As the San Marino Tribune reported, "Our hearts are in the park," Mayor Gretchen Shepherd Romey told the crowd gathered at Lacy Park last September, marking the 100th anniversary of the ground her family has visited every Fourth of July since she moved to San Marino in 1996. It's the kind of line a mayor says at a birthday party. But it also happens to be true in a more literal sense this year, because the civic calendar built around that park just moved.
For years, the San Marino Motor Classic ran in August. It was the kind of fixture nobody questioned, the closing note on a hot summer at Lacy Park, hundreds of concours cars parked under the same mature trees that shade the rose garden every other weekend of the year. In 2026, that changed. The Motor Classic shifted two months earlier, to June 13 and 14, and organizers said plainly why: cooler weather for guests standing on open lawn for hours at a time. It's a small scheduling decision with a bigger effect. The single largest draw the park sees all year no longer sits in the hottest month. And once you notice that, the rest of the 2026 calendar at Lacy Park starts to look less like tradition and more like a pattern.
What August Used to Look Like
Before this year, the rhythm was simple. Summer Sunset Concerts ran through July and into August, and the Motor Classic capped the season in the final weeks of the month, when the park was already at its most crowded and the afternoons were already at their longest. It worked, mostly, because nobody had an alternative to compare it to. Now there is one.
Moving the Motor Classic to mid-June means the park's biggest turnout of the year, organizers projected roughly 7,500 people and 350 cars on the field, now happens before the summer heat sets in rather than at its peak. The Symphony of Cars Gala that kicks off the weekend still runs Saturday evening, and the judged show still fills the lawns Sunday morning through early afternoon, but the whole event now closes out in June instead of August. For a resident who has spent years working around Motor Classic weekend, that's worth updating in the calendar, not just observing in passing.
The Concerts Filled the Space That Opened Up
With the Motor Classic no longer anchoring August, the Summer Sunset Concert Series became the last live event of the season on its own. The 2026 run stretched through the summer and closed out August 14 with Adelaide Pilar performing modern Latin pop alongside Westwind Productions' Polynesian dancers, an evening slot running 5:30 to 8 p.m., scheduled for exactly the hours when the heat breaks. Attendees are told to bring their own snacks and drinks or buy from food trucks on site, and registration was never required. It's a low-friction way to spend an evening in the park, and this year it did double duty as the thing that used to share a month with the car show.
Here's the shape the 2026 calendar actually took, once you line the dates up:
| Event | 2026 Date | Time |
|---|---|---|
| San Marino Motor Classic | June 13-14 | Sat 6-10 PM, Sun 9 AM-3 PM |
| Summer Sunset Concerts | Closed Aug 14 | 5:30-8 PM |
| Halloween Trunk-or-Treat | Oct 23 | 6-9 PM |
| Tree Lighting & Mayor's Reception | Dec 4 | 5-7 PM |
Read down that list and a shift is visible, though it isn't universal. The Motor Classic now runs in June, while the concert series still runs into August and the Sunday show spans 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. The park's programming has quietly reorganized itself around comfort rather than habit, and 2026 is the first year that shift shows up as a full calendar rather than a single rescheduled date.
What's Still Ahead
Two of the year's remaining dates are still in front of us, and both are already on the city's books. The Halloween Trunk-or-Treat runs October 23 from 6 to 9 p.m., with wristband sales open at the Community Center from October 1 through the 22nd. Presale is $5 for residents and $10 for non-residents, $15 at the gate, and kids under one get in free. The evening includes trunk-or-treating, a craft station, a dance party, a costume contest judged around 7 p.m., and food trucks running the full three hours.
December brings the Tree Lighting Ceremony and Mayor's Reception on the 4th, from 5 to 7 p.m., at the corner of Huntington Drive and San Marino Avenue rather than inside the park itself. It kicks off the city's Home for the Holidays season and leans on a piece of local history that predates the park's centennial by decades: the Holiday House Bus Shelter tradition, now in its 74th year. Santa arrives by fire truck, the tree gets lit on a countdown, and the evening wraps with cookies and hot cocoa and a craft table for kids. It's a smaller, more residential event than the Motor Classic or the concerts, timed for early winter dusk rather than open lawn in daylight.
Where the Park's Neighbors Actually Eat
None of this happens in a vacuum. Lacy Park sits inside a tight cluster of small food businesses along Huntington Drive and Mission Street, close enough that a walk to the park and a stop for coffee or lunch are the same errand for a lot of residents. The city's own list of nearby spots, put together for last year's centennial picnic, is a useful map of what's actually within reach:
- Chapresso, 2142 Huntington Dr.
- Cielo Cafe, 2461 Mission St., Ste B.
- Colonial Kitchen, 1110 Huntington Dr.
- Dumpling Bar, 2148 Huntington Dr.
- Julienne's, 2649 Mission St.
- Mari Vees, 2150 Huntington Dr.
- Masamitsu Japanese Cuisine, 2026 Huntington Dr.
- Meat & Essentials, 2004 Huntington Dr.
- Noodle World Jr, 932 Huntington Dr.
Most of that list sits within a few blocks of each other on Huntington, with Mission Street picking up the rest just south. It's not a destination food scene built for visitors. It's a working set of options for whoever is already heading to the park with a blanket or a stroller, which is closer to the point.
The Actual Shift Worth Noticing
None of these are dramatic changes on their own. A car show moved two months. A concert series kept its usual evening slots. A Halloween event and a tree lighting stayed where they've always been on the calendar. The clearest change is the Motor Classic's move to cooler June; the rest of the calendar largely kept its established pattern. The Motor Classic organizers explained the June move, but no comparable change was announced for the concert series or Trunk-or-Treat, making this a targeted adjustment rather than a park-wide shift in scheduling.
If you've lived near Lacy Park long enough to remember when August meant classic cars on the lawn, this year is worth resetting your expectations for. The park isn't smaller or quieter. It's just arranged differently, and the difference is worth knowing before next year's calendar fills in around it.
If you're weighing a move in or around San Marino and want a read on what daily life actually looks like in neighborhoods like this one, Tracey Kardash can walk you through it. Let's Connect.
