Extreme Weather at Outdoor Events

Picture this: You’re all set up for an outdoor event. Your booth looks super slick. The birds are singing. Your displays, on point. Everything, visually speaking, is great.

But there’s one big, constant, inescapable problem—the weather. It’s 90 degrees F out. Or it’s freezing cold. Or heaven forbid, windy. Y’all, I have done it all. Rain, shine, heat, cold, dark, wind.

There’s nothing you can do about the weather, so what can we do to cope? That’s what I’m gonna get into today.

Cold

Obviously, how you choose to dress for an event is gonna have a huge effect. Thusly, it’s important to understand how different materials behave. Without getting too technical^, wool (from sheep, goats, angora rabbits, and alpaca/other similar camelids) and silk are two natural fibers that do an amazing job at keeping in warmth.

Synthetic fibers often also trap heat, but not universally. Since polyester and its variants are human-created, some have been engineered help keep you cool (think workout pants, which are usually part polyester, part spandex, and all plastic), it’s important to think about what a specific garment was designed for. Often the tag will tell you if it’s meant to keep you cool or warm. If there’s no information like that, tho, on the tag, probably safe to assume it’ll trap heat.

^If you do want a really technical explanation, I highly recommend the book Yarn Substitution Made Easy by Carol J. Sulcoski. Even if you’re not a knitter, crocheter, or otherwise, her explanation of the microscopic breakdown of various fiber types is so useful.

So pick clothes and materials that are gonna trap that precious, precious heat. Secondly, speaking of heat, let’s create some.

Firstly, good insulation is the first step. My winter coat (or my “big coat,” as my Wisconsinite friends would say) is lined, thick, and mostly wool. Goodwill, Salvation Army, and charity shops, and consignment shops are great places to pick up good quality jackets and coats. Also blazers. Because those items aren’t worn as often as, say, jeans or shoes, so they’re usually in pretty good condition. Full disclosure: nearly every blazer I own came from a charity shop.

Next up, y’all, I cannot recommend Hot Hands enough. They have gotten me and fellow vendors thru some truly heinous winter days. Put them inside your coat sleeves, in your pockets, down your waistcoat… wait, that last one. Just me? Whatever and wherever (tho the warnings do say not to keep them against your bare skin). And I specifically mean the Hot Hands brand, not some knock-off. I have the field experience and I can tell you the other brands don’t hold a candle to the OG HH’s. Accept no substitutions!!!

I’d also like to add to this not to forget your feet. You think they’re fine because they’re in wooly socks (good job, you, on choosing the wooly ones) and boots.

Think again.

Your toes are gonna get so cold! They’re the first part of you to get shaded, and it’s gonna feel 20 degrees colder in the shade. Add the Hot Hands toe warmers to your shopping basket toot sweet! I’ve not tried the insoles, but I bet they’re good too.

Y’all, they don’t pay me to say this (tho I wouldn’t say no to some Hot Hands money). I’m trying to help you out. Bet, as the youths say.

And these aren’t just for outside. Keeping warm goes for hotels and convention centers too. They keep those places sub-arctic.

Me, trying to keep warm in a convention center

Another hot (pun intended, yes) tip—protect your neck! And by that I mean use a hood, a scarf, a turtleneck, or your hair (or stack your choices) to hold that heat in. You’d be shocked what a difference keeping your neck warm makes.

Other ways to bring the heat: a mini propane heater for when you don’t have access to electricity. If you do have access to electricity, there, of course, are plug-in hearers—for all heaters, be sure to check with the event to see if they’re allowed. They’re usually fire hazards, so there may be rules about such devices.

Again, if you have access to electricity, electric heating pads are great.

Blankets. Just good ol’ blankets. It’s frikkin’ cold after all.

Hot water bottle. I know these are more often found in the UK, but we do have the internet for online ordering.

Hot drinks. And my favorite device for keeping your drinks hot…

A thermos! Again, I prefer the OG Thermos brand ones. These babies will keep your coffee/tea/hot toddy hot all day and into the night. You can keep hot water in it too for that hot water bottle I mentioned above.

I use a second thermos for keeping my lunch nice and hot as well. Most events I do will find me lunching on a hot and tasty rice-based dish—a curry, red beans and rice, a different curry… I love me a curry, okay? And you know what’s the best? When I’m cold and the curry is a lil spicy and it warms me from the inside. I highly recommend Tasty Bite’s vegetables and paneer for just such an occasion.

Again, they don’t pay me to say this. I’m just telling y’all what I know to be good.

Heat

Okay, so there’s keeping warm covered. Now for the opposite end of the spectrum. For keeping cool, in regards to fabrics, cotton, linen, and other plant fibers are generally good at allowing heat to escape.

I shouldn’t need to say this, but hydrate thyself. Those thermoses I mentioned above work both ways, so load them up with some icy water. I have a big, honkin’ 64oz beast that I bring to summer events so that I can share out that icy goodness—we gotta take care of each other, y’all.

I also shouldn’t need to say this, but sunscreen is your friend. I get it. It feels gross. Even the “dry touch” feels all greasy and horrible, but the sun does not play! In addition to sunburn, there’s skin cancer to consider. So get sunscreening!

Once again, think of your neck. But in this case, flaunt it. We’re already sweaty as well as greasy because we made the smart call and put on our sunscreen (and we’re reapplying every two or so hours, right?). There’s no ickier feeling than hair lying against all of that. Ugh! Like that Trolls song says, hair up and air… out? Okay, it doesn’t work perfectly, but you know what I’m going for. I personally like a messy bun or milkmaid braids, or, as I like to call them General Leia Organa braids 🫡 .

Credit: Star Wars

While we’re in the neighborhood, hats. With wide brims if you can swing it. Truth be told, that’s not really part of my aesthetic, but I can see the wisdom in a big hat.

Right, now let’s get scientific. You know how your body cools itself down? Well, in case you need a lesson, when you sweat and it evaporates, that evaporation is a natural cooling system. But, Dana, I hear you say. I’m gonna be in [enter heinously humid place name here] and there’s no wind. Good, we hate wind. And I feel you. I live in TN, and I got you fam.

Enter: a plain old water spray bottle and a portable fan. Spritzing yourself with water and then drying with the fan mimics your body’s natural AC system. You’re beginning to see what happens to all that water I carry around with me in that 64oz thermos, aren’t you?

I also will usually have a baby stroller fan attached to my chair or table. They’re rechargable and can usually clip onto something for hands-free cooling.

And speaking of, if you’re in a tent, try and create a channel for air to flow. It wants to move, especially if the air in one space is hotter or colder than the air around it—thermodynamics, friends. Hot air is a different density than cool, and it wants to find equilibrium, thus, air movement. I’ll usually cinch up a back corner of my tent so that air can go from the front through to be back. Otherwise, all that heat is just gonna be trapped and it’ll sit in your tent and be stifling. Neck fans are also a thing, but they’re not my favorite because they, well, sit on your neck. And we already talked about that.

You know what else you gotta watch? The path of the sun 🌞 . Every time I do an outdoor event, I look at the path of the sun. Usually I’m setting up in the morning, so I know the sun is in the East (or mostly East—the Earth’s tilt makes it not quite true East), and it’ll be on the opposite side by afternoon. The shadows will point the opposite direction than they do in the morning, but you can also use the compass app on your phone to see which way is which. So I try to position my booth, if at all possible, to keep me in the shade. If that isn’t possible, there are tent walls. But, again, you gotta consider air flow. So there’s also my good ol’ parasol.

This is not just fashion, my peeps. This is practicality. Which leads me right into…

Rain, Wind, and Darkness

I chose the parasol I have because it works for both sun and rain. These are important parasol considerations! And I always check my weather app any time I have an outdoor event coming up. I check it days before, and I keep an eye on how the weather changes as the event approaches.

Now, I mentioned tent sides before, and this is when you want them so your stuff doesn’t get all wet. Importantly, if you can get some that can be tightened somehow, that’s help against wind, which often comes with rain—it’s a whole air pressure thing. My tent sides can both zip up together into one, long piece and velcro around my tent’s legs. They will become a sail if the wind really starts kicking up, and I’ve ended up with smashed product because the walls billowed in and knocked over a shelf.

Learn. From my. Mistakes.

Tent walls can be pretty pricey, tho, especially since you need at least three, possibly four if you’re leaving your tent overnight—a big bedsheet across the front entrance isn’t a bad alternative, tho. Another, less pricey alternative are shower curtains. They already have holes for zipties or S-hooks, come in transparent plastic or pretty patterns, and are often available from Dollar Tree and similarly inexpensive places. I like to overlap mine so there are no cracks between where rain can slip thru and then use big binder clips to hold them together along the bottom.

If you can’t pull whatever you’re using as tent sides taut, then I suggest weighing them down to avoid the aforementioned destructive billowing. You can buy sandbags from hardware stores, or fill gallon jugs with water or kitty litter. These are also good options for weighing down your tent legs, which you absolutely must do! A lot of outdoor shows will actually require this. Because no one wants to see a whole tent go flying. It does happen. It happened to a friend of mine. Do not test Mother Nature.

On the subject of weighing things down, have you considered the weight of your signs? A lot of signs are pretty lightweight. Again, I’ve been to a lot of events and seen the wind pick up signs of all kinds and make off with them. The signs around my booth are just paper, so I have a collection of small, mesh jewelry bags, each filled with river rock. I use these small bags to weigh down my little, paper signs, and voila! No more flying signs.

And finally, what if your event goes late? And you’re outside. In the dark. Again, I pay attention to event run times—always read your vendor emails, folks. Always—and when sunset is. I have solar powered outdoor lights that I hang up around my tent’s frame with S-hooks so they can charge up during the day and be full of juice when night falls. I also use rechargeable clip lights around my tent. Trust me, you do not want to be tearing down in the dark.

Is this kind of a lot? Yes. It’s a lot to think about, to plan for. But that’s just part of doing outdoor events. The weather is gonna do whatever the weather is gonna do, and there’s no way around it. So do yourself a favor and prepare. If you’ve got any tips I missed, drop them below 👇 in the comments. And best of luck with your next outdoor event!