Uptown Brown entertains crowds at Chiltern's first Off Grid Living festival with his incredible one-man band show.
Wet weather failed to dampen the spirits of visitors to Chiltern’s first Off Grid Living Festival on the weekend.
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Arriving to wet conditions and last-minute applications of straw to particularly soggy areas of ground, bare-footed children all across the venue had a wonderful time splashing in the mud.
Not discouraged by the rain, patrons at the festival warmed up with a fiery hot sauce tasting.
Traders, though, were disappointed with the slow start as many visitors waited for the drier afternoon conditions to make their appearance and oversights with signage and traffic control further slowed the arrival of patrons who found it difficult to navigate their way to the event.
“We had no idea where we had to go to find the racecourse.” one patron said.
“There were not enough signs through town and even the traffic controllers were pretty unhelpful.”
Despite initial frustrations, by the time the weather cleared mid-afternoon, the expected crowds were happily enjoying a huge variety of sustainable living workshops, demonstrations and stalls offering unique advice and products.
Guests were treated to more than 100 specialised workshops and talks across eight main staged areas with a further 150 hosted by stallholders across the weekend.
Maegan Oberhardt wows onlookers as she demonstrates her unique Painting With Fire technique.
With almost 300 vendors showcasing their products and ideas there was no denying that visitors were busy just trying to see everything.
However, stallholders were concerned that, with the current economic instability, that this may not have been the best year to expand the festival so drastically.
“There were only about half as many stalls last year at Eldorado,” a gallery owner from Beechworth said.
“But the smaller space provided a much more lively atmosphere and generated a lot more sales for stallholders.
“With almost double that many this year there is double the amount of competition for the patrons dollar when they are already struggling with living costs.
“What was a sensational weekend of trading in 2023 has not even covered our costs this year,” she continued.
“There are also a number of customers who we have gotten to know over previous years at the festival who did not come this year because they felt it was just a big market now, that by getting so big, it has lost its original and true identity as a valuable source of information and resources for living sustainably.”
Samara unveils her natural dye tote bag at one of the 150 stallholder workshops.
As with all first-time events, there are bound to be teething problems that need to be addressed going forward, however, it appeared that most visitors were as happy as ever with their experience.
“I’ve just finished a natural fabric dye workshop and I loved it,” local resident Samara said.
“And I attended both ink and carved tool making ones this morning.
“I really liked the new location and the fact that there were so many more stalls.”
Event organisers were also thrilled with the outcome of the move to Chiltern with Saturday attendance on par with 2023 numbers and Sunday far exceeding any previous records.
“We’re so excited!” Arabella Watson said at the close of the event on Sunday afternoon.
“It has been an amazing festival.
“Chiltern has fully embraced us and offered their support in so many ways with providing shuttle buses and a number of other really helpful resources.
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