Behind the Scenes of the Home Tour and Street Fair
By Kate Sultan
Behind every good endeavor there is a good person (or persons). The Greater Park Hill Home Tour & Street Fair is no exception. Our neighborhood is blessed with not only great homes old and new, but an incredible group of neighbors who actively work to make this one of the best communities in Denver.
Planning for the HT & SF starts in at the beginning of the year. The team, once assembled, consists of a graphic artist, a PR person, a logistics coordinator, a copywriter, volunteer coordinators, Street Fair organizer and a Team Captain. Last year, and again this year, the person in charge is Nina Kuhl.
The greatest and most time consuming challenge is to find five to seven homes that will be the showcase for this event. If we are lucky, one or two homeowners offer us their home and the logistics work. One or two down … four or six to go. Now begins the campaign of identifying homes that could be included in this year’s tour. Most years we try to cluster homes that are within a comfortable walking distance in our grand old neighborhood of Park Hill.
The next step is approaching homeowners to ask if they would consider opening their homes for the Tour. Fortunately as a real estate agent in Park Hill, Kuhl is very familiar with the neighborhood and the homes. She meets with the homeowner and walks through to see if there would be a good method of navigating through the home. If it is a home that would work well, Kuhl then has to work her magic to convince the owners to showcase their home.
Scheduled when the Broncos are away
Come April, when the NFL schedule is released, we pick a September Sunday without a Broncos game. Why Sunday? Well, for 36 years now the event has been on a Sunday and it has been successful. Saturdays have school activities and the Street Fair vendors are committed on Saturdays. For those who treat Sundays as a day of rest and relaxation, what better way to spend the day than strolling our beautiful tree lined streets with friends and neighbors?
As soon as we have a date, we ask the Forest Parkway residents if we may use their lovely street and then we announce the date to the Street Fair vendors. New businesses that have opened in or near Park Hill are identified so we can invite them. And the Street Fair website is launched.
Many of our returning vendors have been with us for years and have grown to love their spots and pick the same one each year. Prior year’s vendors get at least one week notice before we send out the next email to all other vendors who may want to join this year.
Now the permitting process begins. This year there is a new special events office that all permitting will go through. Permits for the street closure and one day liquor license must be secured. Meanwhile, we are still recruiting Street Fair vendors and food trucks for the day, and following up to see that payments are coming in for the reserved spots. And we are sending out touch-base emails with vendors.
By early August, we have all of the houses set. We have had the home owners interviewed, the stories about the houses written, photos taken, sketches drawn of each house, the www.ParkHillHomeTour.org website updated – with all of the home information and all of the details ready for the printing of tickets and brochures.
By mid-August most of the Street Fair booths are reserved and returning bands have been lined up. Kids activities have been planned and food trucks are committed.
A real nail-biter
Did we fail to mention that every bit of this is done with volunteer hours?
Every member of the Home Tour & Street Fair committee has a full-time job so this is done in their “spare” time. We do this because we love this neighborhood and we feel good about giving back and helping to support the community. But it also takes the time and support of the whole neighborhood to pull this off!
More than 130 volunteers are required on the day of the tour to help with traffic flow and security for each of the homes; ticket sales at the homes as well as the street fair; monitoring the kids activities; selling beer and wine; and street fair set-up, break-down and cleanup. The recruiting of volunteers begins in the summer and it is nail-biting until we have all of the jobs filled.
So here’s where we’re at now: We are currently in search of great homes for the 2015 Home Tour. Please contact Nina Kuhl kuhlnina@yahoo.com for Home Tour inquiries.
We have a planning meeting on Monday, March 9 at the GPHC offices 2823 Fairfax St. Please join us, from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. You too can “Go Behind the Scenes” of the Park Hill Home Tour & Street Fair. All are welcome to attend and we are happy to welcome new committee members.
Please contact Kate Sultan krsultan@comcast.net or Lynn Maedel lynnmaedel@cacmle.org for Street Fair inquiries.