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New DIY Collective Free Facility Seeks to Facilitate Free Expression

Free Facility is Charleston’s newest DIY collective, and they’ve been making waves in the local scene on Instagram over the past few weeks. Their account was created and started pushing a vague message about supporting local artists that caught on immediately and started to spread around the scene. Then came the announcement of their launch party, happening this Friday, May 31st at a house venue downtown. We won’t publish the address here, but hit us up and we’ll hook it up.

The Free Facility launch party will feature musical performances from locals Lutrell, Ivory Keys, and Current Blue. There will also be art from Charleston-based artists Zach Todd, Reese Massey, Rook Barber, and Liam Rowley, and fashion from Nothing Fancy and Nostalgia & Beauty. According to Free Facility co-founder and and media director Mason, this event is their first foray into trying to make a positive impact on the art scene here in Charleston, and they plan to continue to work toward that going forward.

The collective itself was founded by four local creatives who share a passion for art in all forms, and have found themselves frustrated with the lack of resources and opportunities for nontraditional artists in Charleston to find success and reach their audience. Something that has been a notable problem within the Charleston music and art scene over the years has been the sheer number of talented creative people who have felt the need to move to a city with a more established art community in order to reach an audience within their chosen medium. This is part of what sparked the formation of Free Facility, and is something that we here at Extra Chill also feel strongly about improving. I think we can all agree that we want talented creatives to stay in Charleston, and want even more of them to move here (like Daddy’s Beemer).

Free Facility was created as a platform that seeks to help artists of all ages to become recognized and gain exposure for the work that they’re doing here in Charleston, and as they say, “facilitate free expression”. They hope to grow the scene in a structured and organized way by hosting events, running a blog and magazine, and in a perfect world receiving financial support toward a brick and mortar location where they can collaborate toward growth in the scene and host events on a more professional scale. Many of their events will be free, and when there is a cover or things for sale, proceeds will benefit local charities.

Since their recent launch, Free Facility has already been working behind the scenes with local artists to accomplish by giving them leadership roles in the organization and helping them bring their projects to life. Stay tuned to see what Free Facility comes up with next, but for now you can see what it’s all about at their launch party this Friday night, starting at 7:30pm. Holler for the address.