Bounty of the County, a fundraiser featuring Fresh Local Food and Fresh Local Music.

Thursday Aug 5:

• 5:30pm Appectizers
• 6:30 Dinner Alfresco under the big top at 414 W Becker Ave in downtown Willmar
• The dinner includes wine and entertainment.

Bounty of the County Ticket incl. Dinner & Entertainment $50 per seat

Becker Market, the downtown farmers' market of "homegrown and handmade" begins Thursday, June 3, 2010 and ends Thursday, September 30, 2010.  The Willmar Design Center invites vendors to take a look at the rules, the dates and the application and apply to be a part of this thriving and growing market! 2010 Becker Market Application

Accomplishments of the Willmar Design Center 1-1-2010

Holidaze 2009
click here for more photos

Willmar Blend 2009
click here for more photos

Community Pride Awards, Willmar is a finalist

The Community Pride competition recognizes the energy and ingenuity of Minnesota’s communities in both overall community and economic development achievement, and innovations in specific disciplines, such as education, broadband deployment and application, health care, entrepreneurship support, arts & culture, and public finance and more. Winners lwil be chosen on Sept 6th at the State Fair.

Neighborhoods within Cities of 10,000+– Finalists for online voting
Nominee: Historic Downtown Willmar / Willmar Design Center (Kandiyohi County)
Project/ Initiative: Historic Downtown Willmar

Willmar Walks is the new logo that will go along with the walking path map.  This is a combo effort between Rice Hospital Cardio, Kandiyohi County Public Health (STEPS program), Willmar Design Center and Convention & Visitors Bureau.

This is the preliminary concept for the new Becker Ave (western half).

A core group of volunteers from Willmar were looking for new ideas on how to improve the City. They completed an extensive application for the Minnesota Design Team to come and work with our community. The application was accepted and was decided the MDT would conduct two design charrettes in Willmar. The first to focus on the Willmar region and the second to focusing on downtown Willmar. Town meetings were very well attended with around 400 citizens participating. During the charrettes the community organizers were able to set up a design center in downtown Willmar, providing a place for meetings, walls to display images, and space for Board and committee meetings as well as informal gatherings. The Willmar Design Center became headquarters for MDT visits and for continued work.

 We have set many goals such as opening up Litchfield Avenue, planning a regional trail system, improving connections between places, creating an urban environment, and producing a downtown master plan.

 Our Board of Directors was formed from citizens with diverse backgrounds in city, county, state government, small and large business, and faith and non-profit organizations. One of our first decisions was to commission a downtown master plan due to high interest in this area from the MDT visits. Several committees invested multiple volunteer hours researching design ideas and financing options. And the work continues...