Pecan Street Festival Walk: Love Austin + Love Art: Sat. and/or Sun. (FREE)

Pecan Street Festival Walk - Love Austin + Love Art: Saturday and/or Sunday (FREE)

Let's Meetup for a walk through the Pecan Street Festival.

The Pecan Street Festival is one of the largest, and longest-running, arts/crafts and music festivals in the nation presented by The Pecan Street Association, a 501(c)4 nonprofit organization.

The Pecan Street Festival is a free two-day arts festival held twice yearly in downtown Austin’s Sixth Street Historic District. Taking place the first Saturday & Sunday in May and the last Saturday & Sunday in September, the juried festival attracts hundreds of local and national artisans offering original handcrafted creations in a variety of mediums, from metal, wood, fiber, clay, leather, glass and stone to repurposed materials of all kinds.

The Pecan Street Festival takes place in the Sixth Street Historic District between Brazos Street and Interstate 35 in the heart of Austin’s business and live entertainment district — the very stretch that contributed the city’s designation as the Live Music Capital of the World. Lined with many of Austin’s oldest and most storied structures, some of which date from the 1800s, Sixth Street is populated with entertainment venues, art galleries, cafes, restaurants and retailers. The area is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

When Edwin Waller designed Austin’s street grid, he named north-south streets after Texas rivers and recommended numeric designations for east-west streets. Instead, they were named after trees. That decision was later reversed, and they were renamed with numbers. Though Pecan Street became Sixth Street, the festival honors its original name.

Likely Texas’ best known street, the seven block’s of 6th Street between Congress and IH 35 are certainly Austin’s entertainment center. With a little help from it’s many like-minded sister streets, 6th Street is the heart of Austin’s live entertainment scene and the capital of third coast music.

Sixth Street (formerly known as Pecan Street) is lined with many historical houses and commercial buildings dating from the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. The storied old buildings now house numerous bars, a host of live entertainment venues, tattoo parlors, art galleries, casual cafes, upscale restaurants, and the elegant Driskill Hotel. Live music of every genre abounds. From jazz, blues, and country to rock, hip-hop, beat, progressive, metal, punk and derivations of these, there’s something to whet everyone’s musical pallete. Great food is a staple on Sixth Street, featuring such regional staples as chili, ribs, and Tex-Mex plus steak, seafood, cajun-cooking, and deli.

Sixth Street draws an eclectic bunch including endless streams of mostly single UT students, the YUP’s, the burb’s, some interesting street folk, and lot’s of out of town visitors. It’s not uncommon to spy some celebrity type taking in the sights on 6th. From film folk to politicians, to music men and women, Sixth Street rubs elbows well. Dress code, yeah right. You’ll see cowboys and punks, surfers and suits. On Halloween anything goes, and during Mardi Gras, everything goes !

Going West from the entertainment area, West Sixth Street offers another suprise with antique stores, art galleries, hair salons, restaurants, and lot’s of eclectic shops.

Sixth Street is Austin’s entertainment showpiece, and deservedly so. Great events like the Pecan Street Festival, SXSW, The Republic of Texas Bikers Rally, and Sixth’s Street infamous Halloween celebration all make for great times with great people.

Web Links:

https://pecanstreetfestival.org/

https://www.facebook.com/pecanstreetfest

For now this a save the date type announcement.

We’ll provide additional details when we get closer to the event date.

Thanks!

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Your host for this program is Robert Kelleman, the founder/director of the non-profit community organizations Texas History & Culture and Washington, DC History & Culture.

Texas History & Culture

Eventbrite:

https://TexasHistoryAndCulture.eventbrite.com

Meetup - Dallas-Fort Worth:

https://www.meetup.com/DallasFortWorthHistoryAndCulture/

Meetup - Austin:

https://www.meetup.com/AustinTexasHistoryAndCulture/

Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/TexasHistoryAndCulture/

YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/@TexasHistoryAndCulture/videos

We look forward to seeing you - thanks!

Robert Kelleman

[email protected]

202-821-6325 (text only)

Host or Publisher Dallas-Texas History & Culture