It’s easy to find high-end chain retail in Georgetown, but we’re desperately lacking in the hand-decorated moleskin journal/reconstructed t-shirt/jewelry made from recycled balloons departments. Luckily, we have Crafty Bastards.

Between 10 and 5 today at the Pyramid Atlantic Art Center in Silver Spring, indie crafters will showcase their wares at the annual festival, either making you kick yourself for not thinking of turning old library books into purses first, or wonder why a designer felt it necessary to create a fetus-shaped cookie cutter. There’ll be a lot of Etsy staples like knitted cupcakes and printed t-shirts, but also unique items like “The Prick Cushion” (an anatomically-correct pin cushion), oil portraits of the cast of The Office, and elaborately crafted shadow puppet toys.

City Paper sponsors Crafty Bastards, and it’s tough to get past their judging panel for a spot at the fair. Along with the deserving vendors, Bastards also features music, food, a craft supply swap, and a ton of workshops on printmaking, crocheting, and more. Because of the fair’s success in the its first four years, there will be two this year (the second one coming along in September), but all items are one-of-a-kind and probably won’t make a repeat appearance.

The Pyramid Atlantic Art Center is located at 8230 Georgia Avenue (Silver Spring Metro on the Red Line.)

-Sara Carothers, Voices Editor

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 28th, 2008 at 9:25 am and is filed under Arts and Entertainment, District News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.