Laguna Beach Sawdust
Art Festival
The Laguna Beach Sawdust Art Festival is one of the main
attractions for Laguna Beach, California each summer season.
Over 200 artists set up shop for a couple of months usually
starting the weekend before the Independence Day and lasting
until the weekend before Labor Day.
The pathways connecting the temporary art studios are covered
with sawdust and wooden chips. Beginning in 1966, the Laguna
Beach Sawdust Art Festival has drawn visitors from all over
the world looking for the one-of-a-kind arts and crafts offerings
that can only be attained from the festival artists.
Some of the types of arts and crafts that are featured at
the Laguna Beach Sawdust Art Festival include oil and acrylic
paintings, jewelry, ceramics, photographs, sculptures and
even a hand-blown glass exhibition. Workshops on ceramics,
glass blowing and children's art activities are also offered.
As a long-time Laguna Beach resident, the Laguna Beach Sawdust
Art Festival has always been an interesting place to take
visiting family and friends for something that is truly unique
to Laguna. Some of the local Laguna restaurants also sell
their tasty treats during the Festival and there is usually
at least one band playing, entertaining the folks.
Sometimes criticized for being "too political"
in regards to which artists make it into the Festival and
which are excluded, nonetheless the Laguna Beach Sawdust Art
Festival remains a mainstay (just blocks from Main Beach)
offering the visitors something more than the beach and art
gallery experience which can be had all year long. Other Laguna
Beach art festivals that run concurrently with the Sawdust
Festival are the Festival of the Arts (which includes the
Pageant of the Masters) and the Art-A-Fair.
The Laguna
Beach Sawdust Art Festival is perhaps the most low-brow
of the arts festivals appealing more to the craft crowd than
the fine arts aficionados. Both the Festival
of the Arts and the Art-A-Fair
are seen as a bit more upscale, though arguably not a popular
as the Sawdust Festival has grown to be.
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