Gateway Park

New Beer Festival Coming to Rosslyn

By Heather Mongilio

Arlington Backyard Beer Festival logo (via Backyard Beer Fest)

Rosslyn’s Gateway Park will turn into a beer garden this September with the arrival of Arlington’s latest beer festival.

The Backyard Beer Festival will feature more than 60 craft brews and live music during the event on Sept. 19.

The festival, which is sponsored by Uber, Drink the World and Project DC Events, will also have backyard games with plenty of prizes for guests. Attendees will be able to purchase food from food trucks and other food vendors.

The festival has two sessions, one from 1-4 p.m. and the other from 7-10 p.m. General admission tickets are $25 per session, and VIP tickets cost $35. With a general admission ticket, participants will get three hours of unlimited beer tasting and a souvenir glass. VIP ticket holders will get an extra hour for beer tasting and access to VIP bathrooms.

More than 30 breweries are expected to participate, including Flying Dog from Frederick, Maryland, Old Ox Brewery from Ashburn and D.C. breweries Atlas Brew Works and DC Brau. For those with gluten allergies, the festival will have ciders and gluten-free beers.

The event is for ages 21 and up, and will happen rain or shine. All participants will need to bring an ID with their tickets.

Logo via Backyard Beer Festival

D.C. Burger Bash Coming to Arlington

By Heather Mongilio

2014 BRGR Bash competitors assemble burgers. (Courtesy of Darren Stauffer)

Arlington residents to should start building up an appetite. The third annual D.C. BRGR Bash is coming to Rosslyn’s Gateway Park on Saturday, July 18.

The BRGR Bash is a six hour competition of who can make the best burger, and the judges are the visitors. Each person at the bash gets to try four burgers and then a cast his or her vote for favorite burger.

There will also be craft beers to help wash down the burgers and live music to jam to while eating.

At the end of the day, one burger chef champion will be named, and he or she will walk away with a vacation to Austin, Texas and the Golden BRGR Bash trophy.

The competition was started by Craig Carey, who also started Ballston burger joint Big Buns.

The competition runs from noon to 6 p.m. on July 18, and tickets are $29 per person. A ticket gets a person entry and four burgers. The 16 burgers are broken down into four groups, and each ticket is for one group. D.C. BRGR Bash recommends bringing three other friends so that everyone can taste all 16 burgers. Craft beers are available for $5 at one of the four beer bars.

Vegetarians don’t have to be left out. The competition offers a Veggie Burger ticket for $19, which gets the person entry and a veggie burger. There will also be cider for those with gluten allergies.

Arlingtonians can also attend the bash to support the four local competitors: Willow Restaurant in Ballston, Big Buns in Ballston, Citizen Burger Bar in Clarendon and the combined entry of Liberty Tavern and Lyon Hill in Clarendon.

Photo courtesy of Darren Stauffer

Free Barre Classes in Rosslyn Rescheduled

By Mariah Joyce

Barre in the Park cropped (Copy)The remaining Barre in the Park classes in Rosslyn have been rescheduled from Wednesday to Thursday evenings, starting this week.

Barre in the Park, which is in its second season, is a series of free outdoor classes offered weekly in Rosslyn’s Gateway Park (1300 Lee Highway) by exercise studio Lava Barre, in partnership with the Rosslyn Business Improvement District.

(Barre is a type of trendy exercise class that combines elements of ballet with yoga and Pilates.)

Lava Barre is offering this free series in part to promote their new studio in Rosslyn (1528 Clarendon Blvd), which opened this summer. The Rosslyn studio replaced a Lava Barre studio previously located in Clarendon.

The series started in May and is slated to continue into the early fall. Although the classes are free, registration is required. According to Lava Barre, all registered participants need to bring is themselves, a towel or mat and some water.

Absent cancellation due to inclement weather, the remaining Barre in the Park classes will be offered Thursday evenings in Gateway Park from 6-7 p.m. Should a class be cancelled due to weather, the BID says a notification will be sent to those registered for the class via email.

Currently, classes are planned to continue from now until the end of September.

Photo courtesy Lava Barre

Lineup for 25th Annual Rosslyn Jazz Festival Announced

By Mariah Joyce

Dee Dee Bridgewater at Rosslyn Jazz Festival 2011 (photo by Runneralan2004)The Rosslyn Business Improvement District has announced the lineup for its annual jazz festival.

The event, which BID president Mary-Claire Burick says will be “exciting, bold and fun,” is celebrating its 25th anniversary this summer. In addition to performances covering everything from classic soul to international funk, the festival will feature a selection of food and fashion trucks and an expanded beer and wine garden.

The BID has organized a lineup of  both locally and nationally known artists. Several headliners have already gained national acclaim, including Debo Band, whose EP “Debo Band” (2011) appeared on NPR Music’s 50 Favorite Albums of 2012, and New Orleans group The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, whose music has been featured on the HBO series Treme.

The festival will run from 1-7 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 12 in Gateway Park (1300 Lee Hwy, near the Key Bridge). All performances are free and open to the public, and the full concert lineup is below.

File photo by Runneralan2004

Rosslyn Summer Movie Theme: ‘LOL Fridays’

By Ethan Rothstein

Wedding Crashers poster(Updated at 5:40 p.m.) The Rosslyn Business Improvement District has announced the lineup for its weekly outdoor movie, returning this summer: quotable comedies.

Last year’s theme was “Office Space,” a chance for the thousands of workers in Rosslyn to laugh at movies’ depictions of their daily lives. This year, the comedies will be more farcical than ever, with modern classics “Wedding Crashers,” “The Big Lebowski” and “Zoolander” all lined up.

Each movie will start at dusk — generally between 8:30 and 9:00 p.m. at Gateway Park (1300 Lee Highway) — and is free to attend. Viewers are encouraged to bring picnics, or enjoy dinner and drinks beforehand; the Continental Pool Lounge‘s happy hour nearby ends at 8:00 p.m.

The weekly showings begin on Friday, June 5. The lineup is as follow:

  • June 5: Wedding Crashers
  • June 12: Mean Girls
  • June 19: Happy Gilmore
  • June 26: Tommy Boy
  • July 3: Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
  • July 10: When Harry Met Sally
  • July 17: Anchorman
  • July 24: Clueless
  • July 31: The Big Lebowski
  • Aug. 7: Austin Powers, International Man of Mystery
  • Aug. 14: The Hangover
  • Aug. 21: Despicable Me
  • Aug. 28: Zoolander

Disclosure: Rosslyn BID is an ARLnow.com advertiser.

Afghan Festival Comes to Rosslyn This Sunday

By Ethan Rothstein

Poster for the Afghan Festival in RosslynThe 5th annual Afghan Arts and Culture Festival will take over Gateway Park in Rosslyn all day this Sunday.

Running from 11:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m., the festival features live music from Afghan artists, traditional Afghan food and a bazaar featuring vendors plying wares that you might find in one of the street markets in Afghanistan.

The festival is hosted by Afghan Education for a Better Tomorrow (AEBT), a California-based nonprofit focused on promoting Afghan culture in the U.S. and raising awareness of the rebuilding efforts in Afghanistan.

“It is an opportunity for the Afghan diaspora to share their rich culture and history that is not often portrayed in the western media,” Maryam Rashid of AEBT said in a press release. “As the largest Afghan-American event in the D.C. region, this festival provides an opportunity for positive cultural exchange, and embracement of ethnic and cultural diversity.”

The Afghan Festival in 2013 (photo via Afghan Festival)The event includes kite-making workshops for children, a “nomad tent” where visitors can try on Afghan clothing and jewelry, a fashion show and a Mr. and Miss Afghan contest open to boys and girls in two age groups: age 2-4 and 5-7. There will also be several Afghan artists displaying their paintings and sculptures.

According to the event website, there will also be an eating contest, but not of hot dogs: contestants will wolf down some mantu, which are dumplings filled with beef and onions.

There will also be live music throughout the day with performances by Afghani artists Mahroof, Abdul Faqiri, the Nawaz Brothers, Larmal Wasiq, Nived Sultan, Ebadullah Ebadi, Zia Beghoman, Nomad Dancers, an Afghan dance troupe, with hosts Qias Omar and Harris Khattak, according to the press release.

Photos via Afghan Festival