brews, blues, & bbq
We invite you to join us for the 3rd annual BBQ by the Blast Furnace!
This casual event will begin with cocktails at the heart of our site, followed by a BBQ dinner, served under the iconic Sloss water tower, and end with dancing under the stars.
BBQ by the Blast Furnace is Sloss Furnaces' most important annual fundraiser, helping fund our metal arts program and community events, and allowing us to continue offering free general admission to all visitors. Your support is crucial to our mission to preserve and advance our site as a vibrant public destination where industry, history, metal arts, and cultural life come together.
For questions about the 2026 BBQ Blast or information about sponsorship opportunities, please contact Dianne Williams at dianne@slossfurnaces.org.
Your support is crucial to our mission to preserve and advance our site as a vibrant public destination where industry, history, metal arts, and cultural life come together.
Interested in sponsoring this event?
Presenting Sponsor $25,000
Event Recognition, Private Group Iron Pour, Private Night Tour.
Event Sponsor $10,000
Event Recognition, Private Night Tour.
Table Sponsor $ 5,000
Event Recognition
Sloss Furnaces educates, entertains and inspires over 100,000 people each year. We'll take a little time to talk about important next steps that include a dramatic new park to unite downtown, new immersive learning opportunities, expansion of a national school for metal arts, and preservation of this extraordinary site for generations to come.
This year brings several new events to Sloss Furnaces that take advantage of our 32-acre site like never before - a site now dramatically lit with hundreds of LED lights. We've also been the location for feature films, corporate marketing campaigns, community and private celebrations, student film projects, and music videos.
We'll also tell you about new ways we are sharing the story of Sloss Furnaces and the people that worked here. That includes becoming the first cultural institution to install innovative ways to guide visitors who are site-impaired, new interactive signage, and unique features that incorporate film and sound.
Next April we host our biannual Metal Arts Conference. The last Conference welcomed 650 artists from 9 countries. We have plans for expanding our team of resident artists, a new facility in the future, and growing our internship programs. We continue to balance the education and experiences of our resident and visiting artists, while building our portfolio of public and private commissioned metal art.
