Skating Celebration For Families

TORONTO — From December 5 to 7, Harbourfront Centre hosts the city’s coolest skating celebration for families—ice skating, skateboarding and roller skating—with performances, films, activities and loads of fun! HarbourKIDS: SK8 takes place on Friday, December 5 from 5 to 8 p.m., and Saturday & Sunday, December 6 & 7 from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Admission is free. For information, the public can call 416-973-4000 or visit harbourfrontcentre.com/harbourkids.


HarbourKIDS: SK8 Highlights

HarbourKIDS: SK8 kicks off on Friday, December 5 at 5 p.m. on the Natrel Rink, with a Family Skate Night with DJ Fase featuring kid-friendly hip hop, r&b, reggae, funk, rock, soul, old-school and jazz, along with a live painting from Clay Rochemont, one of Toronto’s most talented graffiti artists. Great SK8 Performances take place on Saturday & Sunday, December 6 & 7 at 12:30 & 3 p.m., featuring incredible synchronized skating performances. The Salads, a Casby Award-winning and a Juno Award nominated group, perform a special rock/ska set created especially for kids on Saturday, December 6 at 1:30 p.m. From Quebec, Amélie Lamontagne (violin), Janie Caron, (piano), and Geneviève Bigonnesse (bass) explore the history of the tango in Fiestango on Sunday, December 7 at 1 p.m., which is part of the Music with Bite family concert series, a co-production with Jeunesses Musicales Ontario. On Sunday, December 7 at 1:30 & 4 p.m., at the cozy, outdoor fireplace nestled among the trees overlooking Lake Ontario, families can enjoy great stories with riddles and puzzles by storyteller Marylyn Peringer. A cooking demonstration focusing on fun sports nutrition and healthy eating by Lily, Avery and Matt, the hosts of TVO’s Taste Buds takes place on Sunday, December 7 at 3 p.m.

On Saturday & Sunday, December 6 & 7, the Natrel Indoor Skate Park is the place to be! An awesome mobile skate park with cool music and instructors is designed especially for kids. (Helmets are mandatory; kids can bring their own helmet and skateboard or use available equipment.) On Saturday, students from the Oasis Alternative School and professional designers from Roarockit Skateboard Company build and design one-of-a-kind skateboards in HOW 2 DO IT YOURSELF, and visitors on Sunday can see the finished work on display.

The Reading Region for Rollers and Gliders features a great selection of skate related books. Also taking place are film screenings with a skate focus: The Hockey Sweater, The Ice Princess, The Mighty Ducks, Xanadu and The Woes of Roller Skates.

At the Laurentien Locker Room, kids can create buttons with cool "tags," design decals and goalie masks, and take part in a felting workshop led by the Knit Café. At the Lego SuperSK8 Studio, kids can build their own dream skatepark.

Blue Blood, a group visual arts exhibition, looks at the cursed trajectory of the Toronto Maple Leafs post 1967, the last year the team won the Stanley Cup. Toronto photographer Martie Giefert documents the interior of small town hockey rinks across Ontario in The Arena Project.

The family skating celebration wouldn’t be complete without taking a skate on the picturesque Natrel Rink. Celebrating its 25th anniversary, the Natrel Rink at Harbourfront Centre is Canada’s largest artificially cooled outdoor rink. Skate rentals, sharpening, change rooms and locker services are available at the Natrel Rink. This year also marks Natrel’s 10th anniversary of sponsoring the ice rink.


Join our Family!

While most everything at HarbourKIDS is for the whole family, there are some things that are meant just for kids! With a HarbourKIDS membership, registered kids will be the first to know about all the cool activities for kids and families happening at Harbourfront Centre—sent directly to them!

Membership is free for kids. To register or for more information, visit www.harbourfrontcentre.com/harbourkids/about.cfm or drop by to visit our information booth onsite at HarbourKIDS:SK8.

HarbourKIDS: SK8 is part of Harbourfront Centre’s SK8 CULTURE program that begins on Friday, November 21, and runs on Friday evenings and weekends until December 21. Revolving around the amazing Natrel Rink where one of Canada's favorite pastimes is enjoyed, SK8 CULTURE features music performances and storytelling by the cozy, outdoor fireplace (beginning on November 22), DJ SK8 Nights with cool music, plus more—all free, as part of SK8 CULTURE. For exact dates and times of performances and event specifics, please visit harbourfrontcentre.com.

HarbourKIDS: SK8 is supported by the Ontario Arts Council, the Toronto Arts Council, Enwave, Sirius Satellite Radio, Pawsway, Queens Quay Terminal, Natrel, Aquafina, Laurentien and LEGO.

FOCUS: Pause
Harbourfront Centre wants you. to. slow. down. In a world where we are constantly bombarded with information and images, what happens when someone really takes the time to reflect? From September to May, Harbourfront Centre wants you to pause and make a connection to art, technology, the world. Find time for yourself by taking one of our Courses and Workshops; reflect while you wait for the World Stage curtain to rise; enjoy while you skate on the Natrel Rink. Harbourfront Centre—time well spent.