2019 Community Chill Night
The 2019 Community Chill Night is DIY Lowell’s third annual chili cook-off event! This annual fundraiser brings together the community to celebrate the projects and events that have activated our underused spaces, brought diverse populations together, and made Lowell better.
The event is Friday, March 1, 6:30 – 9:00 pm at St. Anne’s Church Edson Hall (8 Kirk Street).
Chili Contest
11 chilis and spicy stews are competing, and YOU get to decide who wins!
- Maria Dickinson’s Chicken and chorizo chili
- Suzz Cromwell’s Veggie Happiness
- Lowell Alliance‘s Vegan Chili (GF)
- Purple Carrot‘s Black bean and quinoa vegan chili
- Tavern in the Square‘s Firehouse Chili
- Warp and Weft‘s Caveman Chili
- Cafe UTEC‘s The Madd Love Chili
- Britt Boughner’s Christian Hill Chili Pods
- Joy Robinson’s Joy’s Spicy Chili
- Lowell Downtown Neighborhood Associations‘s Bourbon County Stout Chili
- D’Youville Life & Wellness‘s D’Youville Veggie Chili
Building Lowell
Participate in a collaborative art activity for both young and old, and decorate and color paper cut-outs of Lowell landmarks. These will be glued to a board overlapping one another, creating a fantastic Lowell skyline to be displayed at community events.
Community Transformation Award
The Lowell Coalition for Refugee and Immigrant Support and Engagement (RISE) will receive the annual Community Transformation Award to honor the creation of Welcoming Week Lowell. The Community Transformation Award is given to a group or individual that re-imagined or improved public space. Welcoming Week included artwork hung on the Merrimack Street Enterprise Bank fence, a Flag Parade, a South Common potluck picnic, an Immigrant History Walk, and several other events. RISE was nominated because the Welcoming Week event series is all about promoting inclusivity and integration among long standing community members and newer immigrant groups for a strong, vibrant, equitable and sustainable community.
We will present the award at 7:30 pm, along with a presentation about the runners-up, who have all made our public spaces more vibrant and inclusive:
- The Kindred Project
- Lowell CanalWater Cleaners
- Humanity Boutique
- Mary Hart
- MJ Bujold
- Made in Lowell
- BRM Productions
Musical Performance
We’re proud to announce the Squires of Soul will be sharing their home-grown soul and funk music with us, starting around 8:00 pm!
Other Stuff
Finally, we’ll have a lot of other fun things throughout the evening:
- Activities for all ages
- Silent Auction for arts, crafts, and services with Community Themes!
- DIY Lowell Idea Submission
- Volunteer of the Year Award
- Our famous Do-it-Yourself Sundae bar
Thank You!
Thanks so much to our sponsors:
2019 Star ($500+)
Jeanne D’Arc Credit Union
Super Sponsor ($200+)
- Enterprise Bank
VIP ($100+)
- D’Youville Life and Wellness Foundation
- Gallagher & Cavanaugh
- Lowell Plan
We Need Your Help!
We need your help in the following ways. Nominations and chili entries due February 15!
Award Nominations * Chili Entries * Sponsors * Volunteers
Nominate a Community Member or Group
We need nominations for people and groups you think have made a difference in making Lowell’s public spaces more vibrant, exciting, kid-friendly, colorful, walkable, or better! All nominees will get a mention in our award ceremony, and winners will get a $20 giftcard for individual and 10 volunteer hours for a group!
Submit a Chili or Stew Entry
Submit a Chili or Stew EntryThis year, we’re hoping for a mix of cultural and ethnic stews with American chilis – anything tasty can compete! We are looking for all kinds: traditional and totally off the wall, meat or vegetable based—you name it. No cost to enter; categories for restaurants and individuals.
Get a VIP Table or Become a Sponsor
Get a VIP Table or Become a SponsorWe have special sponsorship packages for $100, $200, and $500. Special perks for being a sponsor include VIP treatment for your organization, a banner at the event, and promotion on social media and on our mailing list.
Even if you aren’t from an organization, a donation would be a big help! After a year of Strategic Planning with our Advisory Committee, we’re kicking off a new era of DIY Lowell and raising funds to hire our first-ever part time Program Director. Donations big and small will help us reach our goal.
Click here to view our Sponsor Deck and email info@diylowell.org with expressions of interest.
Volunteer to Help Out
Volunteer to Help OutWe need help setting up activities, counting chili ballots, scooping ice cream, and more! Please consider helping us out on March 1. Click on the button for a form with all volunteer opportunities.
DIY Community Chill 2018 was a Great Success!
We want to thank everyone who made last month’s Community Chill Night a great event! If you couldn’t make the event, check out these great photos:
Each year, we give out three awards. The first, Volunteer of the Year, goes out to a DIY Lowell volunteer or volunteers who exhibited special excellence in leading or working in a DIY Lowell group. This year, we had two winners:
- Laura Scarlett Tavares, Points of Light Lantern Celebration
- Katherine Dubose Fuerst, Park(ing) Day and Downtown Decorations
The second, Community Transformation Award, goes to a community group or nonprofit that went above and beyond transforming or activating an underutilized or overlooked public space, as chosen by the DIY Lowell Advisory Committee. Congratulations to the No Bully Zone for winning! See all the nominees here:
Finally, we selected two Best Chilis by popular vote, one from a professional and one from an ameteur! Our winners:
- UMass Lowell Inn and Conference Center
- Maria Dickinson
Thanks to all our sponsors and volunteers, who made the event shine! It’s still not too late to donate, just click here to donate by Paypal or check! Thanks to:
- Paul Marion and Rosemary Noon
- Greater Lowell Community Foundation
- Studio 26 Architecture
- Enterprise Bank
- Jeanne D’Arc Credit Union
- Mr. & Ms. Joe Smith
- Yun-Ju Choi
- Made in Lowell
- Coalition for a Better Acre
- Lowell Film Collaborative
- Lowell Bike Coalition
- Points of Light Committee
- Humanity Boutique
- Brew’d Awakening
- Sweet Lydia’s
- St. Anne’s Episcopal Church
- Christine Bruins, Tom Hood, Chuck Arnold, Mary Tauras, and many more!
What’s new with DIY Lowell?
There’s never been a better time to start connecting with DIY Lowell!
Community Chill Night
We’re having a Community Chill Night fundraiser this March 9! A special chili contest party with chili sampling, music, games, nonalchoholic drinks, community awards, and our famous “Chilly” DIY Sundae bar! We’ll have special activities such as lantern decorating for the Points of Light Lantern Celebration, photobooth, and learning about our 2018 projects. It’s the perfect way to break winter malaise for families, teens, seniors, and adults! Join the Facebook Event, register here, and join us for a special night.
Lowell Trash Machine
The Lowell Trash Machine is a community volunteer based project to design, construct, and operate an autonomous robot to remove floating trash from the historic canals. UMass Lowell students are designing and building the prototype, and the DIY Lowell team is running a naming contest, connecting with high schoolers to add creative elements to the utilitarian robot, and more. Learn more at their website!
Summer Dreaming Downtown Pixie Marketplace and Festival
The Midsummer Dream event will be a summer day and night festival for kids and adults with a magical fairy theme, with a marketplace, costume contest, kids craft and storytime, and a special “traveling” production of Shakespeare’s classic “A Midsummer’s Night Dream” that will lead the audience through downtown, traveling from scene to scene. This event will be in honor of Lee Pho, owner of Little Delights and a force for magic and joy in Downtown Lowell, who we lost to cancer last year. DIY Lowell, Humanity Boutique, Pollard Memorial Library, and Studio 506 Theatre are partnering for the event, but we need community help! Our next planning session is Thursday, February 8. Join the Facebook event via the link!
