© 2026 New England Public Media

FCC public inspection files:
WGBY • WFCR • WNNZ • WNNU • WNNZ-FM • WNNI

For assistance accessing our public files, please contact hello@nepm.org or call 413-781-2801.
PBS, NPR and local perspective for western Mass.
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

FAB Passion Fashion Week, 'Gourdfolk Fest' exhibit, Rep. Jim McGovern

This weekend sees the return of FAB Passion Fashion Week New England to Springfield, bringing 12 designers and curators from all over the globe for two days of connection, expression and community. It’s the 4th year for Richie Richardson’s vision of incorporating the city and its people into the world of haute couture, and we learn about getting runway ready with him and two of the folx being highlighted, Charlene Naylor of Charlene's Boutique and Miranda Askie of Miranda Askie Designs.

In Easthampton, a passion side project has become the focus of an exhibit at 50 Arrow Gallery. “Gourdfolk Fest” may have started as a small thank you for Brett Kelly’s pin-buying patrons, but has grown into an annual ritual, and now over 100 of those artworks are flooding that space. We explore his work and the organically growing exhibit with the artist and gallery owner Jason Montgomery.

And Congressman Jim McGovern takes on several listener questions in his chat with us today, in addition to addressing our shifting loyalties in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the very real question of retaliation after the midterms, threats and intimidation to current representatives, and much more.

Christopher “Monte'' Belmonte is host and executive producer of NEPM's The Fabulous 413. He was born and raised in Massachusetts and has been a radio host in western Massachusetts for the last 20 years — the last 17 of them as host of Mornings with Monte on The River 93.9/WRSI.
Kaliis Smith is a radio host and producer for NEPM's The Fabulous 413.