Silver Room Block Party returning to new venue: The Salt Shed

After a two year hiatus, the Silver Room Sound System Block Party is returning this summer to a new venue not far from its roots.

The dance music party, which has been scaled back to one day, is scheduled for noon – 10 p.m. on July 18 at The Salt Shed, 1357 N. Elston Ave. Tickets are on sale April 17.

Founded in 2002 by local entrepreneur Eric Williams as a grassroots alternative to Chicago’s slate of summer street festivals, the event has gone through many changes over the years.

It has long been celebrated by loyal fans of house music, which was founded in Chicago. The parties were powered by local artists and were solely about the music and dancing.

“It was no alcohol, no drugs, just music,” former Block Party volunteer Rebecca McQuillen previously told the Sun-Times. “During that time, we would get shut down by the police because they couldn’t believe that there was no alcohol.”

The block party began in a Wicker Park alley near the art and fashion store Silver Room. The party grew over the ensuing decade, moving to a stretch of Evergreen Avenue and reaching more than 8,000 attendees by 2014.

The party shifted locations to Hyde Park in 2016, where it eventually attracted more than 40,000 attendees before the COVID-19 pandemic put a two-year pause on the event.

The event returned in 2022 as a two-day, ticketed festival at Oakwood Beach. It was held there again in 2023 where it was billed as the festival’s finale.

Williams said in 2023 that difficulties making a profit and the amount of work involved in setting up the festival led to his decision to “lay this to bed” after a “good run.”

He couldn’t immediately be reached for comment on Friday.