HALLOWELL — From behind trays of dozens of whoopie pies, Sally Bullard watched intently as a slate of judges carefully tasted each one.

Bullard has organized the Old Hallowell Day bake-off for the last five years. To her, no event encapsulates the spirit of Old Hallowell Day, which takes place yearly on the third Saturday of July, as well as the annual bake-off, aside from perhaps the parade down Water Street later in the morning.

Old Hallowell Day bake-off volunteer Millie Rauch cuts a pumpkin whoopie pie, decorated to look like cheeseburger, into pieces for judging Saturday in Hallowell. Joe Phelan/Kennebec Journal

Because it has a different theme and different participants each year, the bake-off is always changing, she said, much like the town it celebrates. The more things change for the bake-off, Bullard says, the more they stay the same.

“We change the themes, this year we changed the judging system. Now it’s based on points, where last year and before it was much more subjective,” she said. “Things change, but at its core, it’s always been about having fun and making good food.”

The parade and festivities this year had an emphasis on renewing old traditions while beginning new ones.

For instance, this year’s bake-off challenged contestants to bake Maine-staple whoopie pies with a twist: There were categories for fruit and “nontraditional” pies in addition to the classic chocolate cake and marshmallow cream.

For the first time ever, parade marchers carried an Old Hallowell Day flag, a massive 9-by-20 banner that paradegoers were invited to sign, doodle and write on after the parade.

The event of carrying and decorating the flag is planned to become an annual tradition in future year’s festivities, organizers say.

For Wes Davis, chair of Hallowell’s Tree Board, forward-thinking goes beyond just next year’s parade. He led a group of marchers in the parade each carrying bundles of tree saplings they were handing out to people watching from the roadside.

The Tree Board hands out different types of native tree saplings each year during the parade, Davis said, to get more people personally involved with combating climate change by planting and taking care of native trees.

“We need people to think about aesthetic and environmental quality, and we need kids to get focused on thinking about the future,” he said. “We’re trying to promote fighting global climate change and trying to get young people, everybody in our community involved in planting.”

The theme of creating something new from something old carried through with the “trash art” contest, in which residents are invited to create sculptures and art pieces out of trash and recycled material.

The Old Hallowell Day parade draws a crowd Saturday as it heads down Water Street in Hallowell. Joe Phelan/Kennebec Journal

David “Diesel” Marquis was among the eight artists who submitted pieces to this year’s competition, submitting a small replica of a home made of materials that Hallowell’s North Bay Recycling Center could not process, like plastic bottle caps, shopping bags and Styrofoam.

Though he creates everything from carved wood sculptures to dinosaur skeletons made of propane tanks, Marquis said his use of “rejected” materials for the context was symbolic of his approach to making all of his art: Making new art from old things.

“I see the art in the object,” he said. “You see a log, I can see a hummingbird. There’s something there and I can get it out. That’s why I make art.”

Thousands of people lined Water Street in downtown Hallowell for the annual parade Friday morning and a slate of Old Hallowell Day festivities continuing into Saturday afternoon, with live music throughout the day, film and play screenings, and a fireworks show in the evening.