The Potato House Project in Williams Lake, a heritage and sustainability project, wants to make connections and build community.
A garden party is planned for August 31 at the 49 Borland Street property. The event will be aimed at helping connect people, in whichever way they feel comfortable.
The 19+ event will have a DJ and alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverage options.
"It's just an outdoor party with music," said Jazmyn Lyons, society board member and a key volunteer organizing the event.
The garden party will be like previous ones held by the society, with the key difference being wristbands to help attendees communicate what kinds of connections they want to make.
"We keep seeing so many people say they're having trouble making friends," said Lyons.
Green wristbands indicate a person is looking to make new friends, purple wristbands mean a person is single and potentially looking to date, while yellow wristbands mean the person is at the event just to enjoy themselves, and already has their people.
The hope is to help to continue to build and reconnect the community and to engage the many newcomers to the area.
"I think our community could really use some of that, we've got to mingle and get to know each other," said Nicole Therrian, executive director of the Potato House Society.
Tickets to the party are available at The Realm of Toys, for $15 per person, with cash preferred.
The event will be limited to the garden because the Potato House building does not have an occupancy permit yet, after extensive renovations were unable to be completed when funds ran out.
"We're still struggling from the inflation during Covid," said Therrian.
She said it is hard to navigate both the heritage and sustainable integrity of the building and project when costs have gone up so much.
After investing just under a half million dollars in the building in order to lift the building off the crumbling foundation, rebuilding the foundation and putting the house back onto the new one, more work is still needed.
"It's been a lot of back and forth with the building inspector," said Therrian. While they believe they now have clarity on what is required to get the building up to code, the quote they have to finish the work required is $95,000.
"We're still hurting but we're doing everything we can," she said.
While the heritage designated house was boarded up for awhile due to a number of break-ins to the building, the boards are off and the society is back to fundraising to help finish the building.
Security cameras and lights have been installed to help keep the building safe, and the hope is, when it's all done, the project and the building will be more sustainable in general. Improvements to the basement included building a root cellar which can be leased to another society in order to provide passive income. This would then help pay the mortgage on the property.
Then the organization hopes they can focus on the fun stuff.
"We can finally take a breath and have this amazing space to have these community event and enrich the community," said Therrian.
A small garden is still being grown on the property with the help of some volunteers and the composting program is also operating, thanks to Oliver Berger.
