After a year’s break due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Oregon Flock & Fiber Festival plans to return in late October to a new location. It’s moving from the Clackamas County Fairgrounds in Canby to Linn County Expo Center at the Linn County Fairgrounds in Albany, Oregon, October 23-24.

Plans to move forward with the 2021 festival are still tentative “as the safety of our visitors and vendors is our highest priority,” the festival board wrote in a statement reads the website. “We will ultimately be heeding the guidance of the CDC and the State of Oregon as to whether or not we can hold this event.”

Usually the festival is held the third weekend of October, but this year, the dates were changed so that it wouldn’t conflict with Fiber Fusion NW. Many vendors and visitors participate in Fiber Fusion Northwest and the Oregon Flock & Fiber Festival.

The festival’s mission is “to be a welcoming venue for all who attend and participate in our festival. Our mission is to exhibit and demonstrate the full spectrum of natural fibers (plant and animal) from beginning to end, from the animal or raw fiber to the finished product.”

Activities include demonstrations and workshops, make-and-take sessions, a livestock show, fleece sale, and goat obstacle course. Sheep, goats, llamas, and rabbits are the featured animals at the livestock show.

In 2022 and beyond, the festival’s dates will return the third weekend of October at the Linn County Expo Center. “We talked with the organizers of Fiber Fusion Northwest about our interim adjustment for this fall, and we’re hopeful that an extended timeframe will allow them enough planning flexibility to make changes if they wish to.”

Learn more about the festival and get updates at oregonflockandfiberfestival.com.

The Linn County Expo Center’s address is 3700 Knox Butte Road East in Albany, Oregon.