This Month at East End Fourth Fridays

As always, children will have free activities just for them at the East End Fourth Friday Kid’s Corner including free books, an arts and crafts table, fun with group painting, and more. Join us this September and enjoy arts vendors, barbeque, refreshments courtesy of Live Oak Brewery, and live music. We invite you to explore the East End and discover some of the new businesses and old favorites that help make this district a unique and diverse place in Austin.

Austin’s East End Fourth Fridays! is a unique art and culture-driven, monthly community-oriented event developed by DiverseArts to showcase the very specific cultural attributes and historical identity of Austin’s East End – the Soul in the heart of the City. The East End has been recognized by the City of Austin as an African-American Cultural Heritage District, and East End Fourth Fridays! helps showcase this cultural legacy for the benefit of the community. In partnership with neighborhood artists and businesses, cultural, civic, commercial, and governmental groups, this monthly event is designed to bring a relaxed, communal, open-air art and culture experience to the newly revitalized East End.

It’s an open house in the East End and along East 11th Street! Sample food and drink at established and new venues, take in the headline concerts and bring the kids to enjoy the East End Kid’s Corner at Kenny Dorham’s Backyard, and check out art vendors, organizations, and sponsors doing PR and public outreach. DiverseArts wishes to bring visitors from the neighborhood and the Austin area to see the unique cultural and historic aspects of the East End. We hope to establish East End Fourth Fridays! as a holistic, community-based marriage of culture and commerce, and we can't do it without your support! So come and join us, your feelow Austinites, and people from all places, for this monthly event!

Other participating East Austin Businesses...

I'm currently awaiting confirmation on a sweet little house on Austin's east side, for which I am extremely hopeful and increasingly excited. I perceive East Austin as an intriguing redevelopment. The area is still largely perceived as "the wrong side of the tracks" (the tracks being I-35), but the ongoing gentrification process has seemingly served the area well. Emphasis on seemingly, since I'm on a benefiting end of this whole ordeal.

The central east easily benefits from proximity to UT and downtown, thus rejuvenating commerce by marketing the area as an up-and-coming region propagating towards the young, hip, and/or artsy types. I suppose I fit the bill, which is moderately priced for the central location, respectively. I certainly support the renovation of a somewhat poverty stricken region oppose to other housing opportunities sprouting up around Austin.

AND I'm totally excited to explore the new neighborhood! I'm increasingly becoming aware of the gems scattered about on the east side.

I finally checked out the Second Sunday Sock Hop at Scoot Inn on E. Forth this month, which was amazing. I plan on becoming a regular.

Sam's BBQ on East 12th has certainly become a favorite for satisfying my friend's barbecue binges. I know very little about meat appreciation, as a bias veggie head, but I've seen grown men beg for this stuff.

TC's Lounge at E. 12th & Webberville is a wonderful little blues club that has never left me regretting going out on a Monday night. Plus it's BYOB for liquor/wine, cheap beer and free soul food (on Monday nights, at least).

I'm sure the above are just the tip of the iceberg. I'm thinking up excuses for checking out Rio Rita's and East Side Cafe ASAP.