(JERSEY CITY, NJ) -- CoolVines, Jersey City’s hip craft beer, spirit, and wine purveyor, presents an outdoor festival in the Powerhouse Arts District bringing attention to Jersey City’s rich arts, culture, and culinary communities this summer. The festival will take place on Saturday, August 10th from 11:00am to 8:00pm adjacent to CoolVines’ Powerhouse location at 350 Warren Street. Entertainment will be provided by numerous musical groups, including Cook Thugless and Eliza Neals, a live broadcast by WFMU, dance performance by Nimbus Dance, live painting, and fun activities for the whole family. 

CoolVines has recruited a host of its best wine, craft beer, cider and specialty spirits providers to provide delicious beverages for adults. Food vendors, including the brand new Shake Shack Food Truck will be onsite, as well as a wide range of non-alcoholic beverages - ice tea, fresh-made lemonade, and cold-brew coffee. 

This all-ages and family-friendly festival is free to enter and enjoy the music, art and other festivities. A limited number of VIP passes are available online, with any remaining passes being sold at the door.  These passes will allow the bearer to experience tastings of highly special champagne, whiskey, cider, chocolate, truffle pasta, and participate in exclusive interactive art experiences.

“We are incredibly excited to be part of this neighborhood, and want to do all that we can to highlight and augment the ‘Arts’ part of this neighborhood’s name,” says Mark Censits, CEO of CoolVines. “Our hope is that by hosting this festival, in collaboration with Nimbus Dance and all of our wonderful sponsors and collaborators, we can brighten the spotlight on some great artists and art venues in the PAD.”  

The Powerhouse Arts and Wine Festival aims to bring focus and awareness to the burgeoning arts scene in Jersey City’s Powerhouse Arts District. The neighborhood, once a New Jersey artist mecca known for inexpensive work spaces in emptied factory and warehouse buildings, lost its vibrant artist community in the early 2000s.

Thanks to support from local government, forward thinking developers like Mack-Cali Realty Corporation and LMC, a leader in apartment development and management, and building ordinances in support of reinjecting arts into the area, several long adored Jersey City arts nonprofits have announced their intentions to move back to the Powerhouse Arts District.

“As a local Jersey City resident, I am so proud to be a part of LMC and our dedication to the local community,” says Charles Epstein, vice president of development for LMC. “Our first project, The Lively, slated to open shortly will include 180 apartment homes and the first theater in the resurging Powerhouse Arts District. As a company, we are excited to deliver Nimbus Dance Company a home and proud to be part of this neighborhood.”

Nimbus Dance, in partnership with Pro Arts Jersey City and Saint Peter’s University, will open the Nimbus Arts Center at the Lively in Spring 2020. Jersey City theater company Art House has also announced a move into the area in the next few years.

“The arts, small businesses and people coming together in public spaces are what create the sense of neighborhood that Jersey City has long been known for,” says Sam Pott, Artistic Director of Nimbus Dance. “The Powerhouse Arts & Wine festival is a celebration of community and helps support the new era of arts organizations and spaces moving to the Powerhouse Arts District.”

Proceeds from the festival will benefit the Nimbus Arts Center at the Lively, opening across the street from CoolVines’ Powerhouse location on the corner of Warren and Steuben.

The Powerhouse Arts & Wine Festival is generously sponsored by: LMC, A Lennar Company, Shuster Group, Mack-Cali Realty Corporation, Mill Creek, PADNA and others

ABOUT COOL VINES - we’re all about authenticity in everything we do and sell. We handpick our wines - every one of them.  We buy only from honest, hardworking craft producers of naturally, organically and sustainably produced wine, with minimal sulfites and additives.  You may not recognize the labels, but you will love what’s inside.  Guaranteed. Our first store in Jersey City, opened in early 2014 on Grove Street, has already become part of the fabric of this growing and developing neighborhood.  With regular tastings, wine dinners and other special events – both in the store and around the neighborhood – CoolVines aims to contribute to the emerging epicurean culture of Jersey City.  In November of 2018, we opened our 2^nd Jersey City store – a 5,000 square foot store in the Powerhouse Arts District.  Our most ambitious effort yet, this store includes a full café, with espresso bar, pastries and on-premise food, as well as an expanded lifestyle gifts and accessories department and specialty food market…and an art wall for hosting art shows of the work of local artists.  In both of our Jersey City stores, we are very active with both onsite and offsite events – tastings, classes, dinners, art shows, book signings, live musical performances, wine (social) groups, among others to animate and enliven our presence in the communities we serve.