West Seattle Summer Fest 2013: Sunday afternoon updates

Even if you’ve already been to West Seattle Summer Fest this year, come on down one more time before it’s over! Thanks to Krista for sharing the top photo – “beautiful day in The Junction,” she noted; so true! Music, shopping, food, art, and more – it’s all here, until 5 pm. Art, by the way, is here to observe, to purchase, and to create – Jessie shared this photo from the kids’ area by Wells Fargo, where youth can create along with Young At Art:

For our quick links to info – see our first morning report. And we would love to share your festival photos too – share them by e-mail at editor@westseattleblog.com, or via the WSB Facebook page.

1:38 PM NOTE: From Don Bereiter at Prudential NW Realty (WSB sponsor), whose booth has a fun game to check out: “For every child that participates, we are donating a can of food to the West Seattle and White Center Food Banks. 979 so far. Come on out and help a great cause!” (added) Here’s Tom Root and Chariti McEndoe photographed late in the day – note the counter’s gone up:

2:40 PM UPDATE: The last musical act of the day, The Jellyrollers, is scheduled to start right about now. Earlier, we caught Jazzberry with a young fan up front:

Summer Fest has been a bit lighter on political visitors than past years, but we’ve seen two mayoral candidates so far at the Info Booth – Mayor Mike McGinn, talking with, at right, Dave Montoure and Nancy Woodland from the West Seattle Chamber of Commerce:

And State Sen. Ed Murray, photographed talking with Susan Melrose from the West Seattle Junction Association:

WSJA, by the way, presents Summer Fest every year. Meantime, outside West Seattle Optix, balloon-making was in full swing earlier:

And there’s still time to get down and meet representatives of businesses, organizations, and service providers – we photographed Lisa at the Highline Medical (WSB sponsor) booth, handing out reusable bags.

More to come in the final few hours!

3:42 PM UPDATE: Just got a chance to upload video from today’s first performance onstage – that’s Rat City Brass! The festival is still crowded yet mellow. SPD Lt. Ron Smith, who heads up the on-site Summer Fest patrol, tells us there have been no major problems (and few minor ones) throughout the three days. As for the rest of West Seattle – we’ll get an update tomorrow, when the Southwest Precinct hosts the mayor, as the precincts around the city have been doing, for the latest on the Safe Communities project.

4:35 PM UPDATE: Down to the last half-hour, already. Another politician visited a little while ago:

With County Executive Dow Constantine – who said he had been making the rounds of festivals, including Kent Cornucopia Days earlier in the day – that’s Hamilton Gardiner and Jerome Cohen with him, both in the Info Booth today as community volunteers representing the West Seattle Chamber of Commerce.

5:04 PM UPDATE: And Summer Fest is a wrap for 2013. Thanks to everyone who’s been part of it – whether visitor, vendor, exhibitor, performer, staffer, local year-round merchant, volunteer, law enforcer, sponsor, etc. … it’s been awesome. We’ll have an update later tonight when the streets reopen – it’ll take a few hours for cleanup/breakdown/loadout.

P.S. Just for fun, we have a photo album on the WSB Facebook page with some of the dogs spotted at Summer Fest – see it here.

12 Replies to "West Seattle Summer Fest 2013: Sunday afternoon updates"

  • Living in Paradise July 14, 2013 (5:30 pm)

    Thank goodness the GOP is outnumbered in West Seattle. In spite of the problems here, West Seattle is paradise on earth.

  • Scott July 14, 2013 (6:47 pm)

    I’ve been going to the West Seattle Street Fair for close to 20 years now, and I have to say that the music that was featured Friday and Saturday evenings was a HORRIBLE selection. A heavy rock/thrash/grunge selection was NOT good for the local businesses/vendors that were close to the music. Every single person I spoke with was put off by it. The few shop owners I talked to all said it had severely impacted their business this year, they had shoppers who commented on the music, and found it to be WAY too loud. A lot of people hit the Oregon St intersection, and promptly turned around and went back south away from the music.
    It’s not so much that the music itself was bad(although some of it was), it was just band after band after band with no variety. It was a great relief when Whiskey River came on as the last group Sat night, and the music today was much more appealing

  • Mike July 14, 2013 (8:05 pm)

    Thank you to all of those responsible for another great Summer Fest.

  • G July 14, 2013 (9:44 pm)

    I’ve learned that where you live is largely what you make of it, PIP. In other words, you can find paradise anywhere.

  • Last53BusRider July 14, 2013 (10:30 pm)

    The music WAS a bit obnoxious on Friday and Saturday evenings. But organizers obviously think that is what most of us want and expect – and perhaps they are right. A lot of music fans are not too particular. As long as there is a band on stage making noise, the crowd is happy.

  • Jeff Gilbert July 15, 2013 (12:39 am)

    I’d like to offer to those who found the Friday and Saturday night music obnoxious completely missed the point. The festival producers did an EXCELLENT job in bringing in Seattle rock legacy musicians (not an easy task) and attracting audiences and problem-free nights of diverse music.

    A few hours over a couple of days of what some might think are “noisy” result in large – happy – crowds, and funding for next year’s festival.

    Ask the vendors and surrounding businesses what they think.

  • T July 15, 2013 (4:54 am)

    It’s nice to see Dow Constantine making the rounds. He is a native WS’er himself!

  • Junctionite July 15, 2013 (9:23 am)

    I would appreciate seeing more musical diversity beyond rock and roll, really enjoyed Rat City Brass. More country, bluegrass, jazz, blues – rock is way too represented here. Also, playing loud music after 11 pm was not ideal for some of us living nearby, it seems like this is getting later every year.

  • mookie July 15, 2013 (9:33 am)

    The loud music after 11 seemed to be coming not from the summer fest stage, but from Shadowland, who had a live band playing inside, with the doors open and a crowd of enthusiasts outside. I could hear the music quite clearly more than three blocks away at midnight.

  • sun*e July 15, 2013 (10:09 am)

    While eating a delicious dinner Saturday night at La Romanza Bistro we really enjoyed listening to the musicians that performed there…such great dining music. The bands at the north end of the Junction were quite loud so we chose a place to dine that was some distance from them because we wanted to be able to talk without yelling. I really do appreciate a variety of music genres and styles but when it’s so loud that it conflicts with other musicians and dinner conversation it’s a bit obnoxious.

  • G July 15, 2013 (4:56 pm)

    “Thank goodness the GOP is outnumbered in West Seattle. In spite of the problems here, West Seattle is paradise on earth.”

    Methinks thou doth protest too much.

  • S Greer July 17, 2013 (1:03 am)

    Haha! Scott’s music review is killing me! Is this real, or is he just setting me up..?

    “….music that was featured Friday and Saturday evenings was a HORRIBLE selection. A heavy rock/thrash/grunge selection was NOT good for the local businesses/vendors… Every single person I spoke with was put off by it… It was a great relief when Whiskey River (Lynard Skynard Tribute Band) came on as the last group Sat night….”

    The Mono Men? The Young Fresh Fellows? Those guys were tight- they sounded better than ever! These (and many others) are the bands and musicians that influenced and shaped the legendary Seattle sound. Great sets, and the people that I saw, who came for the music, were thrilled! The people you spoke to that were put off, were not watching the bands- and they were mostly frustrated because they couldn’t find 8 matching napkin rings in the sale box in front of Crapers!
    Scott, the thing is- most people at the street fair did not come for a free spinal check and a pair of woven Guatemalan pants. The big draw is the music. Sometimes, music gets loud, and people buy corndogs, and everyone wins-
    and you (you,Scott) still get to hear your Skynard covers!

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