Get involved with local events like Refract Seattle to create unforgettable experiences for your attendees
Since its inception, what is now the largest glass arts festival in North America draws visitors to Seattle from all over the world, and the somewhat niche community of glass artists, appreciators and collectors take over the city for an October weekend each year. Refract Seattle 2024 was the largest yet, in the festival’s sixth year—and it’s a shining example of an opportunity for business meetings and events, from citywides to VIP groups, to get connected with the locale of their chosen destination in an unforgettable way.
History of Refract Seattle
The greater Seattle area is home to over 700 glass artists and 100 glass studios. The Pacific Northwest has long been hailed as the United States’ regional hub of glass art—and not a lot of people know it. Six years ago, the founders of Refract sought to change that.
Co-founded by representatives from Visit Seattle and Chihuly Garden and Glass, an exhibition located at Seattle Center right by the Space Needle showcasing glass art and other artwork from renowned artist Dale Chihuly, Refract takes the form of numerous events across the greater Seattle area, including open artist studio tours, live demonstrations, artist meet and greets, exhibitions, celebrations and more.
Taryn Coles, assistant director at Chihuly Garden and Glass and one of the founders of Refract, says, “It was really about uplifting our community of artists and making sure that people have the opportunity to see the great work they do. This is one of those things that makes Seattle an epicenter of glass art. It isn’t just the artists, but also this ecosystem that can support artmaking from the very beginning to the master level of art creation.”
Kris La Fata, director of destination services and events at Visit Seattle, says, “[Refract] gives our team the opportunity to showcase their creativity and the passion that we have for art here in Seattle.
“We just want people to know who we are. Our art scene, specifically glass, since we do have so much of it here, really gives people a view of Seattle that is so unforgettable and completely authentic to who we are as a community.”
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How You Can Work Refract into Your Seattle Meetings
One of the great conundrums of planners in recent years: how do you get attendees engaged in new and exciting ways? The answer: provide an opportunity to witness something they might never have the opportunity to experience again.
“Refract is a great example of a way to get attendees and people here for business together for an offsite experience that they may not find anywhere else,” says La Fata.
If you’re a planner interested in working some Refract events into your attendees’ experience, get in touch with the Refract team early. Their team will work with you to curate the best possible experience for your attendees and point you in the direction of hotels and venues they have partnerships with.
Coles says, “Just being able to look at our schedule of events can really help point people towards the activities that would be really beneficial and fun for their group.”
Bringing Refract to Your Attendees
With any destination, planners may not be aware of community events that coincide with the time of their events; this is where working with the local DMO can make the ultimate difference.
Visit Seattle makes it easy with their micro-site, created any time a citywide convention comes to Seattle. This site provides attendees with all the information they need for the convention, as well as direct links to all of the events taking place in Seattle during the time they’ll be in town. Visit Seattle can also curate it to your attendee demographic. For example, La Fata explains, “If our demographic is scientists aged 45 to 60, and they’re really into fine dining and wine tasting, then we can tailor that micro-site to make sure we’re featuring partners that fit the interests of that attendee demographic.”
With the rise of bleisure, an event like Refract is a motivating force for attendees to come in a few days early or leave a few days late. All the planner needs to do is to let them know about it. Tell your attendees, “Hey, by the way, there’s this amazing glass arts festival going on when we’ll be in Seattle,” and point them in the right direction. From there, you can let them discover and sign up for any activations they find themselves interested in.
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Bringing Your Attendees to Refract Seattle
Another, more involved option, is to directly plan offsites. From venues to tours to bookable activities, you can weave Refract into your event.
Venues
Chihuly Garden and Glass is one of Seattle’s most popular spaces to host an event, and for good reason. From walking through the museum and taking in the exhibits, to exploring the outdoor exhibits in the garden among views of the Space Needle, to gathering in the glass house, with an expansive ceiling installation of colorful glass-blown flowers, it’s a venue that speaks for itself.
La Fata says, “I’ve been there so many times, but still, every time I walk into that glass house and understand what glass can do, it’s just so beautiful, and it’s a different kind of art that people don’t often think of.”
The Boathouse, Dale Chihuly’s private working studio and Hotshop, is another venue that leaves attendees far beyond impressed.
Tours of The Boathouse are one of the most sought-after Refract events, and upon stepping inside the unassuming building, it becomes clear why. From seeing artists at work in The Hotshop to stepping into The Evelyn Room—where colorful glass Chandeliers are mounted above an 85-foot long Douglas fir table that looks out over North Lake Union—after walking through the corridor under a Persian Ceiling, where over 700 pieces of glass seem to float, illuminated by light—every space within The Boathouse transports visitors to a world unto itself.
Though the studio is usually not open to the public except on the Refract tours, it can also be booked for private events. The Boathouse can accommodate 150 guests for a reception, and 70 for a dinner, and makes an excellent venue for an incentive dinner or corporate group. Planners can even add on glassblowing demonstrations and a tour. Planners who are interested in booking The Boathouse for an event can get in touch on their contact page and fill out a Reservation Request Form.
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Activities
Refract 2024 was the first to offer a shuttle tour for a few lucky visitors to visit open artist studios. Though open studios have always been a trademark of Refract, the shuttle tour makes it more accessible than ever. Your attendees will have the opportunity to meet the artists themselves and learn about each of their unique individual practices, and even purchase artworks, if they so choose.
For an unforgettable hands-on activity, whether you attend during Refract or any other time throughout the year, visit the Seattle Glassblowing Studio. Groups of five to 35 can book from a selection of customized packages and create their own glass art piece with the guidance of an experienced instructor. Participants can choose the item they’ll make from a number of options, including bowls, ornaments, paperweights and—if you happen to be attending during Refract in October—pumpkins.
“Glassblowing is such a team sport,” Coles says. “In a lot of ways, it takes so much communication and collaboration, so it’s a great analogy to the type of teamwork that people are doing in their businesses. Doing a hands-on activity, or just observing the way that these glassblowing teams work, and then taking that back into the discussions you’re having at your meetings can be a very enriching experience.”
Whether attendees try out glassblowing for themselves or observe a glassblowing team in live demonstrations during Refract, held at Seattle Glassblowing Studio, Pratt Fine Arts Center, Museum of Glass and other numerous locations, it becomes easy to understand how the team effort of glassblowing applies to the team work they’re doing in their own businesses.
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Local Community Impact
Coles shares, “Seattle is known as a really innovative place. Much of our cultural economy plays into that, and our creative community is really a huge undergirding of that innovation. You can just look at glass art here in Seattle, and the various forms that it takes, and the mastery that you see when you come out for Refract, to really understand the innovation and expertise that is possible when a whole community is able to get around one thing.”
Refract is a platform for community building and a source of pride for not only the glassblowing community, but the entire city. When locals see so many individuals coming to Seattle and getting involved in Refract, it inspires a sense of pride in their home.
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Coles says that the intention behind founding Refract was to champion and expands the glass art community for both artists and appreciators. “We have a lot of established collectors and glass enthusiasts who come out for Refract, but we’re also getting a lot of the glass-curious who are coming out, who don’t know a lot about the medium. And for the artists who are participating, they have the opportunity to really share the thing that they love, and that they’re really passionate about, with the people who may very well become the next generation of collectors and enthusiasts.”
Impact on Visitors
La Fata emphasizes how incredibly important it is for business travelers to be involved in the community. Meetings are no more simply about splitting time between hotels, meeting venues and hotel restaurants. Business travelers want to walk around the city, they want to dine locally, they want to bring home a souvenir—and this helps infuse tourism dollars into the community too, which only makes it a better place to visit.
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“It all ties back to how Refract takes place all over Seattle,” says La Fata. Perhaps you have an offsite at Chihuly Garden and Glass. There, your attendees become aware of the immense impact of glass art in Seattle. And later, when you have an attendee walking from their hotel to the convention center, they pass a glass display—and it means so much more to them when they know its relevance to the community. “It all comes down to Seattle being this community that is intricately tied together. We care about the arts, and we’re doing really unique and different things up here,” she says.
More and more, planners look for ways to incorporate the local community in their meetings through activations like community service projects and cultural experiences. “Something like Refract is a really cool way to do that,” La Fata says. “And a lot of the Refract events are free, but just showing up and being able to see who we are and how we can bring that all together is really impactful for travelers.
“As a human, as somebody who lives and works and plays in Seattle, I want people to be here and be excited about it,” she explains. “And I think that opening your mind and experiencing new art—you might not seek out glass art, but if you’re walking by a glass art piece, and you can appreciate something about it, I think there’s really something special about that, and for that person, that will always lead them back to Seattle.”
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Getting your attendees involved in any community event, whether it’s Refract or another one of the many cultural events that take place in Seattle—or a cultural event in any destination—is what brings meetings to that next level of memorable. We know that business travelers want to incorporate bleisure more than they ever have before, and much of that is about providing immersive experiences that allow attendees to really gain an insider’s look into the destination.
Events like Refract, and the ample ways planners can incorporate it into their meeting, not only meets that desire, but leaves your attendees feeling truly heard and valued, and goes above and beyond to amplify positive community impact.
Next year’s Refract, in 2025, will take place October 16-19—if you just so conveniently happen to be booking your Seattle meeting around that timeframe.
