Kumasi Market has been the heart of the Ghanaian community inside Brixton Village for 30 years. This is where my mum and I have shopped for 30+ years; this is where we meet each other, and this is where we send money back home. Places like it are why I've spent recent weeks supporting the Brixton Traders & Community Association to incorporate — the unglamorous part of buying back Brixton Market: drafting the rules a regulator will hold us to.
One phrase keeps stopping the room — for the benefit of the community. Define it, and you decide who counts. This week I put that question in public. My answer so far: traders aren't a business interest within the community; they are its fabric — Stafford at Healthy Eaters, Etta's Seafood Kitchen, and Brian at Fish, Wings & Tings. Read the full piece.
What has been interesting is deciding who is Brixton’s community and who is not.
🎟️ What’s On in Brixton (Thu 20 → Wed 26 Aug 2026)
🎶 Music & Nightlife
Fri, 21 Aug – Carnival Warm Up Party @pergolabrixton. From 5:00 PM | Pergola and Brixton Brewery open Carnival week early on the Village rooftop: Shaun Sky, Tripple M and Cinderella on the decks, carnival dancers, a Brixton Brewery rum punch and free Electric Tropical lager samples 5–6pm. Free entry — arrive for the freebie hour.
🎟️ Event info
Sat, 22 Aug – Ghost of Garage Rooftop Party @freightbrixton. 5:00 PM–11:45 PM | Old-skool UK garage on the Station Road rooftop, third edition: Plastician in UKG mode, El-B b2b J Da Flex (the Ghost Recordings dark-garage originals), Mike Millrain, Lady Passion, Rich Reason and Larishka. Sunset, two-step, home by midnight.
🎟️ Tickets
Sat, 22 Aug – Blessence Big Reunion @brxhousetheatre. 7:00 PM–2:00 AM | Blessence started in Brixton in 2003 as a women-only party and grew into one of London’s best-loved queer Black club nights. Founder Lorna “Sutara” Gee brings the original DJs back for one night: reggae, rare groove, revival, lovers rock, dancehall. £10–£12.50, 18+. 🎟️ Tickets
Wed, 26 Aug – Fulu Miziki @hootanannybrixton. Doors 7:00 PM | Kinshasa’s eco-punk collective build every instrument from street salvage — oil cans, pipes, dead keyboards — and play in full-body masks made of the same. Punk energy, industrial soukous, electronics. A rare midweek Brixton date for a band that usually plays festivals. From £5.55, 18+. 🎟️ Tickets
🎨 Art & Heritage
Sat, 22 Aug – Carnival of Resistance: Exhibition & Book Launch @acelebrationofdemonstration. 12:00–8:00 PM | Photographers Wayne Campbell and Wayne Crichlow mark 60 years of Notting Hill Carnival with a new photo book and a day-long takeover of Unit 22A Market Row: reggae choir, steel pan, dancers, DJs. Free; signed first editions £60. Launch night is Thu 20, 6pm, in the Village.
🎟️ Free tickets
Tue–Sat – Nice Day For It! The British Summer in Technicolour @photofusionuk. 10:00 AM–6:00 PM | Martin Parr, Anna Fox, Daniel Meadows, The Caravan Gallery and John Hinde Studio on the British seaside, 1960s–2010s, at full saturation: deckchairs, chips, sunburn. Six decades of us on holiday, in Beehive Place until 5 Sep. Thursday’s Anna Fox talk is sold out; the show is not. 🎟️ Exhibition info
Wed, 26 Aug – Gus John: 60 Years of Struggle @bcaheritage. 6:15–8:30 PM | The BFI dropped African Odysseys, so Black History Walks took it on the road — to Windrush Square. A new documentary on Black British civil rights 1965–2026, a rare 1989 film Caribbean in Crisis, then an extended Q&A with Professor Gus John, co-founder of the Black Parents Movement. 🎟️ Tickets
🧩 Everything Else (community, food, workshops, markets, talks)
Sat, 22 & Mon, 24 Aug – Dendê Nation x Reggae Choir free workshops @1dende.nation. Sat 1:00–3:00 PM (Market Row, Unit 12) · Mon 7:00–8:30 PM (Pergola rooftop) | Brixton Village’s pre-Carnival drop-ins: sing with the Reggae Choir on Saturday, then Afro-Brazilian dance with Dendê Nation’s Adriano Oliveira on Monday night, up on the Pergola terrace. Free, all abilities, no booking. 🎟️ Session info
Sun, 23 Aug – Carnaval Fever: Yuliana Ortiz Ruano in conversation @roundtablebooks. Doors 6:30 PM, 7:00 PM start | Ecuadorian novelist, poet and DJ Yuliana Ortiz Ruano talks Carnaval Fever — a PEN-winning novel of an Afro-Ecuadorian girlhood where music is the heartbeat — with Meera Ghanshamdas at Granville Arcade’s Black-owned bookshop. £8, redeemable against the book.
🎟️ Tickets
Tue, 25 Aug – Brixton Board Games @otterchaosltd. 6:00–11:00 PM | Five hundred games on the shelves at Atlantic Road’s board-game café, and staff who’ll teach you any of them. Turn up solo and the South London Board Games crew will seat you; sourdough pizza and cocktails keep the table fed. £5 for the evening, RSVP on Meetup. 🎟️ RSVP
Sat, 22 Aug – Supercute Splash, Beckenham (worth the train) @supercutebrewhouse. 12:00–9:00 PM | Brixton’s Supercute brewery takes over the Bowie bandstand at Croydon Road Recreation Ground for a day-long family fundraiser: Latin bands, youth showcases, a Bowie sunset finale, face painting, 15 food stalls, Supercute and Brixton Brewery on the taps. Every ticket goes to fixing the kids’ paddling pool. £10, under-16s free. 🎟️ Tickets
TheBccList Film & Theatre Guide
🍿Mon, 24 Aug – Reggae Girlz: Preview + Q&A @ritzy_cinema. 6:30 PM | Oscar-winner Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy follows Jamaica’s women’s team through unpaid wages and empty coffers to the 2023 World Cup, scored to Bob Marley. We Are Parable and Red Bull Studios bring it to the Ritzy three days before its streaming release, with a Q&A to follow. 🎟️ Event info
🍿 Tue, 25 Aug – California Schemin’ @coldharbourblue. 8:00–10:00 PM | James McAvoy’s directorial debut tells the true story of two Dundee lads who, laughed out of every label for their accents, rebranded as Californian rappers Silibil N’ Brains and blagged a record deal and MTV before it all came apart. £10. 🎟️ Tickets
Brixton Discounts
Reader-only deals across Brixton, updated weekly.
This week’s picks:
Impact Brixton → Free £35 coworking day pass for first-time visitors. New BCC readers only, one per person. Use code bcclist.
Nuvola Pizza → 50% off all pizzas on Tuesdays at Market Row.
See every Brixton discount → (set your real URL)
Until next Thursday, 11.11am
TheBCClist
www.brixtonculture.com