If you've lived in Bluemont for more than a couple of years, you already know the shape of fair weekend. Snickersville Turnpike fills with cars by mid-morning. The Community Center smells like coffee and fresh-baked pie. Somewhere between the petting zoo and the beer garden, you run into three neighbors you haven't seen since last September. That part hasn't changed since 1970, when a handful of volunteers first put together what's now the 56th Annual Bluemont Fair, running Saturday and Sunday, September 19 and 20, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
What has changed is easy to miss if you're running on autopilot. This year's fair carries a theme, a featured local artist, and a new museum layer that weren't part of the fair even two years ago. If your plan is to show up the way you always have, a few specifics are worth knowing before you park.
The Road Closes Before the Fair Opens
The part that trips up even longtime residents is the traffic pattern. During the fair, Snickersville Turnpike runs one-way, flowing southbound from Clayton Hall Road through the village to the main parking lot. If your usual route into Bluemont comes from the north end of the turnpike, that approach won't work on fair weekend. Once you're parked, all vehicles exit by turning left or south back onto the turnpike, then either onto the gravel Yellow Schoolhouse Road toward Route 7, or onto Airmont Road for a paved route toward Round Hill and Business Route 7.
That matters most on Saturday morning. The Pickle and Pie Contest, a fixture since the fair's earliest years, requires entries at the Community Center between 8 and 10 a.m., with a hard cutoff at 11 a.m. Anyone dropping off a jar of pickles or a fruit pie needs to get into the village before the one-way pattern and the fair crowd both settle in.
If you're entering the contest, arrive close to 8 a.m. The 11 a.m. deadline doesn't move for a backed-up turnpike.
Judging wraps by early afternoon, with winners announced at 1:15 p.m. and the losing entries, which is to say the merely excellent ones, sliced and sold to benefit the fair.
This Year's Poster Was Painted by a Neighbor in Round Hill
Every year, the fair's volunteer chairs pick a theme, then open a call for local artists to interpret it for the official poster and merchandise. This year's theme centered on black bears, the animals that turn up along Blue Ridge hiking trails and, often enough, in Western Loudoun backyards. More than twenty artists submitted designs. The chairs chose a painting of a bear wearing a crown of wildflowers with the Blue Ridge Mountains behind it, created by Sara Parella of Round Hill.
Parella moved to Virginia from the Pacific Northwest in 1988 to study at Mary Washington College, where she earned degrees in studio art and political science, and has spent the past three decades working in mental health services around Loudoun County. She also does pottery, rides dressage, and volunteers with local dog and cat rescues. Her artwork now appears on the fair's poster, t-shirts, mugs, and wine glasses, the same merchandise you'll see for sale at the E.E. Lake Store and the Gardener's Shed near the Community Center this weekend.
It's a small detail, but it's the kind that changes every year. The poster you buy this September won't be the one from two years ago, and the artist behind it lives one town over.
A New Exhibit Ties the Fair to a Bigger Anniversary
For the second year running, the fair hosts a juried art show upstairs at the E.E. Lake Store, featuring some of the region's more established painters and craftspeople. That's now a settled tradition. What's genuinely new for 2026 is a museum exhibition at the Plaster Museum called "The Revolution: An American Mosaic," which highlights Loudoun County's role in the Revolutionary War. Reenactors from the Sons of the American Revolution will be on hand giving demonstrations alongside it, timed to land during the country's 250th anniversary year.
The fair's other recurring demonstrations are still there if you know where to look. Archaeologist David Clark sets up in the Montessori Field with artifacts recovered locally, the kind of hands-on table where a kid can hold something dug out of Loudoun soil. Blacksmith Eric Zieg, who also demonstrates at Mount Vernon, works his forge in Stone's Field. Neither is new, but neither shows up anywhere else in the county on a random September weekend, which is part of what makes the fair worth treating as a destination rather than background noise.
Three Stages Running at Once, and Where the Day Spills Over
The fair's live music runs on three stages simultaneously, leaning toward Americana, roots, bluegrass, and folk, with a line dancing element mixed in. That means the fair doesn't really have a single center of gravity. You pick a stage based on what's playing when you arrive, not because there's one main event everyone funnels toward.
The same is true for where the day continues once the gates close at 5. Dirt Farm Brewing, the family-run farm brewery about a mile outside the village on Foggy Bottom Road, sits on land the Zurschmeide family has farmed for decades, and its patio looks out over the same Blue Ridge foothills the fair poster depicts. Bluemont Station Brewery and Winery, closer to the village center, has become a regular stop for the same crowd looking for a smash burger or a flatbread after a day of fair food. Neither is part of the official fair footprint, but both understand that fair weekend brings more people through Bluemont than almost any other weekend of the year, and both plan for it.
What Stays the Same
For all the year-to-year changes in theme and programming, the bones of the fair haven't moved since 1970. It's still entirely volunteer-run. Admission is still $10 at the gate, cash or credit, with kids nine and under free and parking free as well. Pets still aren't allowed, a policy the fair has held to after past issues with dog fights and understandably nervous guests. The petting zoo still runs on donated goodwill, with past guests including a camel and, memorably, a wallaby.
A quick list if you're planning the weekend:
- Gates open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. both Saturday and Sunday
- Snickersville Turnpike runs one-way southbound through the village during fair hours
- Pickle and Pie entries due at the Community Center by 11 a.m. Saturday, winners announced 1:15 p.m.
- Three music stages run concurrently, so there's no single main stage to plan around
- No pets, rain or shine, and the terrain is rough for wheelchairs in spots
None of that is new. What's new is the layer on top: a bear-themed poster from an artist in Round Hill, a Revolutionary War exhibit tied to the country's 250th, and a second year of curated art upstairs at the E.E. Lake Store. That's the part worth paying attention to, because it's the part that quietly makes each fair a little different from the one before it, even in a village that's been running this same weekend for 56 years.
If you're new enough to Bluemont that this is your first fair, or curious about what else is happening around the village this fall, Diana Geremia lives and works in Western Loudoun and is always glad to talk about the area, fair season or otherwise. Let's Connect.
