Community Calendar

May 1 - May 31 / Join us for a month-long celebration of new vegan dishes all over Kalamazoo!

Back by popular demand for the fourth year in a row, businesses across Kalamazoo will showcase exciting special vegan menu items for an entire month, giving everyone the opportunity to explore creative plant-based dishes crafted by talented local chefs.

How It Works:

1- Visit participating restaurants across Kalamazoo.
2- Try their exclusive vegan offerings.
3- Share your experience: Rate and review the dishes you try, comment, post photos of your favorite meals, and tag us at @KalamazooVeganChefChallenge.

This event is open to everyone, not just vegans! It’s about bringing our community together to celebrate incredible food and support our area's chefs.

Get Involved: Looking for ways to connect? Volunteer with us! We’re seeking passionate individuals to help with outreach, event promotion, and community building throughout the month. It's a great way to meet like-minded people and make a difference! Volunteer using this link: TinyURL.com/VOLVCC.

Join us in making Kalamazoo an even more inclusive, vibrant, and compassionate community. For details on participating businesses, menus, partners, and more, visit our website at veganchefchallenge.org/Kalamazoo.

The Kalamazoo Vegan Chef Challenge is hosted by Vegan Outreach and in collaboration with Vegan Kalamazoo.

Help bring back the floral beauty we look forward to seeing on our summer walks, drives, and events in downtown Kalamazoo. There are numerous planting days throughout May in which the community is invited to participate.

Start time is 9:00 am, but volunteers are welcome to come for an early shift to help us take flats of flowers to the beds. Each planting day ends around Noon. Volunteer for any amount of time you can give. Signing up in advance is encouraged, but you can also show up on the day of planting. For all of the dates, times, locations, and details on where to park and check in, they can be found on SignUpGenius, https://www.signupgenius.com/go/5080C4BA8AD2DAAF49-62628403-2026#/

Gardening experience is not required. Supplies will be provided if you don’t have your own gloves, trowel, or kneeling pad. Beverages and snacks will also be provided. Planting happens whether it rains or shines or is hot or cold. Dress for the weather.

These spring planting days are the perfect opportunity for bonding, team building, and meeting new friends.

May 1 - May 31 / Join us for a month-long celebration of new vegan dishes all over Kalamazoo!

Back by popular demand for the fourth year in a row, businesses across Kalamazoo will showcase exciting special vegan menu items for an entire month, giving everyone the opportunity to explore creative plant-based dishes crafted by talented local chefs.

How It Works:

1- Visit participating restaurants across Kalamazoo.
2- Try their exclusive vegan offerings.
3- Share your experience: Rate and review the dishes you try, comment, post photos of your favorite meals, and tag us at @KalamazooVeganChefChallenge.

This event is open to everyone, not just vegans! It’s about bringing our community together to celebrate incredible food and support our area's chefs.

Get Involved: Looking for ways to connect? Volunteer with us! We’re seeking passionate individuals to help with outreach, event promotion, and community building throughout the month. It's a great way to meet like-minded people and make a difference! Volunteer using this link: TinyURL.com/VOLVCC.

Join us in making Kalamazoo an even more inclusive, vibrant, and compassionate community. For details on participating businesses, menus, partners, and more, visit our website at veganchefchallenge.org/Kalamazoo.

The Kalamazoo Vegan Chef Challenge is hosted by Vegan Outreach and in collaboration with Vegan Kalamazoo.

Help bring back the floral beauty we look forward to seeing on our summer walks, drives, and events in downtown Kalamazoo. There are numerous planting days throughout May in which the community is invited to participate.

Start time is 9:00 am, but volunteers are welcome to come for an early shift to help us take flats of flowers to the beds. Each planting day ends around Noon. Volunteer for any amount of time you can give. Signing up in advance is encouraged, but you can also show up on the day of planting. For all of the dates, times, locations, and details on where to park and check in, they can be found on SignUpGenius, https://www.signupgenius.com/go/5080C4BA8AD2DAAF49-62628403-2026#/

Gardening experience is not required. Supplies will be provided if you don’t have your own gloves, trowel, or kneeling pad. Beverages and snacks will also be provided. Planting happens whether it rains or shines or is hot or cold. Dress for the weather.

These spring planting days are the perfect opportunity for bonding, team building, and meeting new friends.

Estate planning is not just for people with substantial wealth. For many low-income families, a will,
power of attorney, advance directive, or Lady Bird deed can make a lasting difference. These tools
can help families avoid unnecessary hardship, protect homes and other assets, and create greater
stability during illness and after death.

The clinic begins with a presentation by an experienced attorney on the importance of estate
planning. The presentation explains how planning can help individuals and families prepare for
illness, incapacity, and death, and introduces key estate planning tools, including wills, powers of
attorney, advance directives, and Lady Bird deeds.

After the presentation, eligible participants meet one-on-one with volunteer attorneys. During
these consultations, attorneys may identify the client’s needs, provide tailored legal advice, and,
when appropriate, prepare and help execute estate planning documents.

This short collaboration celebrates sneaker culture through poetry. Consisting of two parts, part one is a micro saga-in verse about a quest to find sneakers but yields an even great discovery beyond shoes. Part two is a collection of prose poems, a kind of mixtape, which explores many aspects of sneaker culture from overarching artistic reflections to personal ties to footwear. Themes in this book will tie into Future Now: Virtual Sneakers to Cutting-Edge Kicks.

Future Now: Virtual Sneakers to Cutting-Edge Kicks is co-organized by the American Federation of Arts and the Bata Shoe Museum, and curated by Elizabeth Semmelhack, Director and Senior Curator of the Bata Shoe Museum.

Please note that this event will not be livestreamed or posted on YouTube.
All book discussions are free, open to the public, and take place in-person at the Meader Fine Arts Library. Participants do not need to have read the book, but it will help facilitate the overall discussion. Preregistration is encouraged.

This short collaboration celebrates sneaker culture through poetry. Consisting of two parts, part one is a micro saga-in verse about a quest to find sneakers but yields an even great discovery beyond shoes. Part two is a collection of prose poems, a kind of mixtape, which explores many aspects of sneaker culture from overarching artistic reflections to personal ties to footwear. Themes in this book will tie into Future Now: Virtual Sneakers to Cutting-Edge Kicks.

Future Now: Virtual Sneakers to Cutting-Edge Kicks is co-organized by the American Federation of Arts and the Bata Shoe Museum, and curated by Elizabeth Semmelhack, Director and Senior Curator of the Bata Shoe Museum.

Please note that this event will not be livestreamed or posted on YouTube.
All book discussions are free, open to the public, and take place in-person at the Meader Fine Arts Library. Participants do not need to have read the book, but it will help facilitate the overall discussion. Preregistration is encouraged.

May 1 - May 31 / Join us for a month-long celebration of new vegan dishes all over Kalamazoo!

Back by popular demand for the fourth year in a row, businesses across Kalamazoo will showcase exciting special vegan menu items for an entire month, giving everyone the opportunity to explore creative plant-based dishes crafted by talented local chefs.

How It Works:

1- Visit participating restaurants across Kalamazoo.
2- Try their exclusive vegan offerings.
3- Share your experience: Rate and review the dishes you try, comment, post photos of your favorite meals, and tag us at @KalamazooVeganChefChallenge.

This event is open to everyone, not just vegans! It’s about bringing our community together to celebrate incredible food and support our area's chefs.

Get Involved: Looking for ways to connect? Volunteer with us! We’re seeking passionate individuals to help with outreach, event promotion, and community building throughout the month. It's a great way to meet like-minded people and make a difference! Volunteer using this link: TinyURL.com/VOLVCC.

Join us in making Kalamazoo an even more inclusive, vibrant, and compassionate community. For details on participating businesses, menus, partners, and more, visit our website at veganchefchallenge.org/Kalamazoo.

The Kalamazoo Vegan Chef Challenge is hosted by Vegan Outreach and in collaboration with Vegan Kalamazoo.

Help bring back the floral beauty we look forward to seeing on our summer walks, drives, and events in downtown Kalamazoo. There are numerous planting days throughout May in which the community is invited to participate.

Start time is 9:00 am, but volunteers are welcome to come for an early shift to help us take flats of flowers to the beds. Each planting day ends around Noon. Volunteer for any amount of time you can give. Signing up in advance is encouraged, but you can also show up on the day of planting. For all of the dates, times, locations, and details on where to park and check in, they can be found on SignUpGenius, https://www.signupgenius.com/go/5080C4BA8AD2DAAF49-62628403-2026#/

Gardening experience is not required. Supplies will be provided if you don’t have your own gloves, trowel, or kneeling pad. Beverages and snacks will also be provided. Planting happens whether it rains or shines or is hot or cold. Dress for the weather.

These spring planting days are the perfect opportunity for bonding, team building, and meeting new friends.

Each year, a growing number of talented Kalamazoo filmmakers, both amateur and professional, take on the challenge of participating in the Kazoo 48-Hour Film Festival. Assigned a genre, prop, character quirk, location, and line of dialogue to use within a short film, participants have just 48 hours to bring their visions to life.

The winning films for 2026, selected in multiple categories, were announced during a public screening at the GQT Kalamazoo 10 Theater on April 23.

During this celebratory event at the KIA, watch the winning films and hear from the filmmakers themselves about their experiences and personal highlights from the festival!

Please note that this event will not be livestreamed or posted on YouTube.