Thousands flooded Main Street to support local businesses and celebrate the community at the second annual Main Street Fair on Saturday. Organized by a coalition of Evanston organizations, the fair sprawled across the Main Street business district with artisan and food vendors lining the streets, live music filling the air and street performers entertaining around every corner.
The Main Street Fair debuted in 2025 as a revival of the old Custer Street Fair, which ran from 1972 to 2019. This year, the fair expanded, spreading down Custer Avenue and Washington Street into Charles B. Eiden Park. The event featured 161 vendors and over 30 performers, according to its website.
“It’s a true community fair,” said Katherine Gotsick, executive director of the Main-Dempster Mile.
Gotsick served as the organizing committee’s volunteer chair for Saturday’s fair.
This year’s fair offered new features including an Age, Dementia, and Sensory Friendly zone in Eiden Park, an expanded Kids Area also in the park and a dedicated Kids Stage at the corner of Washington Street and Custer Avenue.
The fair also brought in street performers, including a mime, a living statue and a unicyclist. Gotsick said people requested to bring back the street acts, a staple of the old Custer Street Fair.
Bringing back the fair for a second year was no easy feat. Last year’s event was organized by the Evanston Lighthouse Rotary Club, which decided not to host the event this year.
To fill the void, eight local organizations stepped in: Main-Dempster Mile; Evanston Made; Shorefront Legacy Center; Around Evanston; Evanston Latinos; Hive Center for the Book Arts; Evanston Asian, South Asian, Pacific Islander American and the Evanston Chamber of Commerce.
Organizers spotlight diverse local businesses, artists
Several organizers said an overarching goal of this year’s fair was to diversify its vendors and performers to reflect Evanston’s many cultures and communities.
Shorefront Legacy Center, Evanston Latinos and Evanston ASPA curated the fair’s Main Stage performance line up and also offered activities and information at their respective tents.
Evanston ASPA Founding Director Melissa Raman Molitor said she wanted to get involved with the fair to increase Asian American visibility across the vendors, performances and attendees.
The Main Stage was headlined by Chicago-based band Funkadesi, whose music blends Indian and Afro-Carribean genres. Molitor said Evanston ASPA has worked with the band before, and she was excited to bring the group to the fair alongside an array of performers.
Shorefront Legacy Center’s tent featured an interactive banner by Evanston-based artist Andrew Walker III that people could color in with crayons. Walker said the banner featured Evanston-based Black musicians, past and present.
Shorefront Executive Director Laurice Bell said Saturday’s fair aligned with the goals of the nonprofit, which collects, preserves and shares the stories of Black individuals who have lived in the suburban North Shore.
“Not everything has to be the biggest moment,” she said. “But it’s just the idea of people coloring with their children or dancing to music or enjoying art or eating that is part of what we do, and that is our mission.”
Fair platforms local vendors and acts for residents of all ages
Attendees weaved their way through vendor tents and stands, extending all the way from Hinman to Sherman Avenue on Main Street, down Custer Avenue and Washington Street and into Eiden Park, where kids played on the playground and some even sold creations at their own stands.
Izzy Becker-Bogan, a Wilmette resident and preschool teacher, came to the fair with her father, who said the two used to come to the old Custer Street Fair. Becker-Bogan said she loves the opportunity to appreciate people’s art.
“I feel like it’s a really great way to bring people together, appreciate each other and enjoy all the things that Evanston and different communities have to offer,” she said.
This year, the fair had a dedicated Kids Stage, curated by Evanston-based unicyclist and juggler Kyle Campbell, known as UniKyle.
Campbell said he picked out the acts with help from his own kids, adding that it was important for him to feature kids and a variety of performances.
“There’s a lot of music here today, and I wanted acts that were not music,” Campbell said. “I wanted a little bit different, like circus-y style stuff.”
Performers included students from Evanston dance school Chicago Ballet Arts, Chicago-based performer and “Instant Mime” Karen Hoyer and Campbell himself, who closed out the stage juggling swords while unicycling.
The fair was also an opportunity for vendors to sell their goods and expand their customer base.
Jessica Nettles, founder of D’Mood Kreationz, sold her handmade jewelry at the fair.
Nettles, based in Grayslake, Ill., said she heard about the fair through Evanston Made’s Instagram account. She said opportunities like this are valuable for artisans who don’t have a storefront.
“You meet different people, people see what you do and create, and then they want to make sure that they’re helping you get in front of those other audiences, so that’s a great opportunity to network,” Nettles said.
Funding hurdles pose challenge to fair’s future
Putting on an event at the scale of Saturday’s fair is not cheap, and Gotsick expressed concerns about the prospects of a fair next year.
Gotsick said the fair raised about $81,000 in sponsorship, almost all of which came from Evanston-based businesses and individuals. But that still doesn’t cover the $85,000 budget, and she said organizers were hoping to make up the gap with tent and beer sales as well as donations at the fair.
Organizers are still raising money on the fair’s website. Gotsick said these funds will either go toward the organizing groups or potentially be reinvested into next year’s fair. She said the eight organizations agreed to split the profits — if any — that the fair made.
In order to host the fair next year, Gotsick said Saturday’s event needed to be a win for sponsors and businesses, and what that means might look different to each.
“I don’t think we can count on just the joy factor to fund next year’s festival,” Gotsick said.
Many residents and business owners expressed their hopes for the fair to continue every year.
Evanston resident Michelle Minor, owner of Michelle’s Ice Dyes, sold her ice-dyed clothing items at the fair. She said she grew up going to the Custer Street Fair and she hopes to sell her clothing at the Main Street Fair every year.
“Evanston’s awesome,” Minor said. “They always support local people and small businesses, so Evanston needs to have more events like this.”
Evanston Latinos Executive Director Ricardo Villalobos, who helped organize the fair, said the event helped increase his organization’s visibility. Evanston Latinos’ tent offered information on the organization and an interactive vision board that attendees could add to.
Villalobos said the board will help shape Evanston Latinos’ advocacy work for the year, and he noticed a trend in what people added.
“People want to feel included, people want to have voices in what’s happening in Evanston,” he said. “When I say people, brown and Black folks who are here, who make this city run as much as anyone else, really care about voice and inclusion.”
Despite the funding obstacles, the Main Street Fair brought joy and visibility to the streets of Evanston in an event that was local through and through.
For Gotsick, the ultimate goal of the fair is to become an important, strategic day of the year for local businesses and an event that makes Evanston a destination.
“If people from outside Evanston are coming here then hopefully they’ll want to come back,” she said. “They’ll want to try that restaurant they didn’t get to try, or they’ll walk away from a plant that they wish they had bought and they’ll come back and get it. There’s so many good things happening on Main Street that I hope this turns into a destination.”
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