They gathered each week for months. For the first time, the Library organized two teen printmaking groups, one based at the Port Orchard branch, and the other at Sylvan Way (though some young artists couldn't get enough and worked with both).
The process started with ideas, sketches, and thinking about what the word "alchemy" brought up for them. Then they went home, drew up designs, and came back together. The groups picked the elements that resonated with them all—culminating in one massive design.
Then, day by day, week by week, they carved. Gently, they scraped and carved the linoleum away to form a gigantic block print. And in those hours, the teenagers who had been strangers became friends, allies, and artistic collaborators.
When the day of the Wayzgoose Kitsap 2026 festival finally came, they were ready for the steamroller to turn their hours of effort into physical prints...and even an afternoon rainstorm couldn't dampen their enthusiasm and artistic drive.
"One of the fun things about [being on a Wayzgoose team] is that it builds up to a festival," says Izzie, a teen who's participated on the Port Orchard team for three years. "A lot of stuff, you do here in the library, and it stays in the library, but this is a project you work on to put out in the world."
An Elevated Legacy
The Library began assembling Wayzgoose Kitsap printmaking groups in 2023 under the guidance of then-teen services librarian Glenna Matteson.
"What I fell in love with about linocut and block printing is that it's a really accessible art form and the best way to learn is by doing it," says Glenna, who is now the manager of the Bremerton - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. branch. "I saw teens who maybe didn't see themselves as amazing artists, but they were able to fully participate in the process and consider themselves carvers and artists through this process. I saw teens get to know each other and form community and strong bonds. The collaborative, creative process is really valuable. It's not just about teens creating things on their own, but creating things together, and then having that work celebrated by the community at large."
Glenna says Wayzgoose offers many ways for the Library to pursue its strategic priority areas of community and social connectedness, fostering welcoming and belonging, as well as supporting interest-based learning. "The carving leading up to the festival is promoting community amongst the teens who are building it, " says Glenna, "but then they come to the festival, they also find that community with other artists, and with other experts, and teens."
At each festival, the Library also hosts a kids' booth, where Kathleen Kondek, the youth services librarian at the Bremerton - Sylvan Way branch, works with library staff to help kids learn about printmaking. Every year, Glenna says Kathleen is "someone's first exposure to printmaking."
When Glenna was promoted to branch manager, she says she didn't ask her successors to continue what she'd started. But she joined the Wayzgoose Kitsap Board of Directors to help nurture the relationship as an informal liaison for the Library and now provides oversight for Wayzgoose Kitsap and the festival as a whole.
When Wayne Holder and Jacqueline Keating, the new teen services librarians at Port Orchard and Sylvan Way, decided to organize their own teen artist teams, Glenna says the Library's participation in the festival deepened. "They have totally elevated it," she says. "They both have brought it to another level beyond what I accomplished. And I'm really, really proud and inspired by both of them and their teams."
Building Communities
"It's really important to provide safe community spaces for people, knowing that there are trusted adults in places where people can be who they are," says Wayne, whose Port Orchard teen group partnered with Kitsap Pride.
"This is such a great opportunity for people to get out there and actually be able to feel like they're a part of something," says Ely, one of the teens who participated in both groups this year. "It's really fun. It allows you to work with a group of people and play to your own strengths."
Ely says the process helped her use her skills—which she describes as more technical—in creating the design. This balanced nicely with the talents of her team members, like Scarlet, who was on the Sylvan Way team and says her own abilities are more artistic. So, Ely helped conceptualize the elements that would allow their design to adhere to the year’s theme of Alchemy, while Scarlet sketched the design, focusing particularly on the bugs, feathers, and flowers of the piece.
“I think about symbolism and transformation,” says Scarlet. “How we ordered the quadrants [of our design] looks like the transformation of life.”
Both art pieces this year feature a rabbit resting in a moon, “that had to be in there!” says Izzie. The rabbit moon is a nod to the first Library printmaking team’s design and has become an unofficial signature of each Library art team since.
“We actually got really excited this year because the theme for this year’s Summer Learning is a bunny in a moon,” says Ely. “The design to me really represents alchemy, and that represents how we took everyone’s individual strengths and brought them into one cohesive piece,” she added.
Sylvan Way’s Teen Services Librarian, Jacqueline, says she saw participants from schools across the county, both middle and high school students, come together to join their team. “These kids who would never necessarily meet are now friends in this group,” she says.
Her teen group partnered with the Bremerton Youth Art Hive, and she says the partnership gave the teenagers the opportunity not only to learn the skill of carving, but also to work with the public, including a live carve at the Bremerton Farmer’s Market and answering questions from the crowd about their art.
Jacqueline says her favorite part of the entire process was when the artists combined the words “alchemy” and “we” into “Alchewe” as a name for their piece. “Most of them hadn’t met, and they were fast friends at the end.”
A Vibrant, Connected Future
Izzie from the Port Orchard team says she loved the process of figuring out how to incorporate everyone’s ideas into the final art piece because, in the end, “everyone has their own little piece of the design.”
For many participants and librarians, the best part was the festival itself. Although it poured rain in the afternoon, all the participants came together to protect the prints and allow the artists to work. Wayne says it was the perfect ending after months of effort. “Just seeing how excited and happy [my team was] to show off the work that they did, and having people not related to them at all coming out to support the work being done was a really positive influence on everyone involved.”
Looking ahead, every teen young enough to participate next year is already thinking about their next design, and the librarians supporting them say they’re committed to making sure these printmaking teams continue to grow, thrive, and bring their art into being.
“At the end of the day, it’s the community aspect,” says Wayne. “Having an opportunity for teens throughout the county to be able to feel connected to each other and participate in artistic endeavors just bolsters community.”
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