HARLEM, Manhattan (PIX11) — There is so much to celebrate in Harlem these days that Harlem Week this year it’s an entire 11-day festival of fun food and fashion.

It’s called a Great Day in Harlem, and this year’s theme is “Be the Change.”

At the first outdoor public event of Harlem Week 2023, one of the opening acts was Gravity of Love, with so much more on tap at the Ulysses Grant National Memorial on Riverside Drive.

“We are encouraging people to be the change,” Ade Williams, Harlem Week Executive Board Member, told PIX11 News. “Take a stand for environmental justice. Look out for your neighbors. Look out for your community. Make the difference you want to see.”

For the hundreds here, it’s a chance to celebrate Harlem’s History and support Black-Owned businesses like the 25-year-old Harlem lifestyle boutique, The Brownstone.

“We’ve got regular size and plus size, so if you have a body, will put it in something great,” Princess Jenkins, the owner of The Brownstone, told PIX11 News.

There was also the smallest small business owner, 7-year-old Alicia Scott, selling Ali’s World lemonade to buy a toy she wanted.

“A Barbie car,” Scott told PIX11 News.

The Ponder This columnist from Harlem Community News was celebrating her birthday, but hard to believe Hazel Rosetta Smith is 82.

“What better place to be for my birthday than right here,” Hazel Rosetta Smith, Harlem Community News Columnist, told PIX11 News. “This is a great day for the newspaper I write for, Harlem Community News.”

So many exciting stalls like Jaja’s

African Hair Braiding doing real hair braiding to promote the Manhattan Theater Club Broadway production, or Camille Yarbrough, who wrote Cornrow 44 years ago and the founder of Fathers Forward, Melvin Alston.

“A lot of the fathers are not dead and beats. They are dead broke, and we help them with a lot of stuff with little or no cost,” Alston told PIX11 News.

This is the 49th year of Harlem Week, and organizers are already starting to think about what they’ll do for the 50th anniversary next August.

If you’d like to live stream any Harlem Week events over the next few days, go to HarlemWeek.com to learn how.