The annual Greentopia Festival is kicking off in High Falls this week.
The 6-day event celebrates sustainability with eco-friendly films, musical performances, art, design and fashion at various venues in the community.
"It's not a festival of just tree huggers,” says festival co-founder and Friends of the Garden Ariel board chair, Michael Philipson. “We often get that. But really it's about how do you make living in a sustainable world more entertaining, more educational, more sort of less daunting, if you will, than some of the more staunch views of what we must be moving toward sustainability."
Philipson says the goal of the “festivals within a festival” is for the public to walk away with one “green” idea that they can implement into their lives.
"It starts the process of getting more people just more mindful of how we live in this world and more aware of what they do. And, hopefully, can start changing behaviors even in terms of what you are throwing away in that trash bucket just before you do."
Philipson says the event has grown so much that they created more space for the alternative car show - in order to contain all the new innovative and electric cars.
Other events include an Ecofest, which is free to the public, music featuring the Ying Quartet as part of the Classical series, the FUTURES Summit held at the Eastman Business Park and a new outdoor, eco-friendly film on Thursday free to the public at Manhattan Square Park.
Author and Academy award nominee Mariel Hemingway will appear at the Little Theater with the screening of "Running from Crazy" as part of the film series.
The Greentopia Festival runs from Tuesday, Sept. 10 thru Sunday, Sept. 15.