Cork and Limerick have conducted Lifelong Learning Festivals, Cork for ten years and Limerick for the past three years. This paper reviews aspects of this experience and considers the question of whether successful Lifelong Learning Festivals can be seen as a pathway to building sustainable learning cities. Discussed in the context of an initiative by Cork, we examine how Cork has adopted an international development by PASCAL to reconceptualise learning cities as broadly based sustainable opportunity cities, and action by Limerick to extend its city experience to the whole county following the decision to amalgamate city and county. (Contains 1 footnote.)