Ten Fabulous Mardi Gras Parade Frocks
PHOTOGRAPHY: Giuseppe Santamaria | Instagram
The 48th annual Sydney Gay And Lesbian Mardi Gras Parade took over Oxford Street, Flinders Street and Moore Park Road on Saturday, 28 February 2026.
This year’s festival theme was Ecstatica, and the Parade, the penultimate event of the broader Mardi Gras Festival, more than lived up to it. An estimated 250,000 spectators lined the route as more than 10,000 marchers and over 170 floats lit up the night. Dykes On Bikes led the procession as always, followed by First Nations marchers and the 78ers, the original activists whose 1978 protest started it all nearly five decades ago.
The Parade route makes history
The celebration carried extra significance this year. Just days before the Parade, the Oxford Street route was officially added to Australia’s National Heritage List, placing it alongside landmarks like the Sydney Opera House as a site of outstanding national importance.
