pride was the first small town festival to emerge beyond the relative safety of the big city of Seattle and plant roots in a little community, population  36,000 in 1991.  It's no mistake that Capital City Pride was fostered in the liberal City of Olympia, nurtured by a progressive college called The Evergreen State College and organized by a legion of LGBTQ community-based activists.  State workers also played a strong role through their unions by fighting for LGBTQ rights and protections in the work place as well as building  LGBTQ-competent service practices.  Over the years, other Pride celebrations have emerged across the State in larger cities like Spokane and Tacoma, as well as smaller towns like Centralia and Aberdeen.    

Capital City Pride is registered as a Washington state non-profit corporation and holds a combined state and City of Olympia business license.