Moda3, the lifestyle shop at 320 E. Buffalo St. in the Historic Third Ward, dumps 50,000 lbs. of snow on the neighborhood this Saturday for its fifth annual "Boardfest."
One of the biggest snowboarding events in the Midwest, Boardfest features a 50-foot wide by 30-foot tall structure, lovingly referred to as "Mt. Milwaukee." The structure will play host to 100 competitors who will battle for a large cash purse by sliding down handrails affixed to Mt. Milwaukee.
Past years have seen judges ranging from Olympian Mason Aguirre to snowboarding legend J.P. Walker. This year the responsibility lies on professional snowboarders and Midwest natives Louie Vito from Omatic Snowboards, Pat Milberry from Red Bull Energy Drink and Joe Sexton from Stepchild Snowboards.
This year the event moves to a new location. Boardfest has outgrown its street location on Buffalo and moved to a nearby parking lot.
"We were just getting to big to fit on Buffalo Street," said Moda3'sgeneral manager, Eric Kuester. This year, Boardfest takes over the parking lot behind the P.H. Dye House. The parking lot affords twice as much space that will now accommodate the Scion guitar hero challenge.
Also new to the event this year is a contest in collaboration with TrueSkool, a non profit organization whose mission is to empower youth to become community leaders through the core values of hip-hop culture: peaceful conflict resolution, creativity, self-expression, nonviolence and community activism. The contest winner will design a skateboard deck to be used as the next Moda3 branded board.
On the music line-up this year are Rusty Ps, Haz Solo, A Prime and Gambit.
Boardfest is one of the city's coolest events, and nothing brings suburban kids and their families to Downtown like Moda3. Check it out beginng at noon. The event runs until 8 p.m. with a 21+ after party at Moct. "It's a great event for kids and parents," said Brian Preising, owner of Picture Perfect, Moda3's neighbor in the Dye House.
A life-long and passionate community leader and Milwaukeean, Jeff Sherman is a co-founder of OnMilwaukee.
He grew up in Wauwatosa and graduated from Marquette University, as a Warrior. He holds an MBA from Cardinal Stritch University, and is the founding president of Young Professionals of Milwaukee (YPM)/Fuel Milwaukee.
Early in his career, Sherman was one of youngest members of the Greater Milwaukee Committee, and currently is involved in numerous civic and community groups - including board positions at The Wisconsin Center District, Wisconsin Club and Marcus Center for the Performing Arts. He's honored to have been named to The Business Journal's "30 under 30" and Milwaukee Magazine's "35 under 35" lists.
He owns a condo in Downtown and lives in greater Milwaukee with his wife Stephanie, his son, Jake, and daughter Pierce. He's a political, music, sports and news junkie and thinks, for what it's worth, that all new movies should be released in theaters, on demand, online and on DVD simultaneously.
He also thinks you should read OnMilwaukee each and every day.
