Christmoustache soiree benefits S. Presa community
Eva Ruth Moravec
San Antonio Express-News
Dec 21, 2008
Artists, musicians and gardeners alike manicured their lip foliage or slapped on a fake 'stache for this year's Christmoustache, an annual event that brings together locals who love their facial hair.
The event, now in its third year, is usually held solely to bring friends together in front of the Alamo, an ideal setting for quirky snapshots of men and women celebrating everyone's favorite soup strainer.
But this year, 28-year-old Justin Parr offered to host the event on Saturday night at his Flight Gallery on South Flores Street. It featured musical guests Demitasse, half of the band Buttercup, and DJ JJ Lopez from KRTU Radio.
“It's always a wide swath of people, and everyone is wearing mustaches,” he said. “It started just for fun, but this year, we decided it should benefit someone.”
He opted to suggest a $3 donation from mustache growers and wearers that will help grow the community garden on South Presa Street, where he frequently volunteers. Parr didn't want to waste paper by printing out fliers to advertise for Christmoustache; attendees found out about it through the radio waves and online social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook and Twitter.
The garden is one of 15 overseen by the Green Spaces Alliance of South Texas, formerly the Bexar Land Trust, which sends volunteers to the garden and helps garden managers to secure grants and other funds. A group of volunteers started the garden in 2007 on a site owned by Darryl Ohlenbusch.
His mother, Mary Ann Ohlenbusch, said she and her sister, both avid gardeners, helped out at the garden in the beginning, but said the first year was a failure. Too much rain that summer leached the soil of its nutrients, and few vegetables sprouted.
“They've really learned a lot. This year, the vegetables are huge, they're really nice,” said Ohlenbusch, who purchased the garden site from her son a few months ago.
Parr said the donations would allow the garden group to pay property taxes and the water bill, and to buy supplies, like organic fertilizer and horticultural molasses, which they'll use on projects including an edible mushroom bed.
Parr has been working at the garden for about a year and a half, and says it serves a valuable purpose for him.
“It's a totally organic garden, it's free produce, and it builds community,” said Parr, adding that the garden has introduced him to several friends, many of whom wore lip-wigs at his Saturday night soiree. “All of those things are important for our future.”
But Saturday, the only thing important to Parr was that nobody's lip was naked. Christmoustache was stocked with boxes of extras at the door, and a photo booth inside ensured party-goers would never forget how it felt to wear a mustache, if only for one night.