winter festival

This past weekend I was lucky enough to attend the Gowanus Canal Conservancy's Winter Festival. Kurt's brother, Erik, is heavily involved with the GCC and encouraged everyone to attend the fundraising event.

I don't have a lot of money, but what I do have is time and energy, so instead of buying a ticket, I volunteered to help with setup and worked the door for a couple hours during the event. Kurt calls this being cheap. I like to think of it as using my resources efficiently :)

The party was held at the brand new warehouse for Build it Green's Brooklyn outpost. It's an incredible space right on the canal (and a couple blocks from my apartment). Build it Green is a non-profit architectural salvage that sells surplus or rescued building materials at a low cost. Not only was the party well suited to the huge, old industrial building, but we were surrounded by cool vintage furniture and building materials that were all for sale. Can someone get married here, please? I think it would be amazing with lots of paper lanterns and twinkle lights. 

After a delicious (albeit spicy!) dinner of gumbo, cornbread, coleslaw, and apple crumb dessert from Lot 2, we were treated to the musical stylings of several different artists. First, Amanda Palmer did a few acoustic songs on top of a gorgeous mid-century modern credenza. I was working the door at this time, but it still sounded good from there!

Then The Suzan (all girl, Japanese rock band) took the stage.

I was so sad to still be sitting at the door for this set. They sounded awesome and fun. The crowd loved them!

Thankfully, I was able to abandon my post for good and got to see most of Savoir Adore's set. I heard them during their sound check while I helped set up in the afternoon and they sounded amazing. Check them out!

The last band of the evening was the Ambassadors. I feel if I had heard their music independently of watching them, I would have really liked it. But the lead singer was an odd duck. He has an incredible voice but makes such odd faces and is just so theatrical that I found I couldn't watch him. I bet he could have a promising future in musical theater :)

The gang after all the music was finished and they started giving the beer away for free.

Thanks to the GCC for putting on a great party and working for an important cause!

BTW, can your believe this is my 300th post?! Personally, I cannot. Thank you so much for reading. I've had so much fun writing. I can't wait for 300 more!