Smyrna's Calendar Through Dec. 10, and the Saturday That Doubles Up

On Saturday, Dec. 5, the doors at Brawner Hall open at 10 a.m. for the 6th annual Smyrna Handmade Holiday Market. The building opened in 1910 as a hospital and spent part of the 1990s empty. The Reed House down Atlanta Road holds the rest of the vendors. At 3 p.m. the same day, a DJ starts the final College Football Saturday of the year at Village Green Park.

The other anchor dates between now and Dec. 10 lead up to that Saturday or follow from it. The city's events are close together in time and close together on the map. They run out of a short list of city-owned buildings, most of them historic, plus one taproom on King Street that fills Thanksgiving week.

Here are the anchor dates, in order.

Nov. 7 opens the stretch at Village Green

College Football Saturday has been running since early fall. The city scheduled it for Sept. 26, Oct. 10 and Oct. 17 before the two dates left on the calendar, Nov. 7 and Dec. 5. The City of Smyrna's listing promises a live DJ, prizes and giveaways, with free admission and a 3 p.m. start. The Bright Side's Oct. 23 weekly lists it as 3 to 5 p.m. and tells guests to bring their own chairs.

Nov. 7 is a quiet Saturday. It falls two weeks after downtown wrapped up the Crafts & Drafts Fall Festival, which The Bright Side previewed with about 150 arts and crafts booths around City Hall. The Dec. 5 date is the one that overlaps, and it gets its own section below.

Nov. 11 closes Smyrna's America250 year where it started

The Veterans Day ceremony runs 11 a.m. to noon at Veterans Memorial Park, 2800 King Street, according to the city's Oct. 19 notice. The program, as listed in The Bright Side, includes:

• Keynote by Col. Kevan Lewis, USMC
• Osborne High School JROTC color guard
• Music by the Whitefield Academy Band
• Remarks from Smyrna Fire Chief Brian Marcos
• A gun salute by the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War
• An America250 Time Capsule Dedication by City Councilman Travis Lindley
• Recognition of veterans by their era of service
• Invocation and benediction by Chaplain LTC Brandon Markette

The time capsule makes this year's ceremony different from the ones before it, and the setting gives it a frame. On July 1, the city installed a 250-flag memorial at the same address, the Twentieth Century Veterans Memorial at 2800 King Street SE. So Smyrna's semiquincentennial year starts and ends at one memorial. The Smyrna Library's America250 series added history programming in between. That included a Nov. 1 lecture on Mary Musgrove, presented by the Friends of Smyrna Library with a Georgia Humanities grant. The city has not yet said what goes into the capsule or when it is meant to be opened.

Watch the forecast. If it rains, the ceremony moves indoors to the Smyrna Community Center, 1250 Powder Springs St. That has happened before. In 2023 the city moved it to the Community Center gym because bad weather was expected. WSB-TV's 2025 roundup placed last year's ceremony in the large gym there too. In 2024 it was held outdoors at the memorial next to City Hall. The City of Smyrna, the Smyrna Veterans Committee and American Legion Post 160 sponsor the event, and it is open to all.

Thanksgiving week runs through King Street's taproom

After Veterans Day, the next stretch belongs to StillFire Brewing at 2725 King St. SE. This is its first holiday season in Smyrna, since it opened on March 13, 2026. The building covers 25,000 square feet, with a rooftop SkyDeck, the Jonquil Beer Garden, 78 taps and Beto's Tacos as its food partner. It bills itself as family- and dog-friendly, which matters for its first holiday date.

After trivia and music bingo nights earlier in the month, StillFire's Smyrna events calendar starts its holiday programming with Photos with Santa on Friday, Nov. 20, from 4 to 6 p.m. That is more than a week before Santa's official city appearance at the tree lighting. The Turkey Eve Party with Luke Latimer follows on Wednesday, Nov. 25, from 7 to 10 p.m. Foozer plays Black Friday, Nov. 27, from 6 to 8 p.m., and Dueling Pianos fills Saturday, Nov. 28, from 8 to 11 p.m. For anyone hosting family over the long weekend, that is three event nights in four days at one downtown address.

Dec. 1 turns the season over to Market Village

Home for the Holidays is what the city's listing calls "Smyrna's annual kickoff to the holiday season." It runs Tuesday, Dec. 1, from 5 to 9 p.m. in Market Village. Local school choirs perform throughout the village, Santa lights the tree and then poses for photos, and the Kris Kringle Market sells gifts and treats.

The city has not posted a tree-lighting time for 2026. Last year's event, held Dec. 2, 2025, used the same 5-to-9 window, with music starting at 5 p.m. and Santa lighting the tree at 7 p.m. Families timing a visit around the lighting can use 7 p.m. as a starting point and check the city page for any change.

The Kris Kringle Market lasts one evening. The handmade market four days later lasts two days and happens somewhere else.

Dec. 5 is the Saturday that doubles up

The Smyrna Handmade Holiday Market came back as a two-day event at Brawner Hall and the Reed House: Saturday, Dec. 5, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and Sunday, Dec. 6, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. The city's separate Sunday listing gives a 6 p.m. close, so confirm closer to the date if you plan a late Sunday run. The city billed last year's market as the 5th annual, and the Cobb County Courier listed it at the same two buildings on Dec. 6 and 7, 2025.

The city is pitching this market to makers of artisanal goods, pottery, specialty candles and baked treats. Applications are reviewed starting the week of Nov. 9, and accepted vendors hear back the week of Nov. 16. The $25 application fee goes toward a $175 vendor fee for those accepted. So the full vendor lineup will not be set until about two weeks before opening day.

The buildings are part of the draw.

• Brawner Hall, 3180 Atlanta Rd. It opened as a mental-health hospital in 1910 and stood vacant from the 1990s. The city rehabilitated it for offices, training classrooms and rentable rooms.
• Reed House, 3080 Atlanta Rd. This circa-1910 home was designed by architect Leila Ross Wilburn and sits on 3.6 landscaped acres. The city now rents it out as an event space.
• Taylor-Brawner Park, 3180 Atlanta Rd. The 10-acre park around Brawner Hall has a playground, gazebos and a walking trail. It opened in April 2009, along with the restored circa-1890 Taylor-Brawner House. The Taylor-Brawner Foundation raised $427,000 to restore it. The city credits the Taylor family with bringing jonquils to the area, which is where the Jonquil City nickname comes from.

The market's Saturday hours overlap with the 3 p.m. College Football Saturday at Village Green Park, the last one on the 2026 schedule. If you want both, shop the market in the morning while the vendor rooms are fresh, then head downtown before kickoff. On Sunday, StillFire has Trey Odum from 2 to 5 p.m., so a second market visit can end on King Street.

Dec. 10 ends the run indoors, with a guest limit

The last date has the strictest limits. All I Want for Christmas is Spirits runs Thursday, Dec. 10, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the Smyrna Community Center, 1250 Powder Springs St. SE. Atkins Park provides the holiday food and drink pairings. The event is 21 and up and capped at 75 participants.

Every other date on this calendar is open to the public, and most are free. This one has 75 spots, so it is the date to put on the calendar first and register for early through the city's event page.

From Village Green to Market Village to Atlanta Road, a lot of what makes these weeks work is the city's buildings, and our team at Terence Richardson pays attention to that when we film around Smyrna. If you'd like to know how downtown's calendar and its historic buildings play into what homes nearby are worth, schedule your free market consultation and we'll go through it together.