Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 Year Anniversary: My Top Ten Memories

A personal reflection on the Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 year anniversary — the people, the moments, the mistakes, and the memories that made it all mean something.

Originally wrote March 2, 2015

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The Charleston Wine + Food Festival 10 year anniversary feels like exactly the right moment to reflect, remember, and share what this decade has really meant — not just the polished highlights, but the full picture. I wrote about leaving two years ago, but the Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 year anniversary deserves something more complete: my ten most personal, most honest, and most treasured memories from eight years of building something I am enormously proud of. Here they are.

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Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 Year Anniversary Memory #1: The Original Planning Committee

Very little has been said in this year’s anniversary celebrations about the original volunteers who laid the actual foundation — and that needs to be corrected right now. The Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 year anniversary belongs as much to them as to anyone. Caroline Lee Jackson, Caroline Mancill, Craig Donofrio, Linn Lesesne, Lisa Buzzelli, Nathalie Dupree, Marc Collins, Matt McKeown, Marion Sullivan, Michael Saboe, and Mickey Bakst — you gave your time, your money, your contacts, your wisdom, and your tears to something that didn’t yet exist. You made it real. You rock, completely and without qualification.

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Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 Year Anniversary Memory #2: Year Two and All the Lessons

After a genuinely successful first year, we got a little cocky — and year two bit us hard. The opening gala had mud pits. The fire marshall threatened to shut down the Village. We had a kids’ village that taught us more than we bargained for. Twenty thousand recipe books required hand-binding and assembly by an army of volunteers — sorry, Deidre, truly. There was a trade day, and an eighteen-wheeler carrying pork and grills from a famous pitmaster making its way down King Street. Event management mistakes are the most effective teachers available, and year two of the Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 year story gave us a masterclass. I am grateful for every lesson.

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Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 Year Anniversary Memory #3: Laura Hewitt

Laura Hewitt — founding board member, second Board Chair, and one of the most extraordinary people this Festival has ever had in its corner. She and her husband Bill helped fund and establish the Friends of the Festival Program, led the charge to make the organization financially sound, and championed good food and good wine in Charleston with everything she had. She was my mentor, my friend, my supporter, and my mother figure through so much of this journey. Losing her last year was devastating in ways I still feel. On this Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 year anniversary, I know she is overlooking Marion Square making absolutely sure everything goes according to plan. She always did.

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Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 Year Anniversary Memory #4: The Guest Chefs

Daniel Boulud. Bobby Flay. Eight years of extraordinary culinary talent walking through Charleston because of this Festival. Some were genuine gems. Some were staggering talents. Some were, to put it charitably, enormous personalities. I could write an entire book about my chef dealings over those years and deeply wish I had kept a journal documenting all of it. What I know is that many of them are real friends today, have continued to support my work since leaving, and represent one of the great privileges of everything the Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 year journey gave me.

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Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 Year Anniversary Memory #5: Frank Stitt

Of all the chefs who left a lasting mark on this Festival and on Charleston’s culinary identity, Frank Stitt stands apart. His influence became so undeniable — so clearly woven into the fabric of what this event meant — that the one year he took a break from participating, we felt his absence acutely enough to create an annual chef award in his honor and organize a tribute dinner to celebrate his impact on Southern cuisine. Watching him experience that tribute with genuine surprise — because he is exactly that humble — was one of the most moving moments of my entire tenure. The James Beard Awards committee should take note. Loudly and urgently.

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Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 Year Anniversary Memory #6: The Wildest Event Ideas That Actually Worked

The Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 year anniversary would not be complete without acknowledging the people who came to us with ideas that had absolutely no business working — and then worked magnificently. Thank you Jeff Allen, Ida Becker, Mitchell Crosby, and others for the creative courage. A Critics Dinner at Fort Sumter. The Waffle House Smackdown. An offshore fishing trip with a dozen chefs. The James Beard Foundation semi-finalists pre-dinner at Fort Moultrie. A soul food shuffle. Every single one of these was a genuine risk, and every single one produced some of the best events ever organized in this city — or possibly at any festival, anywhere. Creative event programming at its absolute finest.

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Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 Year Anniversary Memory #7: The Behind-the-Scenes Moments

The Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 year anniversary story that the public never saw is the one I treasure most. An unnamed staff member leaving a van running for over twelve hours before anyone noticed. A board member wandering around the park carrying what can only be described as an alarming amount of cash with no plan for where to put it. Everything that happened in the FIG kitchen at the after party — which will remain exactly where it belongs. These behind-the-scenes moments are what I miss most deeply, more than any event or accolade or highlight. The human reality of event production lives in these stories, and they are mine forever. #updog

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Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 Year Anniversary Memory #8: Randi Weinstein and Sara Donahue

The Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 year anniversary simply cannot be told honestly without Randi Weinstein and Sara Donahue at the center of it. I have never seen two people work harder, give more, or accomplish so much for a single event. The three of us clicked in a way that was immediate, natural, and completely irreplaceable — and I miss working alongside them every single day. If there were a monument to be placed anywhere in Marion Square, it would be in their honor. They are the greatest professional gift this Festival ever gave me, and that is saying something extraordinary given everything else on this list.

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Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 Year Anniversary Memory #9: Time With My Mom

From the very first year, my mother and her partner Bob drove down from the upstate to work a full week at the Festival. She arrived before most staff, stayed later than almost everyone, and did anything and everything asked of her without complaint. But more than the help — it was the time. We did not have enough of that growing up, and the Festival gave it back to us in the most unexpected way. Reconnecting with a parent through shared work is a gift I did not anticipate. The moments that hit hardest were the ones when people would find me during the weekend and say: I met your mom, and she is really proud of you, Angel. Those were some of the best words I heard in ten years. I treasure every one of those weeks completely.

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Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 Year Anniversary Memory #10: Finally Being a Guest

My original goal when I first started the Festival was always to eventually be a spectator — and I am thrilled to now be in exactly that position. Sleeping in. Staying out late. Eating and drinking without a single worry about the weather, ticket sales, ego management, or any of the thousand invisible things that make this weekend run. The Charleston Wine and Food Festival 10 year anniversary finds me in the best possible seat in the house: proud, grateful, and free to simply enjoy what was built.

I recognize how hard the new team is working, and I commend every single person leading the charge to continue growing this extraordinary event. Cheers to ten years — and may the next ten produce another blog post full of memories just as rich as these.

With love for every person who was part of this story, Angel

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Learn more about Angel Holmes and everything she’s passionate about at sipindipity.com/angel-holmes.