On Sunday afternoon, the worktables at Carbondale Clay Center at 135 Main St. fill with plain ceramic skulls. Anyone can walk in between 2 and 5 p.m., paint a calavera for a home ofrenda and leave it behind. The Clay Center fires the pieces in its kiln and has them ready for pickup by the end of the week. Skulls painted on Oct. 25 come out of the kiln just before Nov. 1. The plaza celebration comes later, on Nov. 6.
Carbondale's Día de los Muertos takes about two weeks. It is spread along Main Street and depends heavily on what people make with their own hands. In 2026 those handmade parts carry more weight than usual, because one of the procession's longest-running groups will not be in it.
A Holiday on Sunday, a Celebration on Friday
Carbondale Arts holds its celebration on November's First Friday. That puts it a few days after the holiday most years, and it did last year too. In 2025 the event fell on Friday, Nov. 7, "nearly a week after the Nov. 1 holiday," the Post Independent noted. This year Nov. 1 is a Sunday and First Friday is Nov. 6, so the private observance and the public one again land on different days.
Here is the calendar from this weekend on:
| Date | Event | Where |
|---|---|---|
| Sat., Oct. 24, 11 a.m.–1 p.m. | Anderson Ranch Day of the Dead arts and crafts, free and all ages | Pitkin County Library, Dunaway Community Room, 120 N. Mill St., Aspen |
| Sun., Oct. 25, 2–5 p.m. | Free calavera U-Paint-It Party, drop in while supplies last | Carbondale Clay Center, 135 Main St. |
| End of that week | Fired calaveras ready for pickup | Carbondale Clay Center |
| Sun., Nov. 1 | Día de los Muertos | |
| Fri., Nov. 6, 5–8 p.m. | November First Friday Día de los Muertos Celebration | 4th Street Plaza, 76 S. 4th St. |
The Saturday event in Aspen has families making traditional altars and making colorful skulls. Go to it, then to the Clay Center on Sunday, and you have two days of making things before the holiday itself.
The Ofrenda Moves Down Main Street
The community ofrenda is the center of the Carbondale celebration. In 2025, Carbondale Arts built the altar outside The Launchpad on Nov. 1 and took photos and other remembrances from the community all week. Local businesses built ofrendas of their own.
The 2026 listings carry that idea further. The Clay Center's event notice says it "will be one of many Main Street business to host a community ofrenda this year," and anyone can add to it. Carbondale Arts' own event page asks the public to contribute mementos to the community ofrenda and says more details are coming.
So the ofrenda is no longer just one altar to visit on one night. It is a string of altars along the street that you can add to over several days. A calavera painted at 135 Main St. on Sunday can end up on that same building's ofrenda later in the week, or on a home altar. Carbondale Arts' Día de los Muertos page puts the main community ofrenda on the front patio of The Launchpad, where it stays up for a week, and notes that businesses and locals also build ofrendas along Main Street. The page does not give a 2026 drop-off window, so watch the November First Friday listing for this year's details.
Who Puts It Together
Carbondale Arts has run the celebration for more than two decades. The 2023 edition was the 19th, 2024 was the 20th and 2025 was the 21st.
The organization describes its role as convening the event, not owning it. Carbondale Arts' 2025 press release credits a planning committee of leaders from the Latino and nonprofit communities. In 2023, organizer Jamie Abbott told the Post Independent that the Latino community drives the event and that it is a collaboration, with Carbondale Arts bringing the participants together. Carbondale Arts calls it the largest Día de los Muertos celebration anywhere in the valley.
The procession pieces have come from the same spread of contributors. For 2025, Livier Cruz Guerrero, Anjanette Garcia and Estela Lopez made pieces, along with students from the Aspen Music Festival and School, and Garfield County Libraries also contributed. Because so many groups build it, the celebration can change shape when one of them leaves.
The First Year Without Folklórico
That change comes this year. The 2025 celebration was the last for Aspen Santa Fe Ballet Folklórico, which has offered free after-school classes in Mexican folkloric dance around the valley since 1998. The program closed when instructor Paco Nevarez-Burgueño retired, the Post Independent reported.
Speaking to that paper before his final Carbondale procession, Nevarez-Burgueño described what the dancers had brought to the event:
"The Aspen Santa Fe Ballet Folklórico program has been very important to the (Día de los Muertos) celebration because we are the ones who provide the real traditions, like dances and the tradition to celebrate beside the altars."
Last year his dancers wore traditional Tehuana dress from Oaxaca in the procession and gave a separate performance after it. The evergreen Carbondale Arts page still lists Folklórico dancing in its description of the procession. That text predates the program's end. The Nov. 6 lineup has not been announced.
His quote names two things: the dances and the practice of celebrating beside the altars. The second never depended on one dance program. It goes on at the Clay Center tables on Oct. 25, at the ofrendas along Main Street, and at the community altar Carbondale Arts invites everyone to add to.
What Nov. 6 Has Looked Like
The 2026 program is still to come. Recent years give a good idea of the evening. In 2025 the procession left Third Street Center at 6 p.m., went along Third Street and Main Street, and finished at 4th Street Plaza, with more performances afterward.
Recent editions have included:
- Performers: Mezcla Socials Dance, Roaring Fork Youth Orchestra and Rhythmystics in 2025. In 2024 the lineup also had drumming led by Gabriela Mejia.
- The procession: large puppets and dance along the route.
- Food and drink: food trucks, pan de muerto and Mexican hot chocolate.
- For families: face painting, Lotería and art activities. In 2023 there was also a Catrina costume contest.
These are past programs, not this year's schedule. Even so, the event has held steady over 21 years: a walk from Third Street Center to the plaza, and a shared altar at the end. This year's First Friday runs 5 to 8 p.m. at 4th Street Plaza. For a photo to go on the community ofrenda, bring a print, not your phone. For a calavera, the Clay Center's drop-in runs Sunday, Oct. 25, from 2 to 5 p.m., while supplies last.
I'm always glad to hear which Carbondale traditions you mark each fall, whether that's a calavera from the Clay Center or a photo you bring to the plaza every November. If you'd like to talk about life in Carbondale and the wider Roaring Fork Valley, Soffia Wardy would welcome the conversation. Let's Connect.
