Homegrown Festival began the way most small town festivals do–inspiration, beer, and dumb luck. In 2014, local man Michael Christian won the use of the Silver Lining Stage in West Bend’s Regner Park for a day. After he considered all of his options, he decided to invite his friends and their bands to play the stage, then also invited a few hundred people to watch, then invited food vendors and beer vendors to supply non-musical sustenance.