Hamlet City Lake Pop-Up Market returns

HAMLET — The Hamlet City Lake Pop-Up Market made a vibrant return Saturday with its first event of the season, drawing visitors and vendors from Richmond County and beyond. The initiative, a joint effort between the city of Hamlet and the Hamlet Senior Center, was met with enthusiastic community support and showcased a wide range of handmade and homemade goods.

“It’s a team of teams effort,” said Amanda Kempen, director of the Hamlet Senior Center. “Each person has their different roles, but when you bring them together and connect the pieces of the puzzle, it’s a beautiful thing and you see here with all the different artisans. We have young artisans who are under the age of 15 selling here. We have senior citizens who are selling, we have different ethnicities and cultures that are selling here and so it really just shows a beautiful side of this small city of Hamlet — our melting pot and how creative and the dreams that people have by what they create and share with us today.”

Kempen emphasized the market’s impact not only on the community but also on the Senior Center’s mission.

“The fees that are charged to the vendors to come set up go directly back to the Hamlet Senior Center in our special events funds for our big events, parties and programs,” she said. “For me, I’m a people person, I’m a social butterfly and this gives me an opportunity not only to be out in our community, but show people who we are as a senior center and encourage folks to come and volunteer and so for me, this is just another way fo the footprint of the Hamlet Senior Center to get out into our community.”

The event featured an array of vendors offering everything from fresh produce and baked goods to crafts and clothing. The idea for the market was sparked during a trip taken by Mechelle Preslar, director of the Hamlet Depot and Museums and Community Engagement.

“My husband and I like to travel, so we had gone to I’m pretty sure it was the beach— but it was the waterfront, one of the little inlet areas and they had vendors set up on a Saturday around the water and I said ‘that is such a great idea,’ and I’ve always had in my mind that I wanted to do something at City Lake, but I didn’t know what,” Preslar said. “I thought it would be a good thing to do at City Lake and I know that they’re a lot of businesses that don’t have storefronts but they make their product and this will be a great way for them to showcase it, so it turned into everything I thought it would and more because it’s almost all entirely homemade/handmade items.”

She also noted the location’s natural draw and the benefits it has created for the surrounding area.

“I like to ask people how they heard about it that stop and a lot of them say ‘we just rode by and we saw activity, so we stopped’ and then I talked to National Railroad, they are run by volunteers and they only open on the weekend, but when we had our markets, they open it early, so they are also benefiting from the markets— that is exactly what we wanted, to bring people to Hamlet and then they’ll venture out and do business with the other businesses around town.”

Preslar hopes residents will continue to support the market and what it represents.

“I hope that they come out, shop local. I’m always saying shop local, eat local and stay local. Why would you want to leave? Why wouldn’t you just stay here? We have something for everybody.”

The City Lake Pop-Up Market is held the first Saturday of each month from April through November, running from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.