Rose Park Market Opens This Wednesday
By • April 5, 2021 0 1259
Suddenly, it’s here! Daylight savings. Spring weather. People going out more, even with masks and social distancing. Shopping.
All that leads to the opening, this Wednesday, April 7, of Rose Park’s weekly outdoor market, relocated now — and potentially permanently — to the basketball courts at the corner of 26th and O Streets NW. Hours are 3 to 7 p.m.
“We have 36 vendors that have signed up to be there,” said Gail Daubert, president of Friends of Rose Park, the volunteer organization that sponsors and staffs the market. Last summer, when the booths were reshaped in a circle on the old baseball field, the market became something of a community meeting place, with over 700 people attending on a single day.
During the winter holidays, the market was reconfigured on the basketball courts into a holiday fete — with lights, hot drinks and vendors offering local and international gift and craft items.
Now, the old baseball field, refurbished with sod, has play and picnic areas. The market — on the more firm surface of the courts — is considering extending its hours into the evening with lights and perhaps live entertainment. “The idea is to bring the arts to people in safe places,” Daubert told The Georgetowner.
Also being explored is the feasibility of providing COVID vaccinations onsite; Friends of Rose Park offered coronavirus testing late last summer.
Vendors who are on the schedule so far include: Anchor Nursery, Café La Jolie Bleue, Belmont Kitchen, Boso Foods, Bun’d up, Buttercream & Burrata, Cams Kettle Coffee, Cannabreeze Hem, Cold Country Salmon, District Expedition, District Peach, Dolcemisu, Enise Jewelry, Gardens and Pots, IndiBlossom, K-brod, Lobster Maine-ia, Metro Microgreens, New Horizons Apiaries, Not your Average Birch (art), Pagne Lifestyle, Pax Humanum, Pearl Fine Teas, Schmaltz Brothers, Schmidty’s Kettle Corn, Silverglow Studio, Soultry Brand, Spicy Water African Grill, The Baking District, Freshmobile, Turning the Page, Versatile Foods, White Magnol, Zamani House of Heritage and Quaker Valley.
Several of the vendors accept pre-orders from their web sites including Anchor Nursery, Cipolla Rossa Pizzeria, Lobster Maine-ia, Metro Microgreens,Quaker Valley Orchards and Versatile Foods Catering.
Attendees and vendors are required to follow pandemic safety protocols: wearing a mask or a mouth covering and keeping a proper distance from food displays and surfaces. Customers are urged to only send one family member per household to the market, to leave pets at home, to avoid entering the market if they are exhibiting a symptom of any transmissible infectious disease (such as a cough, a fever or a running nose) or have a confirmed COVID-19 diagnosis and to maintain six feet of distance from each other person.
While the large farmers market at Dupont Circle on weekends continues its weekly presence, it appears that the Rose Park market is, so far, the only small outdoor market to open in Georgetown this season.
