Merchants in the Mount Washington Village business district are organizing an Oct. 23 fall festival that they envision as a "block party."
The free festival will be held from noon to 6 p.m. on Sulgrave Avenue, which will be blocked off between Smith Avenue and Newbury Street, said co-organizer Koula Savvakis. Sponsored by the Mount Washington Village Merchants Association and City Paper, it will bear little resemblance to the wine-, cheese- and jazz-themed festivals that merchants have organized in recent years, Savvakis said.
"We're moving in a different direction," said Savvakis, whose sister, Denise Klicos owns DK Salon in Mount Washington Village.
Three bands will perform and food will be provided by restaurants in the business districts, which will have tables or booths, as well as by additional vendors, Savvakis said.
She said organizers hope to draw at least 2,000 people to the event, which will double as a "welcome" to the newly expanded Mount Washington School, formerly Mount Washington Elementary. Part of the proceeds from sales of food and beverages will benefit the school, she said.
"We just want to make it a big party for this area, so everybody knows we're alive and kicking" as a business district," Savvakis said.
As the Messenger reported in June, Merchants are unhappy that Jay Harris, a promoter who used to be on retainer with the Mount Washington Village Merchants Association to organize the wine fests in recent years, is now organizing a similar festival in the Greenspring area, but is still calling it the Mount Washington Village Wine, Art and Jazz Festival.
That festival is planned Sept. 25, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., at Quarry Lake at Greenspring, a residential, retail and office development in Baltimore County. The Quarry Lake festival will feature live music by the Swingin Swamis at 2 p.m. and David Bach at 4 p.m.
Quarry Lake is more than 3 miles from Mount Washington Village — and, merchants point out, not even in Mount Washington.
"We were disappointed" by those plans, Savvakis said.
Harris said in June that he has sponsors including Beazer Homes, Walgreens, M&T Bank, and the financial services company Morgan Stanley. Beazer co-sponsored the 2009 wine festival in Mount Washington Village.
Harris said he deleted the word "Village" and added the words "Quarry Lake," but kept "Mount Washington" in the name because the festival has long been identified with that community and because Quarry Lake is in the 21209 ZIP code, as is Mount Washington.
"I figured, why lose the title?" Harris said at the time. He said he thinks that Mount Washington residents will still claim the festival at Quarry Lake as their own and that it will also attract residents in the Quarry Lake area, as well as in Glen and Cheswolde.
But Mac Nachlas, former president of the Mount Washington Improvement Association, said at the time. "Mount Washington has its own brand and its own neighborhood."
Google Maps actually lists Quarry Lake as being in Pikesville.
"The quarry is not in Mount Washington," Savvakis said in June. "They should call it the Quarry Festival."
Savvakis said then that merchants wanted to change the focus of the festival anyway.
"We want to try to attract a young, hip crowd," she said in June. "We're not sure if a wine and cheese crowd is the way we want to go."
The wine, cheese and jazz festival was popular for almost a decade. The last was the ninth annual one in 2009. Business leaders decided not to have one in 2010, partly because of nearby bridge reconstruction planned by the city, which potentially would have interfered with the festival.