So let’s just say that it’s the place to be Saturday.
The New Deal, which is being held in the space behind Stein Mart in Hanover Center on Oleander Drive, is the brainchild of designer, fashionista and all-around cool chick Jessie Williams, who owns downtown Wilmington boutique Edge of Urge. The choice of charity is personal to Williams, who had a learning disability as a child. “Somebody took their time and reached their hand out and introduced me to the arts, and it changed my life,” Williams said. “I don’t know what to do with myself if I’m not making something, so I’m not sure how I would’ve turned out if that hadn’t happened.” The name The New Deal, she said, is “playing off the whole economy thing. It’s about starting fresh a new way of thinking,” from supporting local artists to creating clothes that are both stylish and utilitarian, or even made from recyclable materials. Many of Williams’ own designs, for example, such as dresses and swimsuits, can be worn as many as five different ways. The New Deal begins with a handmade market from 1 to 7 p.m., at which more than five dozen area artists and clothing designers will sell their handmade wares. Six local bands will play, including indie rock icons Summer Set (their first show in more than two years) and Owl Laws, Williams’ band with her boyfriend, the singer and songwriter James Reardon. Other acts include seldom-seen Fayaway, Americana duo The J Miners, Jane Beck & The Experience and Onward, Soldiers. The market also features film screenings from the Cucalorus Film Festival and a silent auction and raffle for such items as a three-night stay on Bald Head Island, dinner for two at Circa 1922 and gift baskets from Tidal Creek Co-Op Market.
At 7 p.m., everything thing moves across the street and underneath a tent in the Independence Mall parking lot. There, a fashion show will feature clothes and accessories by more than a dozen local and regional designers who have created work around, or in response to, the theme of utilitarianism and necessity becoming fashionable