Month: April 2025

SABF Celebrates Creativity in May

The Seattle Art Book Fair (SABF) returns May 10 and 11, 2025, to Washington Hall. This free festival features artists and their books, book design, and independent publishing. This year’s fair will include more than 85 exhibitors, classes and presentations, and book-inspired art on display.

SABF defines art books, also known as artist books, as creations which use the medium of publishing or manufacturing a book as an artistic practice. Volumes seen at SABF can be handmade, offset-printed, letterpressed, photocopied, screen printed, or risographed.

The event celebrates creativity on many levels, with artists and their books using narrative, poetry, photography, and illustration to convey their message. Talks, activities, and installations from members of the arts community will take place throughout the weekend. A “launch party” will be held on Friday, May 9. To learn more, check SABF’s website at https://www.seattleartbookfair.org/ (home page of website shown below).

SABF is held at Washington Hall, 153 14th Avenue, in Seattle.

Additional West Coast art book fairs in 2025 include the LA Art Book Fair (May 15-18, 2025), Vancouver Art Book Fair (July 4-5, 2025) and the San Francisco Art Book Fair (July 11-13, 2025).

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April’s Get Lit Offers Onsite and Virtual Events

Eastern Washington’s biggest book event returns in April. Get Lit! is a four-day festival, Thursday through Sunday, which includes full days of readings, writing workshops, craft classes, panel discussions, literary happy hours, a book fair, and more.

For the 2025 festival, April 10 through 13, the festivities kick off on Thursday with readings throughout the Spokane area including the popular 21+ and over event, Pie & Whiskey, at The Washington Cracker Building. At Pie & Whiskey, A limited number of chapbooks containing work from the readers, including Spokane’s Mayor, will be sold. Designed by Lost Horse Press, printed by Gray Dog Press, and hand-stitched by EWU students and alumni, the chapbooks are a small press celebration of the event.

Friday and Saturday brings more readings and writing workshops. The Book Fair on Saturday will be held at the Montvale Event Center. The Book Fair features 20+ local and regional booksellers, small presses, non-profits, and other organizations including Girl Noise Press, Talking River Review, Makeout Creek Books, Melanie Hewitt AKA LibroBuch, Washington Center for the Book, Books to Prisoners, Latah Books, Willow Springs Magazine, Willow Springs Books, Rock & Sling, Spokane Print and Publishing Center, Lost Horse Press, Lynx House Press, Western Colorado University, Fugue, Spark Central, Spokane Arts, SpokAnimal, Page 42 Bookstore, Spokane Public Radio, Jupiter’s Eye Book Cafe, Foray for the Arts, Gray Dog Press, and Wishing Tree Books. 

All events on Sunday are virtual and can be watched on the Get Lit! YouTube channel.

Further information on the festival can be found at https://inside.ewu.edu/getlit/.

Get Lit! is a nonprofit housed within Eastern Washington University. In addition to the festival, Get Lit! also helps to promote EWU’s Visiting Writers Series and works closely with EWU’s Writers in the Community program, which places graduate students into local spaces of need to teach creative writing. Virtual events from 2025 and previous years can be watched at https://www.youtube.com/@ewusgetlitprograms1998.