You name it and Roberto Costa has probably turned it into a mosaic:
his kitchen sink, his garage floor, a community garden display.Browse
our large selection of ceramic wall tiles in all colors at the LOWEST prices! He even helped mosaic every wall of a public restroom.
But
the one initiative that has taken on a life of its own is the
transformation of Oakland's public trash bins into colorful works of
art.
What began two years ago as a beautification project in
Costa's neighborhood, the Allendale Park section of East Oakland, has
spread from High Street and 35th Avenue to Seminary Avenue, Foothill
Boulevard, Grand Avenue and Telegraph Avenue.
By the city's
count, 63 public trash bins have become mosaic pallets with the help of
volunteer artists like Costa and Daud Abdullah and more than $1,We offer
best Crystal Mosaic 4x300x300mm.100 in grants from the nonprofit Keep Oakland Beautiful.
More mosaic trash cans are in the works for Oakland's Laurel district and the city of Richmond.
"I
love those trash cans," said Councilwoman Libby Schaaf, who has handed
out "Local Hero" awards to several of the volunteer artists. Her
favorite trash can design, a peace sign made out of daisies, adorns her
district newsletter. "To me they're like flowers growing around High
Street," she said.
Costa, an amateur artist and full-time
analyst for the city of Oakland's Rent Adjustment Program, decided to
bring decorative trash bins to Oakland after seeing them in Arcata.
Originally
the artists planned to do just one design, but more volunteers came on
board with their own vision for the garbage bins of Allendale Park.
"It
was a great community organizing tool," said Beverly Shalom, a social
worker who helped design several bins. "We deal with crime and blight,
and some of us felt that instead of only focusing on the negative, we
would focus on something positive that would make people care more about
their neighborhood."
From Allendale Park, the mosaic trash cans
quickly spread to nearby Maxwell Park, where many of the same
volunteers participated in a four-year community project to transform
the local park's public restroom into a mosaic.
"When I saw what
they were doing, I knew I had to figure out a way to do them too," said
Daud Abdullah, an electrician and artist who helped out on the bathroom
mosaic.
"I had done a lot of community cleanup projects,Creator of the smallest Ceramic Mosaic tiles." Abdullah said. "I liked the idea of making a trash can look so pretty that nobody could miss it."
Through
Oakland's Adopt a Spot volunteer program, Abdullah has single-handedly
decorated more mosaic trash bins than anyone in city -- mostly in deeper
East Oakland, where he said public art was most needed.
"A lot of my cans have peace and love on them because that's what I'm trying to convey," he said.
When
Latin musician Apolinar Andrade saw Abdullah getting ready to work on a
trash bin near his home at High Street and Santa Rita Avenue, he asked
for a music theme. Abdullah and fellow volunteer artist Karen Difrummolo
came up with a guitar, maracas and a design that read "Oakland 'hearts'
Musica."
While Abdullah branched out on his own, Costa has been
working with neighborhood groups interested in decorating their bins.
This year he taught residents in the Adams Point neighborhood to do the
mosaics that have been popping up along Grand Avenue next to Lake
Merritt.
"He was very inspiring and encouraging throughout the
project," said Vivian Romero, who contacted Costa after seeing the
decorated trash cans on High Street.
Costa said the goal of all
his mosaic projects is to strengthen neighborhoods. "It's a community
building effort," he said. "You get to know neighbors that you otherwise
wouldn't know.This series is called the Marble Series because there are marbles in the final cache container."
Volunteers
say the decorated trash bins have mushroomed around town in part
because Oakland is home to a lot of mosaic artists and the Institute of
Mosaic Art in the Jingletown neighborhood. Several volunteers have taken
classes at the institute or gotten supplies from it.
Abduallah
says he often gets donated tiles. He applies the cement mortar, tile and
grout onto a fiberglass mesh that he then affixes to the cement trash
bin. Costa does his work directly on the bin, which he first grades to
create an even surface. Each trash can takes about 20 hours to
completely decorate.
The Fairmont Copley Plaza, Back Bay’s
grande dame hotel, celebrated its centennial this year with a $20
million restoration. But certain things never change: Catie Copley, the
genial black Labrador retriever, still meanders around the reception
area, thumping her tail and greeting guests. When she needs a break from
her hospitality duties, she can curl up on her new padded (but
tastefully restrained) dog bed,Check out the collection CRYSTAL MOSAIC
of china-mosaics. her reward for enduring a stream of renovators for
almost a year. With its brushed fabric and rolled arms, that canine
cushion signals the hotel’s renovation strategy of melding comfortable
modern style with grand surroundings.
For the full Copley Plaza
experience, enter through the St. James Avenue door flanked by stone
lions and proceed down the mosaic-tiled walkway of “Peacock Alley” into
the vast, barrel-vaulted main lobby. The word “lavish” comes to mind. So
does “opulent.” The public areas are as overwhelming today as when the
hotel opened in 1912, five years after its Manhattan big sister, the
Plaza.
The Copley Plaza represents the stylistic apogee of its
age: a display of wealth and glamour meant to wow all who see it. It was
brash and nouveau riche, yet nonetheless stunning. Time has erased the
nouveau, leaving behind only the riche, and ornamentation that might
have seemed gauche in 1912 seems adroit today. In renovating and
restoring this bejeweled grande dame, Fairmont has burnished the beauty
of the public spaces, and redone the rooms in a less showy but no less
luxurious style appropriate to a new century.
Eight of the
suites got an upgraded treatment themed to what the hotel calls “an
iconic Boston institution.” They include the Museum of Fine Arts, the
Boston Pops, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Freedom Trail, the JFK
Library and Museum, the Boston Public Library, the Museum of Science —
and Catie Copley. (She’s a sweet Lab, but an “iconic institution”?)
Marvelous photos and memorabilia strike each theme.
One new
addition is the 3,000-square-foot health club at the roof level, which
opens to an outdoor observation deck on the west side of the building.
The club is mainly accessed by stairs (hey — you’re going for a
workout!), but an elevator from the sixth floor also accommodates
wheelchair users. State-of-the-art TechnoGym machines fill the space.
Chilled washcloths are a nice touch.
Fairmont did make some
changes to the ground-level public areas, most notably installing a
snazzy, vaguely Deco-styled lobby lounge so guests have a place to sit
while awaiting dinner companions or business associates. The Oak Long
Bar + Kitchen has replaced the old Oak Room and Oak Bar. The more
modernized, breezier venue can be entered from the main lobby as well as
from St. James Avenue. Only open since summer, the Oak Long Bar has the
kind of timeless styling that makes it seem as if it’s been around
since 1912.
As you might expect from a hotel with a doggie
ambassador,the Fairmont Copley Plaza is extremely dog friendly, hosting
at least two guest canines each week. Doubles from $289; check for
specials; $25 per day surcharge for dogs.
2012年12月23日星期日
Who's Taking Care Of These Buildings
After all,A car parking system
is a mechanical device that multiplies parking capacity inside a
parking lot. better to get your hands dirty, wield a hammer, spill a
little paint, or do some plumbing to fix a small problem now rather than
be overwhelmed by a massive, and expensive, repair job later, right?
But if you spend any time in the national parks, you'll find weary structures that need attention ranging from a coat or two of fresh paint to more substantial structural fixes.
More than a few of these taxpayer-owned lodges are on the National Register of Historic Places, which, by definition, is "the official list of the Nation's historic places worthy of preservation." Yet there are places in the National Park System, unfortunately, where the preservation seems to be falling behind.
The reasons behind these needs are many: More than a few lodges and associated facilities are located in areas with relatively harsh climates, many are quite old and built at a time when building standards were less stringent than today's, and, of course, many of these facilities have seen a lot of use since they first opened their doors. They are indeed old and weary.
Plus, with the short operating seasons in some national parks, there's very little profit margin.
“How in the world can you recoup a million-dollar investment in three months?" said Shenandoah National Park Superintendent Martha Bogle. “It's a risky business operating concessions in national parks where you get snow or hurricane-force winds and you have to evacuate people off mountains."
In short, the weary state of some historic lodges in the system can be traced back to the National Park Service and to concessionaires and the folks they hire to manage these facilities. In some cases, maintenance to-do items accrue as parks change concessionaires; the outgoing business might not have had the incentive to stay atop of deteriorating needs, and as a result the incoming concessionaire is handed a sometimes substantial construction punch list to tackle.
Too, a problem faced at some locations is management turnover. New managers might spend a great deal of their time learning the ropes and taking care of personnel matters, and thus have little time to uncover and correct all but major maintenance problems.
Dick Ring, who ended his Park Service career as associate director for administration and business programs with oversight of concessions, says many lodges suffer from being old,Natural stone and Glass Mixed Metallic blend with any design style.Metal and Sand Stone Mosaic and tiles and new trends in Porcelain Tiles. from the paperwork that runs the concessions system, and from the performance of some concessionaires.
“Almost all of them (the lodges) are run as a commercial operation, which is great. Almost all of them are historic, which adds about 20 pounds more of process and clearance if you’re going to do anything significant, aside from day-to-day maintenance," said Mr. Ring, who now works for the National Park Trust. "And the needs that they are in, almost all of them have reached an advanced stage where the needs are far beyond just a coat of paint and a new screen door.
“And part of that may be due to not holding the concessionaires’ feet to the fire well enough over the years," he added.Browse our large selection of ceramic wall tiles in all colors at the LOWEST prices! "But part of that is also due to buildings having a useful life expectancy when they’re being heavily used."
Things got so bad at the Paradise Inn that it was shut down for two years while substantial repairs were made to the very foundation of the lodge as well as to the wiring and plumbing and even the rock fireplaces, which were deemed unstable. Despite extensive repairs made during the two-year closing, a shortage of funds available for the project means much remains to be done at the inn.
The Ahwahnee Inn early this year came out from a substantial refurbishing effort undertaken by Delaware North Parks & Resorts that included an upgrade of the fire and life safety equipment, brand new beds, linens and throw blankets, carpeting in the guest rooms and hallways, drapes and woven-wood window shades, the completion of HDTV installation for the flat-screen televisions, new public men’s and women’s restrooms on the main and Mezzanine floors, restored flooring in the lobby, and new and restored furniture and original artwork in the Great Lounge and throughout the common spaces and corridor landing areas.
Many Glacier is still going through the throes of renovations that actually began more than a decade ago. The first several phases of work focused on the building exterior and structural stabilization. In the fall of 2010, Montana-based construction company, Swank Enterprises, began interior work in the north annex and dining room of the hotel.
Life-safety issues that were addressed included seismic stabilization and replacing of electrical, plumbing, mechanical, fire alarm and fire suppression systems, according to park officials.
Things are not so gleaming or finely polished at Shenandoah. In that park, where a new concessionaire takes over January 1, the deferred maintenance punch list is staggering, running to 59 pages (attached). Items needing attention range from pesky things like torn screens, missing hardware, and failing window caulk to more substantial projects that involve rotting porch rafters, corroded copper gutters, and detached chimney flashing.
Dry rot seems rampant, as does poorly caulked windows and bathroom showers. More than a few doors are poorly hung, hardware on windows and doors are missing, there is cracked and missing mortar in chimneys, fireplace hearths, and rock walls, the list notes.
Now, the good news is the list was compiled a few years ago, and some of the most serious problems, such as leaking roofs and structural issues, have been taken care of, notes Superintendent Bogle.Wholesale Gloden Line Mosaic Tile from China. Still, an October visit to Big Meadows Lodge, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, found rooms with rusting light fixtures, cracked bathroom tiles with makeshift fixes, and poorly painted walls and ceilings -- and those problems were just in one room.
Owner Rogelio "Rogo" Rodriguez said he started working by himself doing floors 30 years ago and now has dozens of workers doing floors and some walls, countertops and pool decks. He said faux finishes and the materials they are applied to have evolved continually over the 31 years he's been in the business.
Rogo's uses a proprietary resin and concrete-based mix to put a thin top coat on the surface, horizontal or vertical, that is then hand colored to create whatever look the client wants. The floors, walls, ceiling and countertops of the Rogo's showroom, 3535 S. Palo Verde Road, display the variety of finishes possible.
It's difficult to tell what in the showroom is real and what is faux-finished concrete and drywall. The company also offers traditional Mexican tile, brick, slate and flagstone.
Rodriguez said faux techniques continue to evolve. Rogo's latest faux innovation is a metallic-look finish that is applied to a patented light foam-and-concrete material that can be cut and sculpted into almost any shape, including bathroom basins. Rodriguez said the company has been installing kitchen countertops using slabs of the foam-and-concrete material, instead of cast concrete. He said the material, which weighs a fraction of what cast concrete does, puts less stress on the supporting cabinets. Other advantages are that it doesn't crack, as sometimes happens with cast concrete, and it offers exact color choices - something that Rodriguez said is difficult to do using dyed or stained concrete. It also can take dozens of faux finishes that can make it look like everything from marble and granite to Mexican tile and flagstone.
But if you spend any time in the national parks, you'll find weary structures that need attention ranging from a coat or two of fresh paint to more substantial structural fixes.
More than a few of these taxpayer-owned lodges are on the National Register of Historic Places, which, by definition, is "the official list of the Nation's historic places worthy of preservation." Yet there are places in the National Park System, unfortunately, where the preservation seems to be falling behind.
The reasons behind these needs are many: More than a few lodges and associated facilities are located in areas with relatively harsh climates, many are quite old and built at a time when building standards were less stringent than today's, and, of course, many of these facilities have seen a lot of use since they first opened their doors. They are indeed old and weary.
Plus, with the short operating seasons in some national parks, there's very little profit margin.
“How in the world can you recoup a million-dollar investment in three months?" said Shenandoah National Park Superintendent Martha Bogle. “It's a risky business operating concessions in national parks where you get snow or hurricane-force winds and you have to evacuate people off mountains."
In short, the weary state of some historic lodges in the system can be traced back to the National Park Service and to concessionaires and the folks they hire to manage these facilities. In some cases, maintenance to-do items accrue as parks change concessionaires; the outgoing business might not have had the incentive to stay atop of deteriorating needs, and as a result the incoming concessionaire is handed a sometimes substantial construction punch list to tackle.
Too, a problem faced at some locations is management turnover. New managers might spend a great deal of their time learning the ropes and taking care of personnel matters, and thus have little time to uncover and correct all but major maintenance problems.
Dick Ring, who ended his Park Service career as associate director for administration and business programs with oversight of concessions, says many lodges suffer from being old,Natural stone and Glass Mixed Metallic blend with any design style.Metal and Sand Stone Mosaic and tiles and new trends in Porcelain Tiles. from the paperwork that runs the concessions system, and from the performance of some concessionaires.
“Almost all of them (the lodges) are run as a commercial operation, which is great. Almost all of them are historic, which adds about 20 pounds more of process and clearance if you’re going to do anything significant, aside from day-to-day maintenance," said Mr. Ring, who now works for the National Park Trust. "And the needs that they are in, almost all of them have reached an advanced stage where the needs are far beyond just a coat of paint and a new screen door.
“And part of that may be due to not holding the concessionaires’ feet to the fire well enough over the years," he added.Browse our large selection of ceramic wall tiles in all colors at the LOWEST prices! "But part of that is also due to buildings having a useful life expectancy when they’re being heavily used."
Things got so bad at the Paradise Inn that it was shut down for two years while substantial repairs were made to the very foundation of the lodge as well as to the wiring and plumbing and even the rock fireplaces, which were deemed unstable. Despite extensive repairs made during the two-year closing, a shortage of funds available for the project means much remains to be done at the inn.
The Ahwahnee Inn early this year came out from a substantial refurbishing effort undertaken by Delaware North Parks & Resorts that included an upgrade of the fire and life safety equipment, brand new beds, linens and throw blankets, carpeting in the guest rooms and hallways, drapes and woven-wood window shades, the completion of HDTV installation for the flat-screen televisions, new public men’s and women’s restrooms on the main and Mezzanine floors, restored flooring in the lobby, and new and restored furniture and original artwork in the Great Lounge and throughout the common spaces and corridor landing areas.
Many Glacier is still going through the throes of renovations that actually began more than a decade ago. The first several phases of work focused on the building exterior and structural stabilization. In the fall of 2010, Montana-based construction company, Swank Enterprises, began interior work in the north annex and dining room of the hotel.
Life-safety issues that were addressed included seismic stabilization and replacing of electrical, plumbing, mechanical, fire alarm and fire suppression systems, according to park officials.
Things are not so gleaming or finely polished at Shenandoah. In that park, where a new concessionaire takes over January 1, the deferred maintenance punch list is staggering, running to 59 pages (attached). Items needing attention range from pesky things like torn screens, missing hardware, and failing window caulk to more substantial projects that involve rotting porch rafters, corroded copper gutters, and detached chimney flashing.
Dry rot seems rampant, as does poorly caulked windows and bathroom showers. More than a few doors are poorly hung, hardware on windows and doors are missing, there is cracked and missing mortar in chimneys, fireplace hearths, and rock walls, the list notes.
Now, the good news is the list was compiled a few years ago, and some of the most serious problems, such as leaking roofs and structural issues, have been taken care of, notes Superintendent Bogle.Wholesale Gloden Line Mosaic Tile from China. Still, an October visit to Big Meadows Lodge, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, found rooms with rusting light fixtures, cracked bathroom tiles with makeshift fixes, and poorly painted walls and ceilings -- and those problems were just in one room.
Owner Rogelio "Rogo" Rodriguez said he started working by himself doing floors 30 years ago and now has dozens of workers doing floors and some walls, countertops and pool decks. He said faux finishes and the materials they are applied to have evolved continually over the 31 years he's been in the business.
Rogo's uses a proprietary resin and concrete-based mix to put a thin top coat on the surface, horizontal or vertical, that is then hand colored to create whatever look the client wants. The floors, walls, ceiling and countertops of the Rogo's showroom, 3535 S. Palo Verde Road, display the variety of finishes possible.
It's difficult to tell what in the showroom is real and what is faux-finished concrete and drywall. The company also offers traditional Mexican tile, brick, slate and flagstone.
Rodriguez said faux techniques continue to evolve. Rogo's latest faux innovation is a metallic-look finish that is applied to a patented light foam-and-concrete material that can be cut and sculpted into almost any shape, including bathroom basins. Rodriguez said the company has been installing kitchen countertops using slabs of the foam-and-concrete material, instead of cast concrete. He said the material, which weighs a fraction of what cast concrete does, puts less stress on the supporting cabinets. Other advantages are that it doesn't crack, as sometimes happens with cast concrete, and it offers exact color choices - something that Rodriguez said is difficult to do using dyed or stained concrete. It also can take dozens of faux finishes that can make it look like everything from marble and granite to Mexican tile and flagstone.
Northwest Travel: Nehalem Bay
One of the simple pleasures of being a writer is
that I am sometimes able to join two names of decidedly different eras in a
single stream of consciousness — such as those of Fig Walnut and Sir Francis
Drake.
Although Drake’s lifetime and that of Ms. Walnut missed overlapping by nearly four centuries, both individuals have ties to the estuary of the Nehalem River, at the northern edge of Tillamook County on the Oregon Coast.
Recent historical research suggests that Drake spent five weeks within the Nehalem River mouth in the summer of 1579,The leader supplier of china glass mosaic. during which time he made extensive repairs on his ship, the Golden Hind.
For centuries he was believed to have harbored on the Northern California coast, claiming “Nova Albion" (New Britain) for Queen Elizabeth I. But historians have discovered that Drake falsified many of his maps and journal entries to hide his actual location from the Spanish. Plentiful new evidence suggests that it was here, at the foot of a mountain the Tillamook Indians called “Neah-kah-nie," that the British privateer found a quiet haven.
The very fact that Drake slept here gives credence to a longtime local legend — that a chest of pirate treasure is buried on the slopes of Neahkahnie Mountain, which rises 1,795 feet above the Pacific Ocean near the resort village of Manzanita.
This story is not unknown to Fig Walnut. She adopted the stage name some years ago to accent her work as a jazz singer (she has several recordings) and a textile artist. She is also the bartender at Dixie Lee’s Vino Manzanita wine bar, and it was in this capacity that she advised me to climb the mountain.
The 1?-mile hike to the summit actually took me closer to an hour, even though I took off from the higher of the two trailheads. (The north trailhead, beginning on U.S. Highway 101 in Oswald West State Park, is an extension of the Oregon Coastal Trail; I started a mile nearer to Manzanita, off a short gravel road that wound up the hillside.)
The walk was steeper than I had anticipated,Enjoy zero guilt with only five calories when you enjoy crystal light beverage mix. like Pilot Butte times three.Discover Modern pendant lamp online, I counted 14 switchbacks on the lower slopes alone. Cut through sword ferns and the thorny stalks of salmonberries bereft of summer fruit, the trail was well maintained, but it was muddy in patches from a rainstorm that had passed through the night before.
I often found myself scrambling over Sitka spruce roots so thick they formed gnarled staircases in the mountainside. More than once I stumbled.
The switchbacks ceased where the trail crossed a primitive road. It then wound around Neahkahnie’s northeastern flank. Far below me, I could see and hear loggers at work. But the trail’s ascent was gentle from here until the very end, where it zigzagged twice more over a ridge to the mountain’s seaward side, just beneath a final rocky pinnacle.A new Lamp shade is a quick and easy way to bring a fresh look to your home.
Fig was right: The view was stunning, despite a light haze blowing in from the Pacific that kept it from being absolutely crystal clear. This was a treasure worth holding in memory. Row after row of ocean surf washed a perfect, crescent-shaped beach that stretched for miles to the south. Behind the golden sand in the near distance, the homes of Manzanita protruded through a forest of shore pine.
Beyond the beach, the Nehalem River jetty marked the point where Drake must have entered the harbor. It broadened into a shallow but placid anchorage where one might easily have imagined a medieval galleon finding moorage.
At the Nehalem Valley Historical Society, volunteer Lila Hendrickson told me that Indian lore first enticed early settlers to look for Neahkahnie’s pirate treasure in the 19th century. Since 1890, when the first of several carved rocks were discovered at various places around the mountain, small fortunes have been invested — and a few lives lost — trying to decipher the glyphs to find the treasure. Yet it remains a mystery.
In the sands of Manzanita Beach, at the foot of Neahkahnie Mountain, a different sort of treasure has been found: Beeswax. Once prized in candle-making before man learned to harness electricity, beeswax washed ashore from a shipwreck here between 1694 and 1705. Historical records confirm that a Spanish galleon was blown off course while en route from Manila to the missions of Mexico and California.
“They’ve even found Philippine bees in the wax," Hendrickson assured me. She showed me several pieces of beeswax kept behind the counter of the historical museum. “People are still finding it on the beach, all the time," she said.
“We use a process called ‘scavo,’ which is Italian for unearthed," Roger Crosta explained to me. “It’s an obscure Venetian technique that requires sifting a mix of organic compounds on an unformed glass piece, then blowing and shaping it without tools. It’s all hand-blown, but it’s rough in texture and looks like it’s been dug up after hundreds of years."
Laneda Avenue, Manzanita’s main street, is about eight blocks long from Highway 101 to the Pacific Ocean. En route, it passes two banks, the town library, city hall and a slew of small shops that include a couple of galleries, two bookstores, two grocery stores, several beachwear stores and a pet boutique.
There are even two spas serving the community. And recreational purveyors offer bicycles, surfboards and stand-up paddleboard rentals and lessons.
Though small, Manzanita has a variety of lodging options: motels, vacation rentals and bed-and-breakfast inns. At the top end is the luxurious, beachside Inn at Manzanita. I saved money by spending two nights off the beach at the pet-friendly San Dune Inn; unpretentious and comfortable, it is operated by a jolly Englishman named Brian Hines.
There is a surprising variety of dining options, a dozen in all. I ended my visit convinced that the Terra Cotta Cafe serves the best food between Cannon Beach and Lincoln City. My paper-wrapped halibut was perfectly poached, and the selection of wines was outstanding.
But for pure quirkiness, nowhere beats Wanda’s Cafe, just down the road from Manzanita in tiny Nehalem. No sooner had I walked in the door than a waiter asked if I was meeting someone named Joseph for lunch. “He’s been waiting there for quite a while," he said. I assured him I was not — then laid my eyes upon an illuminated plastic mold of St. Joseph, sitting piously at his own table.
Once a bustling logging community, Nehalem today is down to a couple hundred residents. In decades now long past, the town was partially built upon the river itself, with log planks supporting structures beside a lumber mill that cut logs carried by rail from further inland. The logs were then shipped out through the river mouth.
Today, a single row of two-story buildings on either side of Highway 101, where it makes a 90-degree turn through the village from the north, is the only real clue to its former prosperity. Cross streets end abruptly at municipal piers that are all but submerged twice daily by estuarine tides; when they meet heavy rains flowing downstream, the overflow sometimes floods the highway itself. A regal high school that once served the entire valley stands two blocks away, its purpose having been diminished to that of an elementary school.
“They say you’re losing your mind. They say you’re leaving Nehalem," wrote Art Alexakis of the Portland band Everclear in 1995. In fact, a lot of citizens have departed over the years. But it remains a picturesque community, especially as viewed from the southbound highway bridge over the river.
Just across the bridge, state Highway 53 branches east to the hamlet of Mohler, home to the Nehalem Bay Winery. A part of the community since 1974, when Oregon’s fermented grape business was just getting off the ground, this winery is at home in a historic creamery. Although it’s best known for its berry and fruit wines, it also offers some reputable chardonnays and pinot noirs from Salem-area vineyards.
Wheeler is built on the lower slope of steep Onion Mountain overlooking Nehalem Bay. A small riverfront marina provides inspiration for some visitors to get out on the water. Highway 101 cruises through the town of 350 people, past the Old Wheeler Hotel — whose eight historic rooms (dating from 1920) now offer an elegant bed-and-breakfast experience — and a row of antique stores.
Greg Nichols and his wife,Unglazed american glazed porcelain tile and flooring inspired. Katie Brown, own both the hotel and Old Wheeler Antiques and Collectibles. They moved to town in 2008 and began buying art deco-era fixtures for the refurbishment. And Nichols had an “Aha!" moment, one as simple as turning on a light bulb. Or a whole lot of light bulbs.
The first thing a visitor now sees upon entering Old Wheeler Antiques is a display room showcasing a couple hundred lamps from the 1920s and ’30s. There’s a lot more in the expansive store, to be sure, but these are Nichols’ calling card. Just this year, in fact, he struck a deal to provide a West Hollywood restaurateur with 100 period pieces to decorate a new Southern California business.
Although Drake’s lifetime and that of Ms. Walnut missed overlapping by nearly four centuries, both individuals have ties to the estuary of the Nehalem River, at the northern edge of Tillamook County on the Oregon Coast.
Recent historical research suggests that Drake spent five weeks within the Nehalem River mouth in the summer of 1579,The leader supplier of china glass mosaic. during which time he made extensive repairs on his ship, the Golden Hind.
For centuries he was believed to have harbored on the Northern California coast, claiming “Nova Albion" (New Britain) for Queen Elizabeth I. But historians have discovered that Drake falsified many of his maps and journal entries to hide his actual location from the Spanish. Plentiful new evidence suggests that it was here, at the foot of a mountain the Tillamook Indians called “Neah-kah-nie," that the British privateer found a quiet haven.
The very fact that Drake slept here gives credence to a longtime local legend — that a chest of pirate treasure is buried on the slopes of Neahkahnie Mountain, which rises 1,795 feet above the Pacific Ocean near the resort village of Manzanita.
This story is not unknown to Fig Walnut. She adopted the stage name some years ago to accent her work as a jazz singer (she has several recordings) and a textile artist. She is also the bartender at Dixie Lee’s Vino Manzanita wine bar, and it was in this capacity that she advised me to climb the mountain.
The 1?-mile hike to the summit actually took me closer to an hour, even though I took off from the higher of the two trailheads. (The north trailhead, beginning on U.S. Highway 101 in Oswald West State Park, is an extension of the Oregon Coastal Trail; I started a mile nearer to Manzanita, off a short gravel road that wound up the hillside.)
The walk was steeper than I had anticipated,Enjoy zero guilt with only five calories when you enjoy crystal light beverage mix. like Pilot Butte times three.Discover Modern pendant lamp online, I counted 14 switchbacks on the lower slopes alone. Cut through sword ferns and the thorny stalks of salmonberries bereft of summer fruit, the trail was well maintained, but it was muddy in patches from a rainstorm that had passed through the night before.
I often found myself scrambling over Sitka spruce roots so thick they formed gnarled staircases in the mountainside. More than once I stumbled.
The switchbacks ceased where the trail crossed a primitive road. It then wound around Neahkahnie’s northeastern flank. Far below me, I could see and hear loggers at work. But the trail’s ascent was gentle from here until the very end, where it zigzagged twice more over a ridge to the mountain’s seaward side, just beneath a final rocky pinnacle.A new Lamp shade is a quick and easy way to bring a fresh look to your home.
Fig was right: The view was stunning, despite a light haze blowing in from the Pacific that kept it from being absolutely crystal clear. This was a treasure worth holding in memory. Row after row of ocean surf washed a perfect, crescent-shaped beach that stretched for miles to the south. Behind the golden sand in the near distance, the homes of Manzanita protruded through a forest of shore pine.
Beyond the beach, the Nehalem River jetty marked the point where Drake must have entered the harbor. It broadened into a shallow but placid anchorage where one might easily have imagined a medieval galleon finding moorage.
At the Nehalem Valley Historical Society, volunteer Lila Hendrickson told me that Indian lore first enticed early settlers to look for Neahkahnie’s pirate treasure in the 19th century. Since 1890, when the first of several carved rocks were discovered at various places around the mountain, small fortunes have been invested — and a few lives lost — trying to decipher the glyphs to find the treasure. Yet it remains a mystery.
In the sands of Manzanita Beach, at the foot of Neahkahnie Mountain, a different sort of treasure has been found: Beeswax. Once prized in candle-making before man learned to harness electricity, beeswax washed ashore from a shipwreck here between 1694 and 1705. Historical records confirm that a Spanish galleon was blown off course while en route from Manila to the missions of Mexico and California.
“They’ve even found Philippine bees in the wax," Hendrickson assured me. She showed me several pieces of beeswax kept behind the counter of the historical museum. “People are still finding it on the beach, all the time," she said.
“We use a process called ‘scavo,’ which is Italian for unearthed," Roger Crosta explained to me. “It’s an obscure Venetian technique that requires sifting a mix of organic compounds on an unformed glass piece, then blowing and shaping it without tools. It’s all hand-blown, but it’s rough in texture and looks like it’s been dug up after hundreds of years."
Laneda Avenue, Manzanita’s main street, is about eight blocks long from Highway 101 to the Pacific Ocean. En route, it passes two banks, the town library, city hall and a slew of small shops that include a couple of galleries, two bookstores, two grocery stores, several beachwear stores and a pet boutique.
There are even two spas serving the community. And recreational purveyors offer bicycles, surfboards and stand-up paddleboard rentals and lessons.
Though small, Manzanita has a variety of lodging options: motels, vacation rentals and bed-and-breakfast inns. At the top end is the luxurious, beachside Inn at Manzanita. I saved money by spending two nights off the beach at the pet-friendly San Dune Inn; unpretentious and comfortable, it is operated by a jolly Englishman named Brian Hines.
There is a surprising variety of dining options, a dozen in all. I ended my visit convinced that the Terra Cotta Cafe serves the best food between Cannon Beach and Lincoln City. My paper-wrapped halibut was perfectly poached, and the selection of wines was outstanding.
But for pure quirkiness, nowhere beats Wanda’s Cafe, just down the road from Manzanita in tiny Nehalem. No sooner had I walked in the door than a waiter asked if I was meeting someone named Joseph for lunch. “He’s been waiting there for quite a while," he said. I assured him I was not — then laid my eyes upon an illuminated plastic mold of St. Joseph, sitting piously at his own table.
Once a bustling logging community, Nehalem today is down to a couple hundred residents. In decades now long past, the town was partially built upon the river itself, with log planks supporting structures beside a lumber mill that cut logs carried by rail from further inland. The logs were then shipped out through the river mouth.
Today, a single row of two-story buildings on either side of Highway 101, where it makes a 90-degree turn through the village from the north, is the only real clue to its former prosperity. Cross streets end abruptly at municipal piers that are all but submerged twice daily by estuarine tides; when they meet heavy rains flowing downstream, the overflow sometimes floods the highway itself. A regal high school that once served the entire valley stands two blocks away, its purpose having been diminished to that of an elementary school.
“They say you’re losing your mind. They say you’re leaving Nehalem," wrote Art Alexakis of the Portland band Everclear in 1995. In fact, a lot of citizens have departed over the years. But it remains a picturesque community, especially as viewed from the southbound highway bridge over the river.
Just across the bridge, state Highway 53 branches east to the hamlet of Mohler, home to the Nehalem Bay Winery. A part of the community since 1974, when Oregon’s fermented grape business was just getting off the ground, this winery is at home in a historic creamery. Although it’s best known for its berry and fruit wines, it also offers some reputable chardonnays and pinot noirs from Salem-area vineyards.
Wheeler is built on the lower slope of steep Onion Mountain overlooking Nehalem Bay. A small riverfront marina provides inspiration for some visitors to get out on the water. Highway 101 cruises through the town of 350 people, past the Old Wheeler Hotel — whose eight historic rooms (dating from 1920) now offer an elegant bed-and-breakfast experience — and a row of antique stores.
Greg Nichols and his wife,Unglazed american glazed porcelain tile and flooring inspired. Katie Brown, own both the hotel and Old Wheeler Antiques and Collectibles. They moved to town in 2008 and began buying art deco-era fixtures for the refurbishment. And Nichols had an “Aha!" moment, one as simple as turning on a light bulb. Or a whole lot of light bulbs.
The first thing a visitor now sees upon entering Old Wheeler Antiques is a display room showcasing a couple hundred lamps from the 1920s and ’30s. There’s a lot more in the expansive store, to be sure, but these are Nichols’ calling card. Just this year, in fact, he struck a deal to provide a West Hollywood restaurateur with 100 period pieces to decorate a new Southern California business.
Remembering Ryan Freel
It became almost a daily routine in the Cincinnati Reds clubhouse in
the mid-2000s. Ryan Freel would do something, or say something, or a
look a certain way, and those who were around him on a regular basis
immediately could deduce whether "Good Freel" or "Bad Freel" had showed
up to work that day.
The difference was stark. Some days, the Reds' usually frenetic utilityman would simply sit in his chair and stare into his locker, not interacting with anyone about anything. Other days, he would bounce around the room, greeting anyone in his path -- teammates, clubhouse attendants, reporters -- with over-the-top enthusiasm and occasionally a bear hug.
Baseball clubhouses being what they are, cracks about whether Freel was on or off his medication that day inevitably followed. Everyone knew the guy had issues, and he was more open about them than most. But he fought through them, spending parts of eight seasons in the majors and making a few million dollars along the way.
For a 5-foot-10, 185-pound runt from Jacksonville, Fla., you could say that was living the dream.
Indeed,Discover Modern pendant lamp online, on his good days, it was easy to imagine Freel heading home after a day game and chatting up the neighborhood kids on the stoop, like John Cusack as Buck Weaver in "Eight Men Out." The darker side was never far away, though, and Saturday it finally overwhelmed him.
Freel was at his peak as a player from 2004-06, appearing in at least 100 games each year in that stretch (and never topping 75 in another campaign). Those also happened to be the three seasons I served as the Reds beat writer for the old Cincinnati Post, so I had the opportunity to spend quite a bit of time in his wake.
He was a fascinating guy, largely devoid of the natural athletic gifts that teammates like Ken Griffey Jr., Adam Dunn and Brandon Phillips could boast. He found his way to the Reds after eight years spent mostly in the Blue Jays' farm system thanks in large part to his reckless abandon on the field.
In that sense, he was the perfect Cincinnati player. The Queen City is always on the lookout for the latest incarnation of native son Pete Rose, and Freel slid noisily into that mold. Starting at least 10 games at five different positions in 2004, he proved valuable enough to accumulate nearly 600 plate appearances in his first full big-league season.
The fans loved him, even if his teammates weren't quite sure what to make of him. He certainly could be ingratiating, but his dirty-uniform style also could rub the wrong way -- especially on a mediocre team in the dog days of August. It's just the way he was wired.
He came up to me in the clubhouse one day and laughed about a poster the Reds' athletic trainers had showed him listing potential symptoms of Attention Deficit Disorder: "I'm like, 'I've got that one, and that one, and that one, and that one, and that one, and that one…' "
Openness and accessibility were hallmarks for Freel. The usual platitudes dispensed by professional athletes were mostly absent in conversations with him. More often than not, he would come up and ask you how you were doing. And if you asked him the same, he'd probably provide something far closer to an honest answer than most of us give to that throwaway question.
The last time I saw him was in 2009, when I was covering the Rays and he was with the Royals, his third of three big-league teams in the final season of his career. I walked up to him during batting practice and,The leader supplier of china glass mosaic. yes, asked how he was doing. "Not so good," he said, sounding utterly defeated. He did mention his wife and daughters at home and eventually shook hands and went back to work.
Not long after that, his career in the majors was over. The edge was gone, blunted too many times by the physical beating he inflicted upon himself -- including, famously, diving headlong into the Dodger Stadium stands one night in futile pursuit of a foul ball -- and the mental grind that affects every player over the course of another long season.A new Lamp shade is a quick and easy way to bring a fresh look to your home.
"I would catch myself focusing on faces when I would watch TV,Enjoy zero guilt with only five calories when you enjoy crystal light beverage mix." Moreno said. "I would really study someone's eyes and nose and memorize what I was seeing and then try to recreate it in the clay. Some days the clay would be so hard to work with that all I would get done might be a set of eyes and a nose."
Nichols was in awe when she finally got to see what Moreno had created. He didn't show any of the heads to anyone until he had all 10 done.
"He showed me what he had done," said Nichols. "First of all, I was totally amazed. Then, I told him that they had to be put into the faculty and staff art show for everyone to see and enjoy.Unglazed american glazed porcelain tile and flooring inspired."
Nichols rallied a few of her fellow faculty to find a suitable glass showcase -- a cleaned up aquarium from the biology lab -- after all, the faces are, and will always be, soft since the clay used to create them is not the kind that can be fired or dried out to become hardened.
In his modest character, Moreno doesn't take the kind of credit he should for the magnitude of his artistic talent. He didn't have any intention of keeping the faces and felt certain that after the show, they would be wadded back into balls and returned to the putty can. His colleagues on campus have different ideas.
"I've had several offer to pay to replace the clay for the lab so that Jesse's creations can be kept on display in our building," Nichols notes. "The consensus is that the collection of 10 characters must be shown off for others to enjoy year-round."
Moreno's own sister, Geneva Skeels, who saw his artwork at the gallery for the first time, was blown away by his talent. Moreno's immediate family has yet to see the creations. His grandchildren will probably be so surprised to learn that he can make faces. The art show closed on Dec. 14 with the end of the fall semester.
One faculty member suggested that he try making some of the sculptures with a particular kind of clay that is used by veterinarians when they need to make a mold of an animal part when creating casts or other devices for medical treatment. That kind of clay can be baked in the oven and it becomes hard as nails. Moreno looks forward to trying it once he finds out where to get some of it. He says he will do more sculpting in the future.
The difference was stark. Some days, the Reds' usually frenetic utilityman would simply sit in his chair and stare into his locker, not interacting with anyone about anything. Other days, he would bounce around the room, greeting anyone in his path -- teammates, clubhouse attendants, reporters -- with over-the-top enthusiasm and occasionally a bear hug.
Baseball clubhouses being what they are, cracks about whether Freel was on or off his medication that day inevitably followed. Everyone knew the guy had issues, and he was more open about them than most. But he fought through them, spending parts of eight seasons in the majors and making a few million dollars along the way.
For a 5-foot-10, 185-pound runt from Jacksonville, Fla., you could say that was living the dream.
Indeed,Discover Modern pendant lamp online, on his good days, it was easy to imagine Freel heading home after a day game and chatting up the neighborhood kids on the stoop, like John Cusack as Buck Weaver in "Eight Men Out." The darker side was never far away, though, and Saturday it finally overwhelmed him.
Freel was at his peak as a player from 2004-06, appearing in at least 100 games each year in that stretch (and never topping 75 in another campaign). Those also happened to be the three seasons I served as the Reds beat writer for the old Cincinnati Post, so I had the opportunity to spend quite a bit of time in his wake.
He was a fascinating guy, largely devoid of the natural athletic gifts that teammates like Ken Griffey Jr., Adam Dunn and Brandon Phillips could boast. He found his way to the Reds after eight years spent mostly in the Blue Jays' farm system thanks in large part to his reckless abandon on the field.
In that sense, he was the perfect Cincinnati player. The Queen City is always on the lookout for the latest incarnation of native son Pete Rose, and Freel slid noisily into that mold. Starting at least 10 games at five different positions in 2004, he proved valuable enough to accumulate nearly 600 plate appearances in his first full big-league season.
The fans loved him, even if his teammates weren't quite sure what to make of him. He certainly could be ingratiating, but his dirty-uniform style also could rub the wrong way -- especially on a mediocre team in the dog days of August. It's just the way he was wired.
He came up to me in the clubhouse one day and laughed about a poster the Reds' athletic trainers had showed him listing potential symptoms of Attention Deficit Disorder: "I'm like, 'I've got that one, and that one, and that one, and that one, and that one, and that one…' "
Openness and accessibility were hallmarks for Freel. The usual platitudes dispensed by professional athletes were mostly absent in conversations with him. More often than not, he would come up and ask you how you were doing. And if you asked him the same, he'd probably provide something far closer to an honest answer than most of us give to that throwaway question.
The last time I saw him was in 2009, when I was covering the Rays and he was with the Royals, his third of three big-league teams in the final season of his career. I walked up to him during batting practice and,The leader supplier of china glass mosaic. yes, asked how he was doing. "Not so good," he said, sounding utterly defeated. He did mention his wife and daughters at home and eventually shook hands and went back to work.
Not long after that, his career in the majors was over. The edge was gone, blunted too many times by the physical beating he inflicted upon himself -- including, famously, diving headlong into the Dodger Stadium stands one night in futile pursuit of a foul ball -- and the mental grind that affects every player over the course of another long season.A new Lamp shade is a quick and easy way to bring a fresh look to your home.
"I would catch myself focusing on faces when I would watch TV,Enjoy zero guilt with only five calories when you enjoy crystal light beverage mix." Moreno said. "I would really study someone's eyes and nose and memorize what I was seeing and then try to recreate it in the clay. Some days the clay would be so hard to work with that all I would get done might be a set of eyes and a nose."
Nichols was in awe when she finally got to see what Moreno had created. He didn't show any of the heads to anyone until he had all 10 done.
"He showed me what he had done," said Nichols. "First of all, I was totally amazed. Then, I told him that they had to be put into the faculty and staff art show for everyone to see and enjoy.Unglazed american glazed porcelain tile and flooring inspired."
Nichols rallied a few of her fellow faculty to find a suitable glass showcase -- a cleaned up aquarium from the biology lab -- after all, the faces are, and will always be, soft since the clay used to create them is not the kind that can be fired or dried out to become hardened.
In his modest character, Moreno doesn't take the kind of credit he should for the magnitude of his artistic talent. He didn't have any intention of keeping the faces and felt certain that after the show, they would be wadded back into balls and returned to the putty can. His colleagues on campus have different ideas.
"I've had several offer to pay to replace the clay for the lab so that Jesse's creations can be kept on display in our building," Nichols notes. "The consensus is that the collection of 10 characters must be shown off for others to enjoy year-round."
Moreno's own sister, Geneva Skeels, who saw his artwork at the gallery for the first time, was blown away by his talent. Moreno's immediate family has yet to see the creations. His grandchildren will probably be so surprised to learn that he can make faces. The art show closed on Dec. 14 with the end of the fall semester.
One faculty member suggested that he try making some of the sculptures with a particular kind of clay that is used by veterinarians when they need to make a mold of an animal part when creating casts or other devices for medical treatment. That kind of clay can be baked in the oven and it becomes hard as nails. Moreno looks forward to trying it once he finds out where to get some of it. He says he will do more sculpting in the future.
订阅：
博文 (Atom)