There are Christmas markets, and then there is Dubrovnik’s latest idea: scrap the wooden huts, ditch the bratwurst, and line the Stradun with café tables instead. Because nothing says “festive spirit” quite like squeezing in an extra chair for Auntie Marija next to a double espresso, while a string of fairy lights valiantly attempts to compete with the grandeur of baroque palaces.

Now, before anyone mourns the loss of those festive stands, let me confess: I personally think they were a bad idea from the start.

Cheap (and frankly disgusting) hotdogs from Lidl masquerading as “local delicacies” was always destined for ridicule. And let’s be honest, the hygiene standards were questionable to say the least. Mulled wine ladled out of plastic barrels with dubious levels of alcohol doesn’t exactly conjure visions of Christmas magic, unless your idea of seasonal cheer involves an upset stomach and sticky gloves.

Kitsch to an Art Form 

Elsewhere in Europe, things look rather different.

In Germany, Christmas markets are practically a religion, entire towns transformed into glowing forests of fairy lights and gingerbread, the air thick with cinnamon, roasted almonds and choral singing. Vienna? They’ve elevated festive kitsch into an art form, snow-dusted stalls, orchestras playing Strauss, and enough glühwein to power the city’s trams.

Even Zagreb, just up the motorway, has managed to transform Advent into a full-blown international attraction, with award-winning chalets, live performances, and steaming sausages that don’t taste like they’ve been flown in on a budget airline.

And then there’s Dubrovnik.

The festive stands are passé. Too rustic, too sausage-centric, too beneath the marble dignity of the Stradun. Instead, local restaurants will drag out extra tables and chairs, perhaps even inventing a “Festival Burger” or a dish tailor-made for December.

Picture it: candlelit burgers and pasta dishes on a UNESCO-protected promenade, with tourists Instagramming their carbonara while a choir belts out “Silent Night.” Dickens himself would weep, though perhaps with laughter rather than sentiment.

Extend The Season 

The idea, we’re told, is to create a natural buzz on the Stradun, with proper catering facilities, places with actual sanitary facilities, no less, and to give year-round restaurateurs a chance to extend their season.

It’s being billed as a “pilot project,” an original Dubrovnik experiment that no one else has dared try. Apparently, it’s all about “authenticity.” A bold word in a city where authenticity often comes vacuum-packed and served with a garnish of Game of Thrones trivia.

But let’s not be too cynical.

On paper, the move does make a kind of sense. Why clutter one of the most beautiful streets in Europe with plywood boxes selling reheated wurst when the city already has dozens of professional kitchens and staff within arm’s reach?

At least this way, visitors will sit at proper tables, use proper cutlery, and perhaps even be offered a napkin that hasn’t blown down from the Franciscan Monastery.

Is It a Bad Idea? 

Tourism, we are reminded endlessly, is an experience.

And there’s no denying this will be one.

Whether it’s the kind of experience locals had in mind when they pictured a winter festival is another question.

But then again, this is Dubrovnik: where summer brings Game of Thrones cosplay tours, autumn delivers folklore festivals, and winter will now feature the world’s first Christmas market with table service.

And if you were thinking of enjoying your festive feed perched on the polished stone steps of St. Blaise’s, think again. The festival is meant to be “civilised” this year, and nothing says civilisation quite like a laminated menu tucked under a Christmas garland.

So, is it a bad idea?

Honestly, no.

The whole winter festival project is generally to be praised.

At least it tries to extend life in a city that too often shutters itself the moment the last cruise ship sails away. And any step away from those God-awful festive stands will be a step in the right direction. Dubrovnik has tried the plastic hotdog route. Now it’s trying the café route.

Who knows, maybe one day we’ll get to the mulled wine-and-gingerbread standard of Vienna.

Until then, bundle up, take your seat on the Stradun, and toast the season in true Dubrovnik style: with irony, with spectacle, and with an espresso machine steaming merrily in the background.

Maybe Dubrovnik’s Winter Festival won’t rival Vienna’s splendour or Munich’s efficiency, but it will at least be uniquely ours, a café-table Christmas, Stradun-style.

And in the end, as Winston Churchill once noted, “To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.”

Dubrovnik, it seems, has taken that to heart.

Read more Englishman in Dubrovnik…well, if you really want to

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About the author

Mark Thomas (aka Englez u Dubrovniku) is the editor of The Dubrovnik Times. He was born and educated in the UK and moved to live in Dubrovnik in 1998. He works across a whole range of media, from a daily radio show to TV and in print. Thomas is fluent in Croatian and this column is available in Croatia on the website – Dubrovnik Vjesnik