RenFest 2022, Part One

Once again, my Happy Place is open.

Siddown, kids, let me share a story with you.

Back in 1979 or 1980, I believe, one of my best friends and I made our way, with some of his siblings, to the area west of Shakopee where The Minnesota Renaissance Festival, or RenFest, is held.  Back then, and for many years, we pulled into what I call "West Main" parking.  It is a huge area, probably some 30-40 acres, of flat, grassy land.  It's only the parking lot.  

It was marked with signs that, the closer you park, marked earlier years.  As I recall we counted down to the 1400s, perhaps earlier, before we reached the main gates.  This rather impressive structure looked a lot like a castle, with a number of people lounging on various balconies and peering or hanging out of windows, calling down to the folks waiting in line.  The comments varied from welcoming to joking to downright bawdy.  Mind you, I was a high school kid, coming from a relatively sheltered environment, and some of the costumes and attire were outright scandalous.  

Which was fantastic for a hormonal fifteen year old.  

Once we made entry onto the fest grounds, the place ... was utterly fantastic.  Through to today, the grounds remain much as they were back then, despite forty years of change, and, regrettably, the continued digging and destruction of the grounds around RenFest.  You see, someone had the rather good judgement to sign a long-term lease on the property that, at the time, bordered a gravel pit.  Which means that the land was worthless, it was what lay below.  Aggregate, or just plain old rocks.  From my eye, the soil is reddish, not the deep black soil you find when farmlands are tilled, but not exceptionally sandy, either.  

And the most obvious spot where you can view that aggregate is what's become known as "The Trench".  Eleven years ago, when my daughter worked her second year at the Fest, the trench was not there.  But for some reason the aggregate folks dug what looks to be a twenty-foot deep trench right through the most desirable parking area, right up close to the gates.  Your walk to those gates now drops down on a perhaps twenty-foot-wide trail, then back up at what is probably close to a 45^o angle.  Pretty steep for pushing the standard stroller up, so yeah, if I ever do end up with grandkids in strollers, I'll probably be investing in something with bicycle-sized wheels to go around the Fest with them.

But I'm off on a side road for the main story.

Back in 1979, I was a deeply devoted D&D player.  And I knew I needed color.  That is, as a dungeon master, I needed to develop the sights and sounds in my head of my adventure, and I thought that it might be a darned good idea to see any sort of reproduction of what the world could have been like back then.  And no, I'm not kidding myself.  The RenFest has modern privies, that is, toilets, which are designed to handle human waste in a much more clean way than we did back then.  And the food is prepared to modern cleanliness standards.  Heck, they even have soda fountains all over the grounds.  

But the architecture, if you will, closely mimics what you see in paintings and newer pictures of that remaining architecture.  

And the people are all over the place.  The thing about RenFest is, unlike the State Fair, which concludes tomorrow, is that RenFest is where you can let your geek and dork flag fly, as the saying goes.  You can be an unabashed fan of something, and you can certainly show it off.  I cannot tell you the number of hats I saw on young ladies yesterday that looked like something I'd seen in a video game.  I'm sure the purists will howl mightily, but my involvement with video games in general began, and ended, with the Atari 2600.  So Mario and his various incarnations are, to me, the offspring of Donkey Kong, which was created by one of my wife's previous supervisors.  Yeah, she worked for a company he built after he did his video game stuff.

Back to the point.  These days, costumes run the rather wide gamut of good old medieval right up to where I've seen Star Trek uniforms.  A couple weeks ago I recall seeing a young man on the grounds carrying an unsheathed ... well, I suppose it was a full on broadsword, because the thing was some five feet long, at least eighteen inches wide, and pretty clumsy-looking.  

And no, it wasn't the only sword on the grounds.  In fact, if you find yourself overburdened with funds, you can acquire more than a few what appear to me to be high-quality swords and other weaponry.  My personal favorite of the month is the $1100 Claymore which is available from Sabersmith, one of about a half-dozen sword sellers.  

Back to my entry to the fest, and where we are today.  

The grounds themselves are huge.  My wife did note that our loop of yesterday was probably only a mile.  That's because we went one direction, from the Queen's gate, the west side of the larger central "island", out to the east edge from close to the main gate, all the way down the side, and around to the Museum.

Which is where we got to see an old friend.

On that first trip out to Renfest in 1979, one of the vendors that just flat-out blew me away and started a life-long obsession with Stained Glass had a window hanging in his booth.  The window was about two feet wide by around three and a half feet tall.  At the top, it had a blue sky split with some white-topped mountains, below which sat a castle with a number of towers and turrets, many of which had striking green roofs.  Below the castle was a clear-glass window made up of many small pieces of glass, identically shaped and edges beveled, but the left-and-right borders appeared to be almost woven blue paths I took to represent water, rivers running down the sides of the mountain, to the bottom where some more brown stained glass in several shades made some geographic patterns which I interpreted to be a village, below the castle, on the shores of a lake which was represented by more of the blue glass.

It took my breath away when I first saw it and spoke with the artist who created it.  About three or four years later, on another trip, I found that image had been placed in the new Hall of The Masters - pieces which were picked by the fest to represent their best works, and in a sort of Hall of Fame.  Most of the artists who had this distinction also displayed in their booths a certificate noting "To The Realm" the superior artistry displayed by those folks.  

More than a few years ago, the Hall of Masters was removed, to make places for new vendors.  And yesterday I finally made my way into the "new" Museum, an area which is tucked in behind a more pub-like setting for folks who wish to have a seat and get a drink of some alcoholic variety.  Yes, they sell booze.  They always have.  I wasn't too interested back in 1979, and I do have to confess that, other than Mead, I'm not too much interested these days, either.  I'm not much of a boozehound.  

But yesterday, I got to see my old friend.  That spectacular window.  I expect that, back in 1979, it was probably available for some $1500.  These days, aside from Priceless, I'm thinking it might "retail" for $12,000 to $15,000.  It's a wonderful piece.  As are all of the others in the museum.

But why, you're asking, does this place continue?  My friends, go look at Etsy.  That's right.  The Artisan Marketplace.  Unlike a web site, I can go into a booth and see the works of artisans, and very often, meet either the actual artist or their family members, or folks who work closely with them.

Like yesterday, I visited the place from where I purchased a walnut, wooden MUG a few years ago.  Wonderous Works In Wood.  They had fantastic mugs which were made from all sorts of wood, sealed with food-safe finishes, and ranged in size from shot glass to tankards which would hold a bottle and a half of wine.  So the selling pitch went.  Down the way from his shop a bit I found a gentleman who lives in Fridley, who also makes pens, and I overheard him telling another patron that he had, through good fortune, come into contact with a fellow who, for the cost of shipping alone, was able to purchase microscopic "diamond dust" from somewhere.  I don't know where, but this fellow was telling us about the fifty-five gallon drums the other person was able to purchase, and then sell to friends, who could incorporate that dust into the blanks which they use for pens.  

I've made a number of pens.  I enjoy it.  But I'm also acutely aware that when I start with a block of something that's maybe five-eighths by five-eighths of an inch square by about five inches long, my final product is often only a few sixteenths of an inch thick around a 7mm inner brass tube.  Sometimes, with the acrylic pens, you may be able to even see the brass glowing through the plastic.  So whatever it is you put into that plastic, you're first going to bore a 7mm (outside diameter) hole into it, about 2 3/4" deep - which is all sawdust.  Then you put the pen parts onto the lathe, and round off that square block - making more sawdust. 

Which is in part why pen making to me is somewhat wasteful.  The incredible amount of resource you start with, and what little you're left with, is my biggest part of the problem.  If you are fortunate, you have the good luck to turn that piece of material into something which is spectacularly beautiful.  

It's a joy, but it's also allowed me to recognize that, while the thing hanging in a booth may be beautiful, I've had the good luck to be able to recognize the artists from the ... well, from the folks who are just good at sourcing things.  

So back to RenFest.  Down from the Pen Booth is the "Sky Chairs" booth.  These are canvas chairs which hang from a hook in the ceiling, and are rather comfortable.  They have accessories, including footrests, to make them even more comfortable.  And they're not cheap.  They're now up around $139.99, which is nearly double of what they were back when I had a dream of my wife sitting in one with one of our kids on her lap.  I haven't yet purchased one, mostly because I have not had the space to pull it off.  Yet.

After that, we circled past the chapel, where they do perform weddings and vow renewals, up past the waterwheel, where they now have a print-making place that creates their own paper using the antique method, and they create their own prints with their own old-fashioned patterns.  This is somewhat in contrast to a booth not all that far away that sells maps - some realistic, and more fantasy, including maps of Middle Earth and the lands of Princess Bride.  Some of them are just paper, while others are printed on vellum and even cloth.  And yes, I am hoping some day to get maps of Middle Earth and Princess Bride lands.  Some day.

We circled around what I call Glass Corner - several vendors who make things from glass.  One of the most interesting out there was the fellow who took regular wine and liquor bottles, placed them into a kiln, and then heated them until the glass deformed.  Without destroying or even damaging some of the labels.  That's right.  He said it worked much better with the painted bottles, as plastic and paper labels did burn off, but at 1400 degrees, not much stays the same.  

I know, you're thinking "of what use?"  Many of the bottles they melted would make good spoon rests in a kitchen.  That's right.  They won't absorb anything that you set on them, you can just wipe them off.  

After the glassware, we passed a booth selling "baby dragons".  These were small, thin pieces of leather which were cut into dragon-like shapes, then bent, curved, and some how restrained into positions which allowed them to become hair clips and other decorative items - like much of the RenFest items.

And before you think of this place as very much a medieval mall, there are also shows and wandering players and characters.  The Fest is represented by the King and Queen, who are younger than I am now.  Which isn't too surprising, since they need to move all over the grounds all day every day - their job is to be seen - and daily, at 11 am, they lead the parade around the grounds.  

Their courts have, over the years, downsized.  As have some of the wandering players.  And now absent is the Rat catcher, a fellow who apparently was a bit too in to his character, because he had brought up a few legal liabilities for the Fest.  Fortunately, after implementing a new code of conduct which did away with much of the bawdy talk that both delighted and intrigued me as a kid and had me cringing a bit as a parent (I did wonder what it might do to my kids when we were mock bargaining with one of the players at the main gate who offered a cow for the kids, and I was holding out for a cow and a pig, while my wife was more likely to settle for a cow and a pair of chickens - turns out they're fine).  

We also stopped at a number of jewelry shops and met some really cool people.  And we'll be going back.  

And the only real clinker of the entire experience yesterday was going past the "Ye Old Window" booth where a guy was signing people up, trying to give away free windows.  I'm never taken out of the 21st century while there.  Many of the non-food shops do advertise their willingness to take "Lord MasterCard and Lady Visa" and the cellphone with the Square scanner attached is pretty much everywhere.  

But it was great to see the grounds packed, even if two of the three miles I walked yesterday were in the parking lot.  A mile in, a mile out.  So pro tip - get going early.  If not, head for the western "main" parking area by the main gate, because that area is served by shuttle buses - school buses which load in the parking lot and drop off at the gate - and do the opposite at the end of the day.  For free.  

So there's that.  I'll do a bit more next time, because I've noticed their "Weekly Blog" on the Renfest web site hasn't been updated since 2018.  I'm thinking maybe I'll try to see if they need someone to do that.  And maybe I can bargain for some discount admissions, or a discounted season pass or two.  Yeah, I'll work cheap if it allows me to regularly visit my happy place.  And employees get to park closer and take dedicated shuttle buses.  So that would be nice, too.