According to Wikipedia, porchfests were started in Ithaca, New York, in 2007, and “porchfest events bring local musicians and neighborhoods together to celebrate and create a sense of community.”
But this is East Atlanta, so we do our porchfest with a few twists. It’s not just music spread across the neighborhood, but also artists, food, drinks and games, and we kick off the day with the quirkiest parade in Atlanta Strutting through our neighborhood business district. Then we spread the action out to the neighborhood’s porches — and yards, driveways, parking lots and parkland.
Because the Strut has always been about giving back to the East Atlanta neighborhood, we found the porchfest model was a safer way to continue our festival tradition and celebrate during the height of the pandemic. Our 2020 winning neighbors, below, each received a fabulous trophy and $1,000 donated to a neighborhood nonprofit:
