Shorewood Booster Club Art Fair Returns This Sunday

It is not often that the arts and athletics crowds help one another, but this Sunday, they will do just that.

The Shorewood Booster Club’s 33rd Annual Arts & Crafts Fair is from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday at Shorewood High School.

Something new to the fair this year is that organizers are providing a shuttle from Atwater Elementary School to the high school. Organizers are hoping for 2,000 people to attend the fair so the shuttle service will help relieve congestion in the high school’s parking lot.

Bonnie Adams is in her 13th year with the fair and is serving as the contact for any information needed on the fair this year or years past. She said that the Shorewood High School Athletic Director in the late 1970s, Fred Rebholz, and his wife, Sue, conceived of the idea for the fair when Rebholz saw the need for money to be raised for athletic equipment and other needs.

“His wife, Sue, was very crafty and liked doing the little art fairs … now, 33 years later, we’re probably at least three times the size from when they started,” Adams said.

Adams said it was not a Booster Club event when first started but a realization came out of the fair that there needed to be an organization to support athletics and so the Booster Club came about with it.

The show will feature works from 100 juried artists from around the Midwest. Adams said that the fair is not just a “church bazaar.” There will be much more than hand-knitted booties. 

Janet Reinhoffer is going into her second year as a vendor at the arts & crafts fair. Reinhoffer makes up-cycled skirts to sell. In the days of going green, an up-cycled skirt is just the thing for anyone who wants to recycle their old shirts and sweaters.

“I use worn t-shirts found at rummage sales, Goodwill, friends donating, etc,” Reinhoffer said. “I can cut it up and use the good parts! I use just about every part of a shirt, or sweater or sweatshirt for that matter.”

Reinhoffer has skirts that she has premade for the fair but said that customers are welcome to bring in shirts of their own and she can custom make them into skirts.

Along with Reinhoffer’s skirts, vendors will have other clothing items, jewelry, things for the home and garden, and Christmas gifts.

The admission price to the fair is $4 and all that money will go to benefit the high school athletic program, as well as athletic equipment and other things for the middle and elementary schools.

“Anything that is keeping these kids active, we try to support,” Adams said.

Along with arts & crafts, the Greyhound Cafe will offer a luncheon menu, featuring soups and sandwiches from MKLocalicious, chili from Culver's, a potato bar, and a bake sale.