Two designs for a new farmers market shelter at the Village Green will be on display at the market next month, and the committee behind the plans is urging the community to join the conversation.

The plans, both created by island builders, illustrate a shelter that can accommodate Vashon’s growing number of vendors year-round. With rolling doors — like a garage door — that can be opened in the summer and closed in the winter to keep rain and wind out, but let light in; a clock tower that will serve as an icon for the market and space for a commercial kitchen and events, such as weddings, parties and meetings, the designs aim to bring new life to Vashon’s Farmers Market. Those involved with the project also say that the new building could lead to the green being used more often, encouraging daily use at the place that has drawn concern about loitering and drug use.

The designs are merely ideas for what the Vashon Island Grower’s Association (VIGA) hopes to create to allow for year-round farmers markets.

“These designs are only being used to get feedback and create interest. We’re not coming in and saying, ‘This is what we’re going ahead with,'” VIGA Reimagine the Village Green committee member and local farmer Natalie Sheard said last week.

Every year, as cold and wet winter weather makes its way to the island, the Vashon Farmers Market moves from its space in the Village Green to an indoor marketplace next door to Thriftway. According to Sheard, the move causes business to plummet, as many vendors decide not to sell and the centrality of the Village Green location is lost.

“We really want more people on-and off-island to understand the importance of the market,” Sheard said. “The year-round focus is important, as moving has not been going well.”

Vashon Farmers Market Manager Caleb Johns seconded Sheard and said that the seasonal move has always been a struggle.

“The market is a retail sales establishment and so shopping experience has a lot to do with the market’s success. We need to be regular, and that’s hard when locations and layouts are changing,” he said.

The unveiling of the designs is the most recent development in a process that began early last year when a grant allowed architecture students from the University of Washington to try their hand at designing the new structure. In February 2015, the three students revealed their two designs to a group of roughly 30 farmers market vendors and other islanders. The UW students turned the designs over to the Reimagine the Village Green committee — made up of a wide variety of islanders from Sheard and other island farmers, to The Hardware Store Restaurant owner Melinda Powers, island historian Bruce Haulman and Vashon Winery owner Ron Irvine — which took community feedback and created these two new designs using local talent.

“The UW design is still on the table if that’s what the community ultimately says it wants, but it doesn’t solve the weather issues: cold, windy, all of that stuff,” committee member and farmer Celina Yarkin said. “Plus, we lost two commercial kitchens (Sound Food and the Burton Inn), so we need space for a kitchen.”

The first plan, created by Sheard’s husband, builder Luke Sheard, is a U-shaped structure with a clock tower and central lawn that features large rollable doors lining the longest stretches of the structure. The goal, according to Luke Sheard, is to evoke a sense of nostalgia that begs for shoppers to come enjoy the space.

“If ever there were a time and place to capture that dollar spent to re-live the past, when food stuffs were locally sourced, this is it,” Luke Sheard said in an explanation about his design. “Therefore, it is key that the design and architecture of the structure reflect the past. The venue that will attract (customers) needs to demonstrate, by its very form and finish, that throwback to yesteryear. The venue must share the agricultural styling of the farm, not the box store.”

A second design created by islander and self-described “avid armchair house designer and builder” Jim Champagne, is more modern, but contains the same elements: rolling doors, clock tower, space for events and cooking. He said he was inspired by European farmers markets while on a recent trip, but has also seen farmers markets in northern Washington that speak to the community they are located in.

“For Vashon, what is important is the look and feel of our barns and iconic structures, be they the Roasterie building, Mukai’s processing plant or Fredric Brillant’s French post-and-beam structures dotting our island,” he explained. “Function is important, slick is not. We prefer a board-and-batten wall to a glass wall but, on the other hand, light is also important, no, essential to us.”

He addressed the importance of making the space welcoming, even during a Northwest winter.

“To get people to the Saturday market on a sunny, summer day is easy. To make our vendors and customers show up in the shoulder season requires a space that meets the needs of that weather day, be it blustery or raining,” he said. “It is a business after all. Our structure must be as open, airy and light filled as possible on any given day. Therefore all sides should open up and close up when needed. How do you do that, you might ask? We do things here on Vashon with ingenuity, not complex (read that expensive) corporate industrial solutions.”

For Natalie Sheard, the new building brings with it the possibility of increased business in a world that is forgetting how to cook with fresh ingredients.

Market manager Johns said that over the past few years, articles in national newspapers and business journals have pointed to this trend away from cooking, and it may have hit the island’s market. He explained that items such as cheese or yogurt can be eaten without any preparation, so those sales have not been affected. However, “an onion, olive oil or a steak are tending to be less-popular items,” he said.

“Obviously, there could be lots of different reasons for that. The economy is a huge player, but … from my understanding, for the first time since the market started 23 years ago, processed foods — everything from wine, to cashew creams, to caramels — have outsold farmers, which seems to correspond to that trend,” he said.

He said that farmers’ sales have not decreased, but these “processed foods” (foods ready-to-eat) have seen explosive growth.

“It could be for 1,000 different reasons, but I can’t help but notice that this is what has been predicted,” he said.

The hope is that the new structure will increase the visibility for local farmers’ goods and allow farmers to turn a profit at the market year-round.

Johs said that he feels the market finally has a solid base that can sustain a large change such as a new structure.

“We have the foundation for it,” he said.

The designs will be posted at the Saturday markets beginning in August and on the “Reimagine the Village Green” Facebook page.

To comment, learn more or get involved, contact Natalie Sheard at nataliemsheard@gmail.com.