Daejeon’s bread identity is often compressed into one famous bakery. The 2026 Bread Festival gives a better reason to widen the frame. Daejeon City says 120 local bakeries will gather at Expo Science Park on October 17 and 18. The mix includes 56 members of the Korea Bakery Association and 64 bakeries selected through an open lottery. That selection matters because it makes the festival less like a showcase for a few dominant names and more like a temporary directory of the city’s wider bakery scene. The most useful new layer is the Daejeon Bread Map. According to the city’s official October guide, the festival’s Bread Gallery will introduce the representative products and brand stories of participating shops, while the map will show their locations so visitors can continue the 'bread pilgrimage' after the festival. In other words, the event is trying to convert two days of concentrated tasting into movement across the city. That does not prove every participating bakery is equally distinctive, or that visitors will actually travel widely after the event. It also does not prove international demand. But it does provide a clear editorial shift: bread is being organized not only as a product to buy but as a way to navigate Daejeon. For travelers, the practical implication is simple. The festival can work as a sampling point. Instead of queueing only for the most famous name, visitors can use the Bread Gallery and map to identify smaller shops they may want to visit later. The 2026 event runs October 17-18 at Expo Science Park, with the city guide listing 13:00-20:30 and national culture/tourism listings confirming free general admission. There are still limits. Individual products may sell out early, and we have not tested foreign-language signage, allergen information, cashless payment, queue management, transit between mapped bakeries or whether every listed shop keeps the same hours after the festival. The useful story is therefore not that Daejeon has suddenly become a bread city. It is that the city is making its existing bakery culture more legible as a network. A map can turn a reputation into an itinerary.