Soul Fair Summer Solstice
Sunday June 28, 2026
4:00 – 9:00 PM
WHAT TO EXPECT
Sacred and fun. At the same time.
Soul Fair is a seasonal community ritual in Bakersfield, and we invite you to the Summer Solstice edition. Summer is the height of the year. A season of fullness, of visibility, of vitality, of expressing our aliveness out loud.
The longest day of light is an invitation to stand in it long enough to be seen. Some of us are here because we almost weren't. Some because someone we love isn't anymore. This Solstice we celebrate what survived in the dark. Our radiance. The beauty that grew from what we lived through. The life that came alive in rooms no one else watched.
This is also our first Soul Fair welcoming all ages.
Live music. Local food. Seven stations, each a pathway back to the soul, led by people from this community. Depth and joy are not opposites here. They never were.
Five phases. One journey.
THE ARC OF THE EVENING
Soul Fair is not a collection of activities. It is a single experience with a beginning, middle, and end. You will feel the shift without needing to name it.
Threshold
Arrival. You are greeted personally. A cold glass of lemonade is your first gift, simple and sweet, the way it was when you were a child at a summer stand. You are invited to add your name and your light to the collective. Live music is playing. The marketplace is alive. You cross into a different space, and then you are free to explore.
Exploration
All seven Pathway stations are open. Move at your own pace. Have a poem written live for you. Step into the experience of breath. Dance to the joy of live music. Nobody is herded. Freedom, not obligation.
The Gathering
A bell sounds. The music fades. Drew gathers the room to the center. He names the season and invites everyone into a single collective moment. A moment of joy, of visibility, of vitality. This is the hinge of the evening.
The Practice
The heart of the evening. Guided grounding, collective movement, live performance, and a closing sound bath. People on mats as the light shifts. Candles and string lights alive. The whole room becomes one body.
The Release
Slow rise. Music returns. Ice cream arrives. People linger, connect, and let the evening settle. The real relationships form here.
THE SEVEN PATHWAYS
Seven pathways. Your pace.
Each Pathway is an experiential station designed for the Summer Solstice. You choose which ones call to you. All are self-paced. None requires experience.
Learning & Wisdom
Even in uncertainty, there is light to guide me.
Heart
I will not abandon myself.
Embodiment
My body is my first teacher.
Community
Here, I belong.
Ritual
I am rooted. What I tend to grows.
Liberation
I release what is heavy. I walk in freedom.
Creativity
What is emerging in me is worth trusting.
Swipe to explore →
A Note from Drew
I built this for you.
I was born and raised in Bakersfield. And maybe like you, for a long time I could not wait to get away. I was told the real world was somewhere else, that there was so much more out there, and somewhere in that I learned to see my own hometown as less than. So I left the first chance I got. UCLA gave me room to spread my wings without home being too far out of reach, and then I kept going. I spent the last fifteen years living all over the country.
I did not plan on coming back. But I was guided home, and now I see why my roots needed to be tended here. Because the people I love are here. Because Bakersfield is as deserving of healing, of community, of depth, as anywhere I have ever been. I did not want to build this anywhere else.
I believe how we heal can be different. How we understand each other can be different. How we hold each other can be different. Here is the one thing I most want you to know. What hurt you in connection cannot heal you alone. It heals in connection. That is what this evening is. Not a lecture, not a workshop. A room full of people remembering, together, that we were never meant to do this by ourselves. This is our aliveness. This is our refusal to just survive.
So I am inviting you. To come. To experience aliveness, and connection. Bring whatever you are carrying, exactly as it is.
You do not need to have done this before, and you do not need to arrive whole. Soul Fair is built to meet you where you are, on June 28. And I cannot wait to see you there.
COMMUNITY CONTRIBUTORS
Food. Music. Bodywork. Community
Local makers, healers, and artists fill the space all evening — and every vendor keeps 100% of their sales.
The Venue
The Vendors
Suli Teas
Curated Pure Herbal Teas
3 Gals and a Dude
Handmade bath & skin products
Shawn
Henna
Sweet Peas Bakery
Gluten Free & Vegan Cookie Decorating
Natural Vibes Creations
Handmade Natural Stone Jewelry
Club Control
Pilates
Meet the ones holding the inward journey.
Mia Skeels
Community Weaver
Pathway of Collective
Nikki Scanlon, RYT
Breathe to Become
Pathway of Embodiment
Geniece Trevino
Birdcage Ink
Pathway of Learning & Wisdom
Michael Jasso
Live Poetry Writing
Pathway of Heart
Ulysses
An Unburdening Bridge
Pathway of Ritual
David Morin
Poet, Death Doula, and Prison Educator
Pathway of Creativity
The Center
For Sexuality & Gender Diversity
Free Mom Hugs
Empowering celebration of the LGBTQIA+ community
Marasha Miller
Sound Bath
Evelyn Domínguez
Sound Bath
Asher Phoenix
Live Music
Tatou Uma Pasefika Cultural Arts
Polynesian Dance
Tickets
Collective Investment
Soul Fair runs on a three-tier model. Every ticket grants the same access to the same evening. The tier you choose is a quiet act of community care: those who can give more make room for those who give less. Choose the one that is true for you, without explanation.
Community Care
Early Bird
For BIPOC community members, queer and trans folks, immigrants, those impacted by systemic harm and those in need of financial spaciousness. Community is not just for those who can afford it. Use code SOULCOMMUNITY at checkout.
General
Early Bird
The true cost of holding the evening. If this is accessible to you, it keeps Soul Fair whole.
Steward
Early Bird
Add a donation at checkout to fund contributor stipends, Community Care access, and production costs. You make the model work.
Early-bird pricing ends June 21st, 2026.
No one is turned away for cost. If even Community Care is out of reach, write to us.
Access to healing should not be a luxury. Soul Fair's Collective Investment model ensures the people most impacted by systemic harm do not face the highest barriers to the practices that support their wellbeing.
Soul Fair is where people feel the model in their body.
Everything after gives them the language for what happened.
You do not need to know what you are walking into.
You just need to walk in.
Sunday, June 28, 2026 · 4:00 – 9:00 PM ·
The Amara Downtown Garden Venue, Bakersfield CA
Community is not the container for healing.
Community is the mechanism through which healing completes itself.