PENDLETON — More than 70 vendors filled the Pendleton Convention Center for Interwoven, an inaugural weekend-long event celebrating hand-crafted items, the cultures they come from and the makers responsible for their creation.

The weekend’s itinerary boasted a marketplace at the Convention Center with classes, workshops and panels happening at the same time. In the evening, fashion shows at the Blue Mountain Equine Center and afterparties hosted by The Vybe at the Electric Sundown kept the festivities going.

Travel Pendleton Director Justin Waldron said the idea for Interwoven came about while trying to bring in more business during historically slower months.

“October, November and December have been months where visits are much lower, but we have some remarkable attractions in Pendleton all year long,” Waldron said. “I’ve really been focusing on the culture and our people as our greatest strengths, our community is one our greatest strengths — especially our artist community.”

Waldron said some of Pendleton’s biggest events celebrate the compound cultures of the area, giving the Pendleton Round-Up and Two Cultures One Community Powwow as examples.

“We wanted to continue that tradition of representing all cultures, but we’re doing it through the lens of fashion and art now, with storytelling and food,” he said.

Beside the market in the Convention Center, Interwoven also hosted panels to promote the makers of Pendleton and another to promote the eight designers taking part in the Interwoven Unresidency. The Unresidency brings together Indigenous and western fashion traditions together with community-driven practices and interpretations.

“We thought, ‘Why not celebrate the makers? Why not celebrate the culture that’s here?’” Waldron said.

The Friday Makers of Pendleton panel, comprised of Morningstar Blends owner Maya Barmer, Hamley’s leatherworker Tim Hawk, 23+ owner Joe Melling and Stitches Mercantile owner Rick Vicek, was moderated by Amy Pence-Brown, who owns the Boise, Idaho-based business Wintry Market.

“Pendleton has this amazing tradition and history of traditional makers and traditional methods. We heard from some of them, like leatherwork, saddles, hats,” Pence-Brown said. “Pendleton has such a rich history in that, and there’s never been an event like this in Pendleton that’s focused on that specifically.”

Food-wise, Waldron said Travel Pendleton collaborated with Explore Umatilla County, Wildbill Market and Cooper and Heat for the Taste of Umatilla County experience.

“We spent the past four of five months planning the food element of what we’re doing,” Waldron said. “For the Taste of Umatilla County, we have a chef using local ingredients or First Foods together with a winery, local distillery or non-alcoholic winery to pair bites and sips.”

The Electric Sundown also hosted a Fashion Bites event, an immersive food and beverage experience that paired chefs to designers to create tastings inspired by the Unresidency designers’ creations.

Two pillars of the weekend were the Friday and Saturday fashion shows. The first, the Interwoven Unresidency, showcased the eight Unresidency designers and their creations, inspired by the Indigenous and western traditions subsecting through community-rooted collections, hearkening to the name of the event, Interwoven.

The second fashion show was the Rodeo of Runway, the first of its kind, as a significant portion of the collections were displayed on horseback.

“There’s a production cost of putting together a fashion show in a venue that’s really meant for a horse, it’s not fashion-direct,” Waldron said. “But you can’t have a horseback fashion show in a traditional venue either, so we had to, sort of, create the space. So there’s a number of challenges from the production-side.”

For a first-time event, Waldron said it’s a challenge to build up something like this. Unable to show past photos or provide artist testimonials, he said there’s no way to operate without faith in how the event would unfold.

“Luckily all of the makers that are here knew this was the first year of this event and they signed on, and they’re extremely talented people,” Waldron said.

Despite those challenges, he said there had been a lot of positive feedback from the artists attending the event, and the Unresidency panel had been encouraging regarding the idea that it was “about time” something like this had happened in the community.

Waldron said there were a lot of firsts in the event’s making and that that was one of the greatest rewards in his eyes, to be able to create a space and new experiences for Pendleton and the people visiting.

“We’re hopefully providing an opportunity for a new audience through Interwoven to discover this place and also discover a reason why they’re going to keep coming back here,” Waldron said. “Pendleton’s a beautiful place to live and work and create, and anytime a group of creators get together something beautiful’s going to happen.”