COTTON DISTRICT ARTS FESTIVAL

#CDAF Announcement

The Starkville Area Arts Council Board of Directors and the Cotton District Arts Festival Planning Committee have come to the decision to move the Cotton District Arts Festival back to the Spring.

Going forward, the Cotton District Arts Festival (CDAF) will be planned for the third Saturday in April annually. Please know that this decision has not been made lightly and was made with discussion and input from city officials, the Planning Committee, artisans and restaurants, and attendees.

With this decision, we have also decided to forgo the 2024 Cotton District Arts Festival.

SAAC and CDAF rely on grants, sponsorships, and donations in order to do any of our operations or events, especially CDAF. Many of our grants are distributed once annually and cover significant portions of the planning costs of the event (advertising, entertainment, and overhead primarily). This festival is a huge undertaking for SAAC and all the volunteers involved, not only financially but also for the planning time. Unfortunately, it is impossible for us to plan and execute two festivals in a fiscal year.

During this time, the planning committee will continue to meet in order to fix issues that have persisted for years without proper time to fix those problems, amend maps, find additional committee members to fill in gaps, and overall make this festival better for artisans, food vendors, and attendees. We are working to plan a few smaller events and markets for our artisans and food vendors in 2024 to help supplement this postponement as well as work with other organizations to incorporate more artisans and food vendors into existing Starkville events to provide more opportunities for our artist community.

If anyone is interested in volunteering for the CDAF Planning Committee, we are especially in need of a Taste of Starkville Chair. For more information, please contact SAAC Executive Director Mary Switzer.

We would like to thank the Starkville community for their continued support of CDAF and we hope to make the 2025 Cotton District Arts Festival the best one yet.

See you April 19, 2025!