Lehigh Valley Fiber Fest threads through the community another year

ALLENTOWN, Pa. — What started as a hopeful experiment has blossomed into one of the region’s most beloved celebrations of textile arts, drawing fiber enthusiasts from across the Northeast to the Lehigh Valley each September.

The Lehigh Valley Fiber Festival, returning September 20th-21st, 2025, to the Allentown Agri-Plex, is far more than a craft fair.

Co-founder Allison Mackenzie describes it as a comprehensive journey through the fiber arts; from the farms where sheep, alpacas and angora rabbits are raised to the finished scarves, blankets and artisan-made textiles that emerge from skilled hands across the region.

“Our tagline is farm to finish,” said Mackenzie, who emigrated from England and spent the majority of her life settled in the Lehigh Valley. “We have people there that raise the sheep, raise the alpaca, raise the angora rabbits, and they do their own shearing. We have dyers who dye the fleece and the yarn and the roving. We have spinners. We have the whole works.”

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Nine years ago, a friend approached Mackenzie and her business partner, Hedge Becker, about creating a fiber festival for the Lehigh Valley, which at that time notably lacked such an event despite being surrounded by popular fiber festivals in New Jersey, Maryland, New York and Ohio.

That first year in 2017 at the Wildlands Conservancy in Emmaus, Mackenzie and Becker hoped “some people would show up.” Instead, they were completely overwhelmed as cars kept arriving throughout the day.

“We absolutely knew from that moment that this was something that the Lehigh Valley needed and wanted,” Mackenzie recalled.

The festival’s growth necessitated a move, first to Macungie Memorial Park, where weather proved challenging, and finally to the indoor Allentown Agri-Plex, where the event has found its permanent home.

Over 75 artisan vendors showcase work that extends well beyond traditional yarn and wool, including metalsmiths creating shawl pins, ceramic artists making yarn bowls, glass artists crafting unique buttons, woodturners producing specialized tools, and much more.

“We are very clear that we’re not just a yarn show,” Mackenzie explained. “We want to make sure that we are covering beyond the traditional farm show and make sure that there’s something for everybody.”

“Having people then turn around and walk out and say, ‘That was incredible. Look at all the stuff I bought. Now I have all these projects to do — that is just amazing to witness every year,” Mackenzie said.

Community outreach remains central to Mackenzie and Becker’s mission. Their annual “stash bash” gives new life to leftover yarn skeins, collecting extras from crafters’ projects and passing them along to charitable knitting organizations.

Expanding their efforts this year, the festival will also gather premade blanket squares that volunteers will stitch together into complete blankets destined for the Allentown Rescue Mission and Turning Point of the Lehigh Valley.

“The fiber arts community is very giving, very generous,” Mackenzie noted. “We really want to make sure that we keep that and foster that generosity and that compassion.”

The festival has become an integral stop on what vendors call “the circuit” of fiber festivals that includes the Shenandoah Fiber Festival in Virginia, Garden State in New Jersey, Maryland Sheep and Wool, and Endless Mountains in northern Pennsylvania.

This network brings artisans from as far as Wisconsin, New York, Maryland and Virginia to the Lehigh Valley each September.

The festival offers free admission and parking, with demonstrators, classes and “make-and-take” activities throughout both days. Visitors can expect to see live spinning demonstrations, learn new techniques, and discover everything from hand-dyed yarns to custom weaving tools.

Mackenzie, who typically staffs the front desk as the event’s greeter, encourages both experienced fiber artists and curious newcomers to attend.

“Whether it’s weaving or spinning or crochet or knitting or whatever, it doesn’t matter,” she said. “It’s just feeding that passion and having somebody start something new that makes them feel good, that gives them a creative outlet, that gives them a passion.”

The 2025 festival will take place Saturday, September 20th, from 10 am to 5 pm, and Sunday, September 21st, from 10 am to 4 pm, at the Allentown Agri-Plex at 1998 Liberty Street.

For more information about the 2025 Lehigh Valley Fiber Festival, visit lvfiberfest.com or follow the festival on social media @lvfiberfest.