Keeping it local
Plaza District Festival celebrates 20 years in OKC
This is a festival-heavy state. There’s not a goodweather weekend that goes by without a community gathering somewhere; if you’re looking for food trucks, live music and tent vendors on a Saturday, the odds of finding them in one place are in your favor. The 20th annual Plaza District Festival this Saturday checks all those boxes, as well: live music, artists, food and an abundance of other family-friendly attractions.
It’s the same, but it’s different. For one, it’s 20 years strong, created even before the Plaza District Association was founded. Also, the festival, like the district itself, has taken the popular “keep it local” rallying cry to heart, in that all of the 38 scheduled musicians and 33 accepted artisans are Oklahoman.
“We make a concerted effort that we’re featuring and giving as much love as possible to our businesses and all of our local artists and vendors,” said Selena Skorman, Plaza District executive director.
Longtime Plaza volunteer, board Vice President and festival Cochair Leah Roper agreed, “We are looking only for Oklahoma people, and we want to showcase what they can do, encourage them to get their foothold to start their own business or just to showcase.”
Locality isn’t the only requirement. Festival applications — a whopping 101 for the artists’ market and 192 for the musicians — were juried by separate committees comprised of people who work in those respective fields. “We’re trying really hard to push original artwork and original content and to jury that in so it’s of the highest quality,” Skorman said.
Music, food, art and fun
Musical performances begin at 11 a.m. across three stages. Performers include Adam & Kizzie, Saint Loretto, Flock of Pigs, LTZ, Spinster and Andy Adams. Showcasing artists’ works range from photography and luxury spa items to paintings and leatherwork, to name a few. Seven local food trucks are also on the bill, including Big Truck Tacos and Jerky.com.
Aside from the thoughtfully selected festival performers and vendors, visitors will be able to discover and patronize the Plaza Festival’s raison d’être, the brick-and-mortar businesses that make up the thriving strip.
“The focus is into the street a little bit, but restaurants will have graband-go options, or you can sit down and eat. DNA Gallery always has a show, and you’d miss out if you didn’t go in there. Bad Granny’s has everything you can think of, and I think people forget because it’s at the end of the Plaza, so we placed the food trucks by it to catch people going in that way. You’d definitely miss out if you didn’t go inside,” Roper said.
Event press materials tout the festival as a “celebration of the revitalization” of the district, and in 2017, the festival raised $35,000 for the Plaza, all of which went back into the annual budget for services provided to the businesses and community events, outreach and arts opportunities.
Versus the first festival 20 years ago, the district is hardly recognizable, thanks to the businesses that took a chance, the volunteers who work events like the monthly LIVE on the Plaza art walk and a board that aims to preserve what makes the Plaza unique while keeping its growth manageable and in line with the neighborhood’s ethos.
“At this point, people know what the neighborhood is and they feel safe going there. People and businesses want to be there,” Roper said. “So part of the challenge now is keeping our feel and encouraging growth. We’ve had new builds come into the neighborhood. We’ve had property values go up. But we’re trying to make sure that we keep our identity, that diverse feeling.”
Volunteers do good work
The Plaza District Festival is both an anchor for that mission and evidence of its accomplishments so far. The Plaza’s vibe is deeply rooted in a small group of business owners but also a vast network of people who love the area enough to volunteer their time to helping out there.
“A lot of our volunteers don’t live or work here,” Skorman said. “I think that is so cool that a district can make its way into your heart even though you may not be financially benefiting from its success. They’re people who are passionate about the arts and community.”
Roper, whose first visit to the Plaza was during the festival in 2012, started as one of those volunteers. As her involvement has deepened, she’s borne witness to and participated in the many ways the community around the Plaza has taken charge of its collective fate.
“Everything there is grassroots. LIVE on the Plaza was the businesses coming together and deciding to put on a monthly event. The festival itself was started by the Gatewood Neighborhood Association 20 years ago because they wanted to turn the neighborhood around,” Roper said.
Projected attendance for Saturday is in the tens of thousands, and it seems likely that many of those people, even firsttime visitors to the area, will leave with the same impression that inspired Roper, Skorman and the countless others who’ve made the Plaza what it is today and continue to push for its success.
“What you feel when you come there is the caring that the businesses have and the property owners have and the neighbors have about the area,” Roper said. “They’re essentially family, and when you walk in, that’s what you’re feeling. You can tell there’s something special about it.”