Cherry blossoms in Akron
Celebrate the full bloom of Akron’s cherry blossom trees at the Downtown Akron Sakura Festival, where you can take a guided bike ride, taste sake wine and enjoy live performances among the flowers. Enter a photo contest with your favorite snapshot of the cherry blossoms and end the night with a lantern lighting from 8-9 p.m. at the Lock 2 canal. The Saturday festival is free and takes place along the Towpath Trail in Akron.
Pop-up book market
Get new books, poetry and comics with your produce this weekend at Cleveland’s West Side Market in Ohio City. Starting Saturday at 10 a.m. in the fruit and vegetable arcade, Books at the Market features pop-up vendors and giveaways from local booksellers and libraries. Andrew Aydin, author of National Book Award-winning graphic novel “March,” signs books at 1 p.m. Literary Cleveland hosts a free fiction reading from local authors at 7 p.m.
‘Under A Baseball Sky’
The newest production from the Beck Center for the Arts is a love letter to the long history of baseball in the Mexican American community. “Under A Baseball Sky,” written by José Cruz González, chronicles a young troublemaker unexpectedly connecting with an elderly neighbor over the game. The show plays Fridays and Saturdays at 7:30 p.m. and Sundays at 2:30 p.m. at the Beck Center for the Arts in Lakewood until May 4.
Buttons in Sugarcreek
The Buckeye State Button Society invites you to its spring show of clothing fasteners, A Garden of Buttons. There’s thousands of buttons dating from the 18th century to the present made from materials like porcelain, shell, mother of pearl, brass and celluloid, plus raffles for prizes donated by Ohio’s button-collecting clubs. The event opens Saturday and Sunday at 9 a.m. at the Carlisle Inn in Sugarcreek.
Tapestries in Kent
The Kent State University Museum presents a solo exhibition by John Paul Morabito, head of the textiles program at the university’s School of Art. Morabito combines their queer identity with their heritage as a Catholic and Italian American by reinterpreting classical paintings from Italian masters as 14 colorfully patterned tapestries with glass beads. View the collection at the Kent State University Museum’s Higbee Gallery until June 22.
