Oregon Crafters Market returning in summer with eclectic goods, food trucks
Sandwiched between the newest/oldest restaurants in Silverton and a food truck pod/bake shop, the welcoming little streetside space at 215 N. Water Street will — beginning the weekend of May 6-8 — once again host the summer-long Oregon Crafters Market.
The site of the third-year event may end up becoming a town square of sorts during weekends from May through October.
Visitors will be able to walk the town center, eat in one of several downtown restaurants or grab something from the bakery, food trucks or the market’s own new on-site restaurant, The High Water Grill.
Then, while enjoying live music, they can take a leisurely spring stroll around the market’s 42 vendor spaces to seek out items as wide-ranging and esoteric as Funky Fish, tie-dyed shoelaces, massage stones — even Grammie’s Drawers.
Oregon Crafters Market manager Joy Ewing said in late April that she already had “well over 60 applications” for the available vendor spaces. She said she anticipates the 120-foot-by-300-foot market area should easily fill up on this year’s May 6 opening evening alongside the city’s First Friday event.
“Some vendors won’t be coming to the opening weekend or will have sporadic schedules,” she said, “while some want to come every weekend, and still others just wanting to come on Fridays or Saturdays.”
“Though we have 42 spaces, there’s room to wiggle and put in a few more, maybe,” she said. Purchasing an Oregon Crafters Market membership can help alleviate the scheduling frenzy for dedicated vendors, she noted.
“The first year we were open (the summer of 2020), it was really scary for me,” Ewing said. “My anxiety level was up to here just trying to start something new.”
In the second year, she said she felt the market could have been busier, but attributed that to vendor and pedestrian absences due to the ongoing pandemic.
“I know that this year’s opening weekend will be full,” she said, “but things are ever-changing as far as commitments from people since we have an ongoing open-to-apply plan. We’re always accepting new vendors.”
Longtime OCM vendor and member Ruth Patching sells tie-dye items such as dresses, baby clothes, shirts — and the shoelaces — at her booth, called Soap and Stitches.
She said the event is “really enjoyable; it’s long hours but it’s a welcoming environment and there is a great mixture of people, which is fun.”
Brent Rutter and Patty Tatum are Albany residents who have made the pilgrimage to the Oregon Crafters Market for the past two years to sell their eclectic wares. Rutter’s booth is called Rutter’s Rustic Creations, which peddles wood carvings, “Funky Fish” art and other items.
He said the Oregon Crafter’s Market was “the only game in the state” that functioned well during the pandemic, since it was “open-air and outside.”
Oregon Crafters Market owner Glen Damewood also owns the iconic 1890’s-era Mac’s Place, as well as two Wooden Nickel eateries. He purchased the market lot from a friend who had had experience in working the longtime Portland Saturday Market, where Ewing was once a vendor.
The lot houses a small building that Damewood has converted into a kitchen area. A two-story addition will feature an open-air restaurant on the bottom floor and a second-floor adults-only lounge called the Rong Bar. The entire structure — situated as it is at the intersection of High and Water streets and fronting Silver Creek — will be known as the High Water Grill.
A street-level family outdoor dining area hugs the Water Street sidewalk and the existing Rong Stage hosts live music during the First Friday events each month, as well as the Saturday/Sunday market days each weekend through October 30.
All proceeds from the market, Ewing said, go to the Silver Fox Foundation, which disburses funds back into the community by allowing local students, youth sports and clubs to fundraise at the market.
Weekend dates and event and vendor information can be found at www.oregoncraftersmarket.com.
Freelance writer/photographer Geoff Parks is based in Salem. Have a Silverton story idea? E-mail him at geoffparks@gmail.com.
This article originally appeared on Salem Statesman Journal: Oregon Crafters Market returning to Silverton this summer
