FLORENCE — Florence Night Out is back this year, and it will turn Main Street into a bustling block party.
The street festival took a hiatus last year, but it returns on Saturday, June 1, from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., bringing together community members, artists, musicians and local business owners for an evening of barbecuing, dancing and art-making.
“Art is a big part, but it’s about community and celebrating community through creativity,” said Donnabelle Casis, an artist and event organizer, who launched Florence Night Out in 2013.
“I always had this vision of people dancing in the street,” Casis said. “We expanded to Main Street because there is so much freedom for movement there.”
Main Street will be closed from the Pie Bar to the Florence Civic Center for the festival (the road will be closed to traffic from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m.) to make way for the crowd.
Organizers are aiming to draw 2,000 or more participants, and Casis emphasized that the event will be bicycle-friendly. Festival organizers have partnered with Friends of Northampton Trails and Greenways for a bike ride from Pulaski Park to Florence’s Main Street, and the Massachusetts Bicycle Coalition will offer a bike valet for visitors arriving to the festival via bike trails, while ValleyBike Share will offer free demos to ride at Cooper’s Corner.
As for the main attraction: Open art studios, live music, dance lessons, theater performances and poetry readings are just a few of the offerings in the mix.
Along with multimedia artist Amanda Herman, Casis is co-curating Mobile Art Box installations. Throughout the block party, there will be four pop-up, temporary art spaces made out of storage boxes in collaboration with Tony Gleason, a Florence resident and owner of DIY Mobile Box.
These large boxes will house interactive, multimedia installations by artists Home Body, Jonathan Mark Jackson, Bibiana Medkova, and Angela Zammarelli.
There will also be an open-air market on Main Street to showcase the work of Florence artists and artisans, and festival-goers can make some art of their own.
Rise & Fall will hold a poster and tote bag screen-printing station at 40 Main St., and the New England School of Architectural Woodworking will demonstrate woodturning at 40 Main St. Meanwhile, Attack Bear Press will have its “poetry vending machine” available to create poems at a typewriter station.
In addition, there will be salsa and swing-dancing lessons by Emily Foxtrot at the Florence Civic Center at 90 Park St., and contra dancing from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at 85 Main Street.
There will also be an unveiling of a new mural at Pivot Media at 70 Maple St.
To close out the festivities, brass street band Prone to Mischief will perform, marching from Brick Mill Square to the VFW from 7:30 p.m. to 8 p.m.
Cooper’s Corner, the Pie Bar, Freckled Fox, UYA Poke Bowl, Miss Florence Diner, JJ’s Tavern and Brew Practitioners will be on hand for food and drink.
For a full list of artists and the schedule, visit www.florencenightout.org.
Luis Fieldman can be reached at lfieldman@gazettenet.com.