Community members, vendors get their festival fix at new Art in the Orchard event
A day of rain didn’t stop hundreds of Centre County community members from gathering Thursday for the first day of Way Fruit Farm’s Art in the Orchard.
The three-day event — one of several around the county arranged in the absence of an in-person Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts and People’s Choice Festival — features a variety of art vendors, food trucks and live music.
And while attendees are able to get their art fix, the event also provides a meaningful opportunity for both new and seasoned art vendors alike — the chance to sell in-person art again after the coronavirus pandemic.
One of those vendors is MP Custom Made, run by Morrisville artists and partners Michael Pendleton and Amy Yojo Shaw.
The duo had been planning on participating in this year’s Arts Fest, Shaw said, but because of the ongoing pandemic, all shows were “shot.”
Instead, the couple — who specialize in custom wooden art and furniture — set up a tent Thursday at Art in the Orchard. It’s their first show in 15 months and just their second in nearly two years, Pendleton said.
“I’m really glad that they picked this up and did this fair in the absence of the bigger one,” he said. “I hope it continues by itself.”
He said they weren’t sure what to expect coming into the fair, but were pleasantly surprised by the engagement they saw in the first few hours of the festival.
Shaw highlighted the continued value of art fairs and supporting local artists not only after quarantine, but amid the popularity of online shopping from larger corporations.
“I’m gonna be frank — weird stuff shows up at art fairs, and people need weird stuff,” she said. “They don’t need all the Amazon stuff and all the ‘Live Laugh Love’ stuff.”
In addition to contributing to a community’s culture, Pendleton stressed the importance of art shows like Art in the Orchard because of their accessibility, saying smaller shows offer new vendors the opportunity to get into the business.
First-time art vendors and sisters Abagail Thomas and Hope Cecere of Bellefonte expressed a similar sentiment.
“It was nice because (Way Fruit Farm) said they wanted to make it something that local people could do because sometimes the bigger (art fairs) get way more competitive, and then it’s harder for newer people to get in,” said Thomas, who owns Sweet Peach Designs along with Thomas.
Both women explained that Sweet Peach Designs is a family effort, as they work together with their extended family to create and sell handmade items like baby blankets and handbags.
Another first-time vendor set up at the event was Elaine Huang, 24, who runs Ellaful, a shop that sells Huang’s resin art and laser cut products, such as jewelry and kitchen wares.
Huang said that she wished there were more opportunities for local artists to showcase their products. She spent the last few months looking for art fairs she could participate in, she said, only to find Art in the Orchard.
“I’m really thankful to have this opportunity,” Huang said. “If there were more, I would definitely go.”
In addition to the artists, Art in the Orchard provides an opportunity for community members who’ve missed attending art fairs, too.
State College residents Janice Swayne and Donna Doerr attended the event together in lieu of Arts Fest and People’s Choice, which Swayne said they haven’t missed for over 20 years.
After not attending any kind of art fair after last year’s cancellation, Swanye said the friends decided to try something new this year.
“This is just a nice opportunity for us to get out and look at crafts and spend time together,” she said. “Even though it’s raining, I think people are just happy to get out.”
Art in the Orchard continues from 10 a.m.-7 p.m. Friday and Saturday.