Wet on the Green
COEUR d'ALENE - Thomas Orjala and Iris Siegler may be out of their gourds about art, but with more than 30 years of Art on the Green experience, it's justified.
Orjala, 63, and Siegler, 59, both of Coeur d'Alene, volunteer in the Hands on Art booth located on the south side of the North Idaho College campus. It's a large tent with an abundance of art supplies: easels, markers, beads, clay.
And lots of gourds.
Orjala said that years ago, Hands on Art only had easel art for little kids and nothing for adults, so he suggested gourds. He got contact information for an elderly lady in Georgia who sells and dries them, and they have been buying the gourds from her ever since. They order 300 from her for Art on the Green, but have ordered as many as 1,800.
"Every year I call her up. She's in her 90s, you know, but she still grows them," Orjala said.
Hands on Art provides an open-ended area where kids and adults alike can use their creative skills to customize items, like T-shirts or tote bags, or create a masterpiece on an easel. Orjala and Siegler have been running the booth as long as they have been involved in Art on the Green.
"When I first started with them, there were tennis courts and all we had was an easel," Siegler said. "We were setting up the art and that was it, and then it just kept evolving."
This marks Art on the Green's 45th year. The first day was a rainy Friday, forcing attendees to exchange their shorts and tank tops for umbrellas and sweaters. Despite the weather, the annual event was still something that locals and out-of-towners alike looked forward to, like best friends Debbie Woodall and Pam Waller.
Woodall, 50, and Waller, 51, both of Coeur d'Alene, said Art on the Green is something they enjoy together every year. They had lunch at a picnic table beneath the main gazebo in Coeur d'Alene City Park near the Taste of Coeur d'Alene vendors as they took a break from wandering in the rain. They arrived downtown at 10:30 a.m.
"This year I bought a carved bear for my parents," Woodall said. "I like to come down and buy gifts."
"Unique gifts, that's what I like," Waller added. "I love finding unique things."
Among the many unique creations at Art on the Green is the Barrel Room Furniture made by Bret Bloodgood. His furniture features chairs and tables made from wooden wine barrels, a hobby that he said just kind of took off.
"A couple years ago I saw a picture of a rocking chair that I wanted to build for myself," he said. "So I started looking for barrels and found a couple, and started building a chair, kind of experimenting. But everything that I built somebody wanted, so it just kind of turned into that. It's been more a hobby than a business, just something to do for enjoyment, but it's taking more and more time."
Every barrel takes about six hours of sanding and the pieces can take up to 18 hours to make. This is Bloodgood's first time selling his work at Art on the Green, but his 16-year-old daughter, Caitlin Morier, who accompanied him, said she goes every year.
"There's so many different things that you would never see anywhere else," she said. "I'd never think (to) just take flowers, dry them out, put them in a frame and sell them. I've never even thought of that."
The walkways in the City Park are lined with vendors this weekend, as are the sidewalks of Sherman Avenue for the Downtown Street Fair. Attendees can procure a variety of items, including birdhouses, spices, lawn ornaments, toys, wood workings, brilliant jewelry and much more.
Kennye Eastwood, 40, and daughter Taryn, 16, of Coeur d'Alene, walked with Taylor Young, 16, through Cheamkwet Park on the NIC campus.
"I like the bright colors and the paintings. I love paintings and artwork," Taryn said. She said her dad has a piece hanging in the big tent.
Kennye said she attended the last two or three Art on the Green events. She said what interests her is "what people come up with, the different things they make out of just anything, farming equipment to a piece of pipe."
Art on the Green 2013 features more than 135 artists of every material, metal and media. Hundreds of volunteers and a multitude of vendors will be on site this weekend until the event ends Sunday evening.
"What makes Art on the Green so special is that it's all volunteers. It's our gift to the community," Seigler said. "It's nice to know that when you buy something down here, or eat or whatever, it goes back into the community."