What inspired the June program of events you’ve called DoDarlo?
The Darlinghurst Business Partnership is all about local Darlo businesses, so basically #DoDarlo is all about showing local shops how easy, inexpensive and positive collaborative events with their neighbours can be. Plus it’s something special for their customers to boot!
We hope that the idea will spread and things like this will start to happen between businesses everywhere. Because big, one-day festivals are disruptive, expensive and often compete with the local economy that is trading every day, we thought it would be a refreshing change to create an opportunity for local businesses to do lots of diverse, little events together and within their capacities – leveraging their synergies, to put it in wanker-speak. We really want DoDarlo to be a month of really positive energy on the streets of Darlo.
Who are the organisers behind it, and how did it come together?
With the help provided by a City of Sydney Business Support Grant, The Darlinghurst Business Partnership was tasked with coming up with a new and exciting way to engage our beloved area. In the past I had had huge success with teaming up my business, The Record Store, with Café Lounge across the street – giving punters a chance to eat, drink, be merry, sort through crates of records and generally have a blast. The rest of the DBP board thought it a great idea to expand to the rest of Darlo, and so DoDarlo was born. Prouder parents we could not be!
Darlinghurst is many different things to many different people – what does it mean to you?
Late starts, late finishes and lots of wonderfully unique people. Night and day. Day and night!
How important is Darlinghurst’s creative and social side to its identity as a suburb?
That is its identity. Oh, you forgot “individual” – we all gots our own form of crazy going on.
What are some of the highlights on the DoDarlo program?
Seriously? You’d have me choose favourites? With events happening between shops, bars, restaurants, galleries and creative venues, with all sorts of local creatives involved too, there really is something for everyone.
DoDarlo takes place in and around Darlinghurst until Tuesday June 30. More info available at dbp.org.au.
