BTS is set to play Rogers Stadium, and Toronto City Hall’s sign will light up purple in honour. Here’s the latest

BTS Army, it’s time to get in formation.

With hours to go until BTS play Rogers Stadium over two sold-out nights this weekend, the anticipation is rising for the return of the K-pop superstars, nearly a decade after they last played nearby Hamilton. The group make their Toronto debut with concerts on Aug. 22 and 23, the only Canadian stops on their Arirang world tour.

The city has proclaimed this is “BTS Weekend,” and plans to light the Toronto sign at City Hall purple, the band’s signature colour, for both nights of the BTS concerts. It also marked the occasion with a Friday morning ceremony to temporarily rename part of Yonge Street “BTS Blvd.”

The fans are already out in full force. Many lined up in the wee hours of Friday morning outside the stadium to buy merchandise at a pre-show sales day, social media posts showed.

Sokvin Vann, who runs social media accounts for the BTS Toronto Army, is planning to attend both concerts with her teenage son Jordan. He dyed his hair purple, the BTS Army’s unofficial colour, signifying loyalty and unity.

“It’s beyond the music,” Sokvin said of the energy radiating among fans. “The community becomes a whole family, and I think that’s really special.”

The countdown to these shows has been years in the making for 21-year-old BTS fan Gabriella Graham.

“It’s one of those things that I’ve been waiting for since I was a kid,” she said.

Graham had tickets to see BTS in Toronto six years ago, before the pandemic forced those concerts to be cancelled. Since then, she’s waited for the group’s members to complete their mandatory military service and return to touring.

She bought tickets for the second Toronto show at about $500 each.

This time, she’s bringing her sister along, partly, she joked, as emotional support. “I know from the moment that concert starts, I’ll cry,” Graham said. “That’s why I didn’t want to make a crazy outfit, because I know my makeup isn’t going to last.”

Festivities and plans are well underway; here’s what’s happening around the city and what fans need to know.

Yonge Street strip temporarily renamed ‘BTS Blvd.’

A stretch of Yonge Street in North York has some extra K-pop flavour to celebrate the BTS shows.

Coun. Lily Cheng unveiled the “BTS Blvd.” street signs on Friday morning at a media event, the culmination of a month-long effort that required city council approval and the blessing of Hybe Music Group, the South Korean entertainment giant that owns the BTS brand.

“My office heard from fans across the city and around the world (voicing) their support for this initiative, so I want to acknowledge and thank BTS Army,” Cheng said at the ceremony at the corner of Yonge Street and North York Boulevard.

“They wrote letters to city council and social media posts tagging BTS management to make sure that we got their support. These were nail-biting sessions because we had a production timeline to meet (and required) authorization from Korea.”

While some fans hoped the street signs would be purple, Cheng said that palette was rejected by the group’s management.

“They really wanted the signs to go along with the branding of the Arirang Tour, which, as you will note, is red and black and white,” she said.

Earlier this month, Toronto City Council approved temporarily renaming a stretch of Yonge Street from North York Boulevard to Finch Avenue for a month, from Aug. 21 to Sept. 23.

Part of the original plan included auctioning off the signs, with proceeds going to local food bank 415 Food Hub, but Cheng said that was nixed by Hybe, citing concerns it could establish “a precedent that might create unintended consequences.”

Cheng said the plan now is to make the signs part of ticketed draws at various community events that will be announced at a future date, in association with the Neighbourlink North York food program.

“BTS Army is already talking to them about how they can work together to make sure they get max participation when these lucky draws happen,” she said.

What BTS fans are doing around town

Toronto has come alive with Army energy over the past few weeks as fans bonded with one another by making homemade bracelets, throwing parties and even crafting themed boxes of chocolates. Many of the revelers arrived in the city from long distances, part of a growing tend of music tourism that sees both casual and diehard fans plotting destination vacations around their favourite acts.

BTS fans will have many options over the weekend, including the three-day Toronto Korean Festival, which begins Friday. Held at Mel Lastman Square, the event is described as the largest celebration of Korean culture in the city, spanning music, fashion, beauty and the fanfare around television K-dramas.

Around Rogers Stadium, BTS fans will find a vast selection of food options, from Salvadoran pupusas and Turkish doner to Chinese barbecue and Azerbaijani comfort food.

What the BTS show will look like

Rogers Stadium will look a little different this weekend. Its usual concert configuration is being transformed to accommodate BTS’s signature 360-degree stage, which has travelled with the group throughout its Arirang World Tour.

Outside the gates of the stadium, a dedicated Army Zone will be the space for fans to congregate and exchange fan-made gifts.

Around the venue, concertgoers can snack on a themed menu of Korean dishes that includes grilled bulgogi skewers, Korean fried chicken sandwiches and boba. Organizers say themed photo opportunities and other fan experiences will be scattered throughout the stadium.

In the past few months, Live Nation has been addressing complaints about the stadium, which include some residents saying concert noise was travelling as far away as Thornhill. Other improvements have been made, including adding more shaded areas around the facilities and shortening the amount of time it takes for concertgoers to exit the property.

When BTS fans can arrive at Rogers Stadium

Fans hoping to camp overnight outside the 50,000-capacity venue beforehand will have to make other plans. Rogers Stadium says its long-standing ban on overnight camping and lineups will remain in place, although fans can begin lining up at 9:30 a.m.

Additional details, including gate opening times, will be shared through the Rogers Stadium app and emailed to ticket holders leading up to the shows.

Toronto fans are organizing a light show

Fans are planning to illuminate Rogers Stadium with an elaborate light show dedicated to BTS on both nights in Toronto.

Organizers of the Maple Light Project are asking concertgoers to take part by holding up their smartphones at designated moments.

Using the WePix Arena app, ticket holders can enter their section and seat numbers, which will make their phones flash in co-ordination with those around them. After the group’s second surprise song at each show, fans will be asked to raise their phones. If the plan works, the stadium’s bleachers will light up with synchronized shapes and messages, a stunning visual that organizers hope will catch the attention of the band and provide a memorable moment for fans.

On-site BTS Army volunteers will also hand out pamphlets explaining how to take part in the light show.

How to buy BTS tour merch

A huge part of BTS fandom is spending big on band merchandise, and across the city there are many options for scoring official gear.

At the stadium, a special pre-show shopping day began on Friday outside Gate 1 on the venue’s north side, and operates until 6 p.m. It will open on show days at 10 a.m.

Inside the venue, there are even more options, with merchandise locations around the premises. The biggest is at Terminal 81, a dedicated pre-show fan space and rest area that’s been converted into a massive merch tent for the first time ever. There’s also the fan plaza merchandise store at the centre of the space, the Gate 2 merchandise stand on the northeast corner of the plaza and the north grandstands merch trailer at the south end of the plaza. All of them will open at 4:30 pm.

Another merch space will open in the concert bowl at 5:30 p.m.

There’s also the official BTS pop-up store, operated by Hybe Music Group, which opened last week at 144 Bloor St. W. in Yorkville, giving fans a chance to stock up on $253 hoodies, as well as posters, key chains and mugs.

The cashless BTS Pop-Up: Arirang in Toronto store operates daily from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. Hours will be reduced from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. starting Aug. 31 until it closes Sept. 13.

All shoppers are required to reserve times to enter the store. The store was originally expected to host 850 people per day, but intense demand led the pop-up to shorten the shopping time slots and increase capacity to 1,200 to 1,500 per day.

BTS members spotted in Toronto

More than a week before BTS were set for the Rogers Stadium stage, members J-Hope and RM attended an Usher and Chris Brown concert at the same venue.

J-Hope posted videos on his Instagram account on Aug. 12 showing the pair watching the show from VIP seats, and dancing along to Chris Brown’s song “Look at Me.” Brown also posted a photo with the BTS singers, while Usher dropped an entire photo carousel on his Instagram of them hanging out backstage.

Some BTS fans expressed their disappointment with the K-pop idols’ decision to mingle with Brown, citing his history of assault charges, including a 2023 brawl at a London nightclub for which he will be sentenced in October.

The BTS members may have also been scoping out the venue in advance as the construction of their massive Arirang World Tour stage will reshape the look of Rogers Stadium.

With files from Karon Liu