Weekly Summer Edition MichiganDaily.com INDEX Vol. CXXI, No. 136 | © 2015 The Michigan Daily michigandaily.com NEWS .................................... OPINION ............................... ARTS ...................................... SUDOKU................................ SPORTS................................. inside 2 4 8 2 11 Artists flock to A2 for 56th annual Art Fair Event organizers and officials prepare for four unique fairs By JACKIE CHARNIGA and LARA MOEHLMAN Daily Staff Reporter and Summer Managing News Editor After a year of intense collaboration between local officials and event organizers, the 56th annual award-winning Ann Arbor Art Fair returns to Tree Town Wednesday. Occupying 30 Ann Arbor city blocks, Art Fair draws roughly 500,000 visitors to the city to browse the work of a variety of Michigan-based artists. Many visitors don’t realize, however, that Art Fair con- sists of four unique fairs: the “Original” Ann Arbor Street Art Fair, extending from North University southward to the Diag, the Ann Arbor Summer Art Fair, located on Main Street, the State Street Area Art Fair and the South University Art Fair. According to Maureen Riley, executive director of the “Original” Street Art Fair, each individual fair reflects the unique personality of its location. “The character of the neighborhoods play heavily into the overall feel of each fair,” Riley said, adding that the State Street fair is known for its sidewalk sales while the Summer Art Fair showcases the many restaurants and shops that line Main Street, in addition to quality artwork. Riley said the “Original” fair is organized by a non-profit arts organization, which explains the fair’s heavy focus on art over local businesses. “Our focus has always been on main- taining high-quality artistic standards. We remain small to accomplish that,” Riley said. “We also are committed to engaging the public in experiential and educational opportunities.” In addition to showcasing artwork, the “Original” fair offers art demonstrations, activities and other programs for students. Although the individual fairs offer dif- ferent See FAIR, Page 3 Art Fair: Untold tales of the Urban basement ARTS Urban Outfitters goes to extreme lengths, offering crowd-drawing sales By DANIELLE RAYKHINSHTEYN Daily Arts Writer A headband, a pair of TOMS, a skirt, a romper, two dresses, three pairs of jeans and two shirts: a list of items I bought at Urban Outfit- ters last year — for approximately $120. About $11 an item. This is the magic of Art Fair. If you’ve never been to Urban during Art Fair: 1. I would recom- mend it because you can get half of a wardrobe for 100 bucks, and 2. It’s quite the production. As an Urban Outfitters employee, I help to set up tents outside the store just like any other vendor — an 80-foot tent for women’s clothing and a 40-foot tent for men’s clothing, all of which is on sale. This in addition to the sale section inside the store, and on top of all the sale bins of shoes and accessories we put out in the front of the store. You can only imagine how insanely busy this makes us. With all five registers manned at all times and at least four mobile regis- ters outside by the tents for people paying with cards, there’s still con- stantly a line of at least 10 to 20 peo- ple throughout the day. Our normal hours are 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Our Art Fair hours are 6 a.m. to 11 p.m. We have our normal fitting rooms in the back, and we also set up temporary fitting rooms in the front of the store. They’re always filled; there’s always a line. And while I can’t give exact numbers, suffice it to say Urban makes a highly significant number in the thousands every day during Art Fair … on merchandise that is mostly five to 10 dollars. Even as an employee, I remain astounded by the amount of merchandise sold everyday that amounts to such sig- nificant profits. OPINION All in for Art Fair Aarica Marsh discusses support for A2 tradition >> SEE PAGE 4 CELEBRATING OUR ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY- FIFTH YEAR OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM July 15, 2015 Ann Arbor, MI by Francesca Kielb See URBAN, Page 6