"Small Town Venture selected Danville as the setting for the West Coast expression of this tradition — recognizing what many residents already know: Danville has the walkable Downtown, historic character, tree-lined charm, and community feel that make it a quintessential Stars Hollow-type setting."
Town Manager Tai Williams wrote that in her monthly report to the Town Council in early September. The rest of her report is more useful to anyone who lives here, because it shows how the Town has decided to handle a weekend of outside attention. Flannel & Foliage runs October 23 to 25, which is less than three weeks from now. It was planned to fit inside buildings Danville already owns. Visitors will sleep in other towns and drive in, and Town staff openly describe the festival as a model they would like to see again.
A festival designed to stay off the street
Small Town Venture is a private producer that began as a social media account highlighting real towns that resemble Stars Hollow, the fictional setting of "Gilmore Girls." It now runs fan festivals, and Danville is its first West Coast location. The guest list includes Scott Patterson, Kelly Bishop, Sean Gunn, Emily Kuroda, Yanic Truesdale, Todd Lowe and John Cabrera. Programming runs from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. each day.
Programming will happen at the Village Theatre, the Danville Community Center, the Veterans Memorial Building and Hap Magee Ranch Park. Williams' report sets this apart from "large-scale events requiring street closures." She notes that Flannel & Foliage stays within existing Town facilities, brings in facility rental revenue and "is designed to be repeatable year-over-year."
The Town also changed how it funds events like this one. Its Business Promotion Grant used to run on a yearly application cycle. It now takes applications on a rolling basis, and Small Town Venture applied to fund merchant participation. The report says a number of downtown businesses are already involved, though it does not name them.
Permanent infrastructure for events is going up as well. In August the Town broke ground on a permanent Town Green Pavilion and an Art District Makers Space near the Library and Town Green. The Town's fall newsletter says both are expected to be finished in spring 2027. Taken together, the rolling grant, the venue-only festival plan and the pavilion all point toward downtown Danville hosting more events like this one, without the road closures.
Every hotel block is in another town
Williams' report includes a line that explains how traffic will work that weekend. "When a boutique hotel eventually lands downtown," she wrote, "events like this become natural drivers for overnight stays." There is no such hotel today, so the organizer's lodging guide sends attendees elsewhere. Visit Tri-Valley, the festival's sponsor, negotiated these room blocks:
- Residence Inn by Marriott San Ramon, from $189 a night, about 10 minutes from downtown
- AC Hotel Pleasanton, from $129 a night, about 13 minutes away
- Holiday Inn Dublin, from $129 a night
- Hawthorn Suites by Wyndham Livermore Wine Country, $129 a night, about 20 minutes away
- Hyatt House San Ramon, listed as sold out
With every room block outside town limits, most attendees will arrive each morning by car or rideshare. The organizer's guide says free public parking near the Library, the Village Theatre and around downtown "fill[s] quickly," and it strongly encourages carpooling. It also points visitors to the Sycamore Park & Ride, where County Connection Bus 21 runs into downtown for $2.50. No festival shuttle was announced. Neither the Town nor the organizer has published an overall crowd or traffic forecast.
If your errands usually start in the Library lot or near the theater, plan around the Friday-through-Sunday window. Bus 21 also connects to downtown Walnut Creek, which makes it an option for anyone coming from the north.
The free tickets went fast
General admission was free. The organizer's guide now lists it as sold out. The East Bay Times reported the numbers in early September:
| Measure, as reported Sept. 2, 2026 | Figure |
|---|---|
| Waitlist | More than 15,000 people |
| Cast panel capacity | About 245 seats per day |
| Photo op capacity | About 1,500 |
These figures are capacity limits, not attendance projections, so they can't tell you how many people will be walking Hartz Avenue that Saturday. They do show how much interest there is compared with the indoor space available. The Village Theatre and the Veterans Memorial Building can't hold a waitlist that size, so people who don't get into a session will spend their time on the sidewalks and in the shops and restaurants. The paid add-ons are panels, autograph sessions and photo ops, and the organizer calls their quantities "strictly limited."
The October that stays open to everyone
The festival will take over a few Town buildings for a few days. The rest of October's downtown calendar is open to anyone, and most of it doesn't need a ticket. In date order:
- Scarecrow Stroll, Oct. 1 to Nov. 1. More than 50 downtown businesses are displaying scarecrows, and visitors can vote on their favorites. It runs through the festival weekend, so your out-of-town visitors will see the scarecrows too.
- Village Theatre Staged Reading Series, Oct. 9 and 10. These are the last two dates of a four-play program.
- Magician Brian Scott, Oct. 17 at 11 a.m., at the Village Theatre.
- Howl-o-Ween: For the Dogs, Oct. 17, 10 a.m. to noon, at Hap Magee Ranch Park, six days before the same park hosts festival picnics.
- Spooktacular Celebration, Oct. 22 at 4 p.m., at Oak Hill Park Community Center. Pre-registration is required.
- Walk-tober, Oct. 23 at 10:30 a.m., a 5K for adults 55 and older at Osage Station Park, held the same morning the festival opens downtown.
- Crawloween, Oct. 28. The Danville Area Chamber's downtown crawl includes more than 20 businesses offering tastings, treats and specials, with check-in at Prospect Park Plaza at Hartz and Prospect.
- Halloween Improv Night, Oct. 30 at 7 p.m., at the Village Theatre.
Crawloween lands three days after the festival ends, and the merchants who just had a busy weekend will be hosting again. In November the Town's calendar continues with the Lighting of the Old Oak Tree on Nov. 27.
Where the dinner crowd lands on Hartz
The festival's tentative schedule lists dinners at Bridges on Oct. 23 and 24 and a "Coffee with Scott" session at a Peet's location on Oct. 24. The organizer says the schedule is tentative and will be finalized about two weeks before the event. If you have a standing Friday or Saturday reservation, check in with the restaurant that week.
The Hartz Avenue that visitors find will look different than it did in the spring. Rancho Cantina soft-opened on Aug. 24 at 501 Hartz Ave. It's a family-run Mexican restaurant owned by Danville residents Nico and Alice Tzikas. The space was previously home to Cocina Hermanas, which closed in March. In May the new owners were hoping to open by early summer, so the late-August soft opening meant a longer wait than planned. Most visitors in October will be the restaurant's first out-of-town crowd.
A few blocks away at 267 Hartz Ave., Virtue + Vice announced in September that it would hold its final service that weekend, after opening in spring 2022. DanvilleSanRamon.com reported that over those four years the restaurant created 14 menus and more than 100 cocktails. Through its Wednesday-night Dine for a Cause program, it raised more than $100,000 for local nonprofits. The story reported the planned last night. We found no later confirmation of what's next for the space, so it's worth a walk by before festival weekend.
Organizer Ariana Arghandewal told the East Bay Times that Small Town Venture picked Danville for its "charming and walkable downtown, local merchant community, and proximity to major cities around the Bay Area." Williams' report describes the event as "designed to be repeatable year-over-year" and calls it "the type of event Danville is actively seeking to attract," which means the walkable downtown and merchant community that got Danville chosen are what a second year would depend on as well.
If you'd like to talk about how weekends like this fit into everyday downtown Danville, whether you're settling in, thinking about a move or just curious, Christine Canales is glad to walk through it with you. Let's Connect.
