anyone do First Friday?

[Former_Member]

Has anyone done First Friday in downtown Phoenix? Thoughts?

[Former_Member]

Art Detour is this weekend, so the galleries are open tomorrow (Sunday) if you want to check them out.

http://artlinkphoenix.com/

:)

[Former_Member]

I did First Fridays from 2003 - 2010 and it was a great place to hang out, especially when the galleries were all open and it was run by the Roosevelt Row CDC. Roosevelt Ave was closed, the bands were playing and it was a vibrant community of artists.

But for the past year or so, its pretty much been shut down to artists, other than one small space run by ARTS at 4th street and Roosevelt.

[Former_Member]

I'm not sure I understand what you mean. Shut down to artists? Nearly all the galleries were open, we saw a few bands playing, there were even some vendors out on the streets with tables full of stuff.

[Former_Member]

Yes, the galleries are still open on 1st Fridays but the First Friday Festival is no longer.

Roosevelt used to be closed from Central to 7th street and the side streets south to MacKinley were also closed. Each of these streets were lined with individual artists.

There were 3 major band venues set up. One at Central & Roosevelt, one at 7th street & Roosevelt and one on 5th Street by the School. These were all sponsored by the Roosevelt Row CDC.

On a good night, there would be anywhere between 13,000 and 15,000 people at First Fridays (according to the police estimates).

Its nothing like that now.

[Former_Member]

A.R.T.S. is run by RoRo, and Hilary is still the contact. There are usually 4-5 food trucks in our area.

The commercial sellers are down at Revolver Records.

ARTS is supposed to be handmade, and handmade by you, but the by you part is not very enforced. I do OK on FF, and better on 3rd Friday (we have to commit to both or it costs more)..

They had to stop when Phoenix wanted $10,000 for the police and street closures, and the market was completely overrun by commercial resellers, which meant that handmade was expected to be walmart prices.