Arts Fest 2014 - It's Arts Fest Weekend!

My first trip downtown for the Arts Fest this year (my 27th, though it was founded in 1967) was Thursday.  My assistant, Destiny, has never experienced the State College Arts Fest – a situation that needed to be rectified!  We downloaded the festival app onto our phones (search the app store for  “arts festival state college”) and headed out.

We started on Allen Street – love to see the transformation in just a few days.  Beautiful landscape displays, the buckets with laughing tots running beneath them waiting to get doused.  A group was warming up on the Allen Street Stage, we checked the app and found out that it was the Tarnished Six ready to give us some Dixieland.  Grabbed a button ($10) for the weekend of performances ahead and headed toward the artists.

It always amazes me to see the range of work and creativity on display during this weekend.  Paintings, photography, fabric, wood, jewelry, metal sculpture…year after year, in addition to many returning favorites, there is always something new and surprising.

We made a loop around the booths in town, ducking our heads in for a closer look at many of the pieces on display, and then our thoughts turned to FOOD!  Ok, so I timed our field trip around lunch, what do you expect? So many choices, even though I know I will be eating here more than once this weekend it is hard to narrow down my selection.  Des opted for chicken on a stick, and I had an eggroll and shrimp fried rice

  A great addition to the Fest this year is the new “Fest Zero” initiative for controlling waste.  A recycling container is next to every trash container, and compost bins are near food stands. Under this initiative, introduced by Brad Fey, the festival Trash Crew had been renamed the Green Crew and volunteers are on hand to help festival attendees put their waste into the appropriate containers.  Want to know more about this initiative and the benefits of living a sustainable lifestyle?  Stop by the Fest Zero education booth on Allen Street and chat with the volunteers! Please take a moment before you discard anything downtown this weekend and help with this effort of keeping some of the 75 tons (!!!) of waste generated in an event of this size out of the landfill.

After lunch it was time to head back to RE/MAX Centre Realty but I had one more stop to make before the parking garage.  Heidi’s Strudel.  Love. These. Pastries.  I always make a show of looking over the choices but on my first day I know what I am ordering.  Apple.  Friday it may be cheese or apricot, we will have to wait and see.

Want to plan your weekend at the Fest?  Download the app to see entertainment schedules, artists, maps and other information, or go online www.arts-festival.com  I have to make a plug for my daughter, Clara, and the students from State High that are performing “Alice in Concert” at the Downtown Theatre on Friday at 2pm and 8pm.  This group of performers is taking “Alice” – sets, costumes, and all! -  to Scotland in August to perform in the Fringe International Theatre Festival.  Grab a festival button and meet me there!

Glad I was able to give Destiny her first glimpse of the Fest.  If we have time on Friday I will have to bring her to the People Choice Festival in Boalsburg, another must-see event this weekend.  An arts fest with a bit more laid back attitude and a more distinct local (PA) flair, the People’s Choice Festival runs through Sunday.  Artists, craftspeople, food, and entertainment galore at this event as well.  More info at www.peopleschoicefestival.com . 

My apple strudel is calling me from a box on my kitchen counter.

-Kris Hanahan

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