Hilliard warehouse transformed into marketplace with local makers, food trucks and music

Starting Thursday, Franklin Street in Hilliard will be home to free community events featuring food, shopping, and live performances. Agora Market will offer a trio of marketplace events from 3-9 p.m. Thursday, July 28, and Aug. 18 at 5286 Franklin St.

The initiative comes from a collaboration between local nonprofit Franklin Street Creative and Destination Hilliard. Destination Hilliard as part of the Tourism Attraction Grant Program awarded Franklin Street Creative $7,000 to produce the marketplace three nights during the summer in conjunction with the city’s DORA events.

Franklin Street Creative member Jordan Smith, who has owned and operated Lil Donut Factory with his wife for the last 13 years, said the nonprofit worked to rehabilitate warehouse space into a creative hub. 

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“Agora Market is the first outgrowth of that work with fellow board members and specifically in collaboration with Destination Hilliard,” Smith said. 

Smith said that after Destination Hilliard publicized a new grant fund for creative efforts to attract tourism, he knew Franklin Street Creative could provide a market that would be attractive to non-residents as well as residents, to allow organizers to continue building and growing the event beyond its initial funding. 

Smith said the marketplace will feature vendors, as well as food trucks, live performances, auctions, tutorials, and on-screen entertainment. 

“We hope to create an enduring and recurring Agora Market throughout the year that is increasingly cooperatively organized,” he said. 

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