With the new school year about to start, students at the University of Utah have mixed feelings. Some feel as though their summer went by way too fast while others feel excited to return for another year at the U. However, many can get behind the excitement for the U’s biggest party of the year, Crimson Nights.

Crimson Nights is the late-night, school-wide party that happens twice every semester in the A. Ray Olpin Student Union. This party usually comes with free food and soda, a giant dance party and all sorts of activities related to the Crimson Nights’ theme. Previous incarnations of Crimson Nights have seen a haunted house theme, laser-tag, glow-in-the-dark dodgeball and a foam pit. This school year, the first Crimson Nights will be on Friday, Aug. 23, the first Friday of the semester.

“Crimson Pier” will be the theme of the year’s first Crimson Nights and the Union Programming Council (UPC) decided to have a carnival-on-the-pier feel, similar to Jersey Shore.

“We wanted to pick a theme that had a summer vibe to it,” said Sarah Cronin, UPC Director of Crimson Nights. “The boardwalk theme of Crimson Pier seemed like a good option to go with.”

When asked why incoming freshmen should come to Crimson Nights, Assistant Director of Programming at the Union, Ashlee Christofferson, said that the first Crimson Nights of the semester is “the most exciting and the biggest late-night event of the school year” and that “it would be a great way to meet other students.” Cronin echoed Christofferson’s sentiment saying that freshman should come to “let loose and have fun and celebrate finishing [their] first week of school.”

And for all of those returning students at the U who think that Crimson Nights is just for the freshmen, Cronin says that they are working hard to make each Crimson Nights diverse and include events that everyone can enjoy. According to Cronin, UPC is making a significant effort this year to “[have] a lot of different food options since a lot of things people like at boardwalks and carnivals is food.”

Crimson Pier will have a lot of free food, including pizza and stuffed churros from San Diablo Artisan Churros.

Some of the activities that students can look forward to at Crimson Pier are mini-golf, henna tattoo, a caricature artist, carnival games, a dance floor, music by DJ Bangarang from U92 and for the first time ever, a rock wall.

Crimson Pier is Aug. 23 at the Union from 9 p.m. to 2 a.m. Since this is a college student-only event, U students get in for free as long as they have their physical uIDs. Other college students from all over the country can attend with their valid university IDs as well, for a cost of $5.

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