Part of our mission at NewTown Macon is to attract sustainable and transformative change in downtown Macon and one of the many ways we do that is through Transformation of Space! Read about some of these events that have been made possible through Downtown Challenge Fund grants. How many of these have you been to?
First Friday Garage Meet
NewTown Macon’s addition of the First Friday Garage Meet as part First Friday events has grown to be a fan favorite. This event has taken place 6 times since NewTown Macon received a grant in 2017. The First Friday Garage Meet provides a friendly environment for the Macon community to come together enjoy a night of custom cars while celebrating First Friday in #DTMac.
Flannels & Frost: The Wintervention
Through receiving multiple grants from the Downtown Challenge Fund, NewTown Macon has been able to strategically plan ways to activate the Ocmulgee Heritage Trail. Flannels & Frost: The Wintervention is one of the most popular recent events planned to bring people to the Trail. People came from across the Macon community in their favorite flannel shirts to enjoy a day of roasting s’mores, chilling in a hammock, playing lawn games, and listening to tunes by DJ B3. There was also a Winter Market featuring local vendors where people were able to buy the perfect Valentine’s Day gift for their loved ones. Check out photos from this event here!
The MAC Party
Main Street Macon received a grant in 2017 from the Downtown Challenge Fund to bring back this event in 2018. Students from Mercer University, Middle Georgia State University, and Wesleyan College connected with local businesses and attractions downtown during the MAC Party! Local businesses in the urban core offered food samples, interactive experiences, and fun takeaways for attendees. The event exposed students to all that #DTMac can offer, encouraging them to leave campus during their time in school and hopefully stay in town after graduation. This event took place on August 23rd last year, and you can see by the picture below it was a popular one.
Main Street Macon’s Electric Dance Party
Main Street Macon received a grant from the Downtown Challenge Fund in September of 2017 that provided the support needed to present a Wintervention: Main Street Macon’s Electric Dance Party. This family-friendly event took place on March 11, 2017, and was under the bridge on Poplar Street between Fifth Street and Sixth Street. Attendees enjoyed an interactive art experience with neon and glow-in-the-dark paint, a bike decorating station, a Bike Walk Macon-led glow-in-the-dark bike parade, and, of course, dancing.
Third Place Play (March 2017)
The Third Place Play grant in 2017 enabled NewTown Macon to reimagine how underutilized downtown spaces could be activated. NewTown decided to temporarily energized three different downtown public spaces in a creative way that brought community members to underutilized locations. Events such as the and Movie Night on the River, Movie Night in the Ballpark, and Downtown @Play were made possible through grant. The most popular of these events was the Movie Night on the River. This event brought over 1,000 people from the surrounding community to Riverside Cemetery on Friday the thirteenth in October to watch Hocus Pocus.
Did you attend one of these events that activated downtown Macon’s public space? All of these were made possible with funding from the Downtown Challenge Fund of the Community Foundation of Central Georgia. Learn more about all the projects funded by the Downtown Challenge Fund on March 15 in Cherry Street Plaza from 12pm to 7pm! More information here.