How an annual fair comes together
Janet Robinson, the crafts fair manager at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Londonderry, discusses the history of the annual St. Peter’s Artisan Craft Fair. The church also holds a fair in the fall.
Can you give a brief history of St. Peter’s?
St. Peter’s [was] established in Londonderry in 1987. At that time there was a very small church and it has grown since.
There was an interesting building discovered on site?
The church itself was a house with a carriage house. The carriage house was used by the former owner as a craft shop. We added onto the house once we purchased it and built the sanctuary area onto it and continued to use the carriage house.
Can you describe the original building the craft fair was in?
[The] carriage house [is] kind of like a garage without the garage doors. If you go by the church you’ll see it, it’s right in the middle of the parking lot. Years ago they used to use them just for what it’s called, for the horses and the carriages. … The past owner decided, ‘Oh, well, we need to do something with that.’ She started selling some crafts and then she decided, ‘Well, maybe we’ll invite other crafters.’ I know there were a few years that we did get together with Mack’s Apples and another small craft business in that area to make it a community day, and that went well for a while, so it has taken many turns over the years.
Who owned the craft shop?
All I know is that her first name is Karen and she owned ‘Catnip Corner,’ that’s what she called it. There was a woman’s board at the church and they wanted to carry on that tradition of her craft fairs so they reached out to her … and asked her if she minded if we continued that tradition. At first she wasn’t really happy about it and then she came back to us and said, ‘You know, I think that will be a really nice thing for Londonderry, let’s keep it going.’ She provided a list of 35 crafters, we sent out letters to those 35 crafters, and about 50 percent stayed on as crafters in our fair….
So there was a craft fair in that spot before the church moved in?
Yes. She would open up her grounds for other crafters on the weekend after Labor Day weekend. That’s the weekend we continue on. As we had gotten trained and more experienced in craft fairs we added the spring fair also.
How has the craft fair grown since 1987?
We’re now up to 72 crafters. They do set up their tents and tables on the lawn, on all available spots with the lawn. We also have a food truck that comes. In the beginning what they were doing was they used to call it ‘the bistro’ and they would have volunteers manning a grill, serving hot dogs and hamburgers and that grew to wraps. Then, the volunteers started getting much older and we didn’t have anybody who was willing to volunteer so we switched over to food trucks hoping to give local small businesses some business.
Do you all have a great turnout every year?
Yes, we do. We actually are adding a police detail because it has grown so much. All are welcome. It’s juried so it’s not just anybody. We keep it so that all products have to be handmade by the crafter.
Do you all still use the carriage house in the fair?
We do. What we do is we ask each of the crafters to donate an item for raffle and we call it the ‘Crafter Show Case.’ We ask them to give us, you know, ‘what craft that you make that stands out to represent yourself.’ Then we have a raffle for that and at the end of the fair we will raffle off those products to people who have bought tickets.
Is the fair itself free?
Yes, the entrance to the fair is free. We do have parking although when there’s large crowds it does get limited but there is street parking.
St. Peter’s Episcopal Church Artisan Fair
Where: 3 Peabody Row in Londonderry
When: Saturday, May 18, 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Admission: free
More info: stpeterslondonderry.org/craft-fair, 437-8333
Food truck provided by One Happy Clam
— Zachary Lewis
Featured image: Courtesy of St. Peter’s Craft Fair.
