Went to my local Ren Faire for the first time in probably over a decade and honestly the experience made me pretty sad. This fair has expanded and had so much more to see than when I last went, and so much less of it was worth seeing than 10+ years ago. I went there fully expecting to find something to buy and left without spending money on anything except admission.
It used to be nothing but cool, unique, handmade artisan stuff you knew you couldn't find anywhere else. One of my most beloved possessions from this place is this incredible handmade wolf puppet that drapes over your shoulder and has a control mechanism that goes in your sleeve so you can turn his head. He's an actual work of art! And there's just nothing like that anymore.
So many stalls had your basic 3D printed fidget dragons or mass produced ceramic statues or manufactured tiaras that clearly came from somewhere like Temu or Shein being sold at a markup. I don't want to go to the Ren Faire to buy stuff I can find online! It wouldn't surprise me if most of the artisans got pushed out when they couldn't lower their prices enough to compete with cheap mass produced items.
I'm so tired of seeing artists pushed out of artist spaces because the spaces won't regulate what counts as handmade art in any way.
