LECTURE: Rick Steves Returns Through the Back Door
(European travel guru Rick Steves kicks off Norfolk Forum’s 90th season. Photo by Zachary Scott) By Jeff Maisey When Rick Steves returns from his European vacation — he’ll be in Burgundy and the Swiss Alps in August — one of the first work-related duties he’ll be...
ESSAY: In My Travels
By Tom Robotham This summer, for the first time in a long while, I haven’t ventured outside of Hampton Roads. There are a number of reasons for that, a tight budget chief among them. If all goes well, I’ll wander farther afield in 2023. Meanwhile, I’m moved to reflect...
Elizabeth River Project begins expansion on North Colley
(A rendering of its Knitting Mill Creek boardwalk.) By Jim Roberts The Elizabeth River Project has spent 30 years transforming its namesake waterway. Now it’s preparing to transform Norfolk’s North Colley business corridor and adjacent Knitting Mill Creek. The...
Why We Started WINDSdays
(THE ANSWER IS BLOWING IN THE WIND: A group of environmental activists share a fun moment with their hand-fans promoting wind energy.) By Joel Rubin When you are a public relations professional, you yearn for clients as large and established as Dominion Energy. You...
Mermaid Winery On The Move
By Jeff Maisey Early next year, Mermaid Winery, which opened in 2012 as Virginia’s first designated Urban Winery, will move its original Ghent location to bustling downtown in the former Norfolk Taproom location at the corner of Main and Granby Street. For...
101 Things to Do This Summer in Coastal Virginia
(Symphony By The Sea will feature Virginia Symphony Orchestra on July 28 at 31st Street park at the Oceanfront. Free admission. Presented by Neptune Festival)) By Staff Three and six years ago we published lists of 101 Things to Do in Hampton Roads Before You Die. The...
ESSAY: This Old Man
By Tom Robotham Well, it’s official: I’m an old man. I could have claimed that status last year, when I turned 65—the age at which one traditionally earns the title of senior citizen. But this year, I passed a more significant milestone: a week before my...
ESSAY: Angell on My Shoulder
By Tom Robotham On the evening of May 21, I was watching the Mets play the Colorado Rockies. It turned out to be a disappointing game: an 11-3 rout that decisively deprived the Mets of a double-header sweep. But as I headed for bed, it wasn’t the loss that was...
Reflections on Pride
(Claus Ihlemann and Robert Roman, pictured recently at Decorum Furniture, are pillars of the community. ) By Jeff Maisey As Pride Month approaches during a time of continued social fluidity, it seemed this might be a good opportunity to reach out to Claus Ihlemann and...
PRIDE MONTH EVENTS
(John Childers of MJ’s Tavern prepares for his 10th Pride Month Kick Off on June 4.) Staff Report On June 4, MJ’s Tavern in Norfolk marks its 10th year producing its Pride Month Kick Off, an all-day celebration of unity and diversity. Much of the parking lot...
Beloved Aladdin Brings Joy to Chrysler Hall
(Adi Royas as Aladdin. Photo by Deenvan Meer/Disney.) By Jerome Langston “To me, it kind of feels like destiny. It’s like a full circle moment for me,” says actor Adi Roy, who plays the title role of Aladdin, in the Broadway touring production of Disney’s “Aladdin,”...
Virginia Opera’s Edge of the Seat Comedy
Mezzo soprano Hilary Ginther By Montague Gammon III One of the most popular and well known of all operas, Gioachino Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville,” comes to the Harrison Opera House the first weekend of November in a brand new Virginia Opera production that...
ART: Climate and Culture Dominate Enos Exhibition
By Betsy DiJulio A quick look at the paintings and drawings of Solomon Enos would leave one with the impression that his work gives form to a dystopian, post-apocalyptic future. But that’s why a quick look at art is rarely adequate. While the work leans heavily into...
Violent Femmes Happy to Return to Norfolk
By Jeff Maisey This year marks the 40th anniversary of American folk/punk band Violent Femmes. The Milwaukee-based group made an impressive debut in 1983 with the self-titled album which spawned the longtime classic singles “Blister in the Sun” and “Gone Daddy...
The Gift of the Fiddler
By Jerome Langston “In all honesty, it’s kind of the gift that keeps on giving. If you have to be associated with one show repeatedly in your career, I couldn’t think of a better one to be associated with,” says Gary John La Rosa, the famed director/choreographer,...
Rocking Rachmaninoff
By Jeff Maisey Earlier this year, the Virginia Arts Festival celebrated in grand style the 150th birthday of Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff with a series of chamber music concerts featuring the internationally acclaimed Dali Quartet and violinist Tianwa Yang as...
Still Ga Ga Over the Goo Goos
By Jim Morrison For a decade after they formed in Buffalo and before they became radio stars, The Goo Goo Dolls toured in a van, a trio sometimes headlining and sometimes opening for bands like The Gun Club or Motorhead. Their first album, recorded on a $750 budget...
Symbolism Abounds in Chrysler Exhibition
Matt Eich (American, b. 1986), Fire hose baptism, Newport News, Virginia (from the series “The Invisible Yoke, Volume III: The Seven Cities”), 2013 Archival pigment print, The Do Good Fund, Inc., 2020–5 © Matt Eich By Jerome Langston “I like curating photography...
Details About Possibilities of Paper
Roberto Benavidez, Bosch Beast No. 4, 2017. Paper, paperboard, glue, crepe paper, and wire, 36 x 22 x 12”. (Photo by Echard Wheeler) By Betsy DiJulio In the minds and hands of 13 artists, lowly paper is elevated. Generally thought of as a support for other media or...
Feast Festively on Beethoven’s Bounty
(Piano soloist Orli Shaham) By Montague Gammon III The Virginia Symphony opens its 2023-24 Season with a Beethoven Festival whose bounties Music Director and concert conductor Eric Jacobsen twice likened to a “steak dinner with dessert,” a two course musical feast of...
Back Bay’s Farmhouse Brewing Company
By Diane Catanzaro and Chris Jones If you’ve lived in the Tidewater area for many years you’ve seen a lot of changes in the landscape. In days of yore most of Virginia Beach, where Chris spent his formative years, was farmland instead of suburban sprawl. Now...
Waging the 2018 757 Battle of the Beers
By Jeff Maisey What better location to wage battle than at a military reservation. That’s where this year’s 757 Battle of the Beers will be held — Camp Pendleton in Virginia Beach. Camp Pendleton was constructed in 1912 and served primarily as a riffle range for the...
Behind The Scenes At Blanca Food + Wine
By Marisa Marsey Dining is theater; everyone plays a role. There are settings, choreography, presentations. Open kitchens bring backstage to center. But most folks rarely see preproduction; the late-night set-building and rehearsals leading to the invitational dress...
Norfolk Day Brewing for 2019
By Jeff Maisey Ring, ring. Hello, this is Norfolk calling. Wait a minute, this is Norfolk — Norfolk, Virginia. At the beginning of August, Smartmouth Brewing Company president Porter Hardy IV was contacted by David Holliday, founding brewer and owner of Norfolk...
Chesapeake’s Big Ugly Wins at Great American Beer Festival
BY JEFF MAISEY Nine breweries from Virginia, including Chesapeake's Big Ugly Brewing Company, won medals at the 2018 Great American Beer Festival in Denver, Colorado. Here are Virginia’s 2018 award winners. GOLD MEDAL Lost Rhino Brewing Co., Shooter McMunn’s,...
Oktoberfest Celebrations Abound
By Jeff Maisey If beer has a national — make that multi-national — holiday then surely it is Oktoberfest. Celebrations abound, including right here in Hampton Roads. So how did it all begin? Way back on October 12, 1810, King Ludwig I married Princess Terese of...
UPDATED: Commonwealth Coastal Classic
By Jeff Maisey (IMPORTANT NOTE: This event has been rescheduled for October 20, Noon to 5 PM, in conjunction with Town Point Virginia Wine Festival.) What do you get when you pair more than 35 chefs and oyster-harvesting watermen from across the Commonwealth with 50...
Farm to Table Dinner for 450
By Jeff Maisey A single, 450-foot long table cloaked in pristine white linen stretches down the center of America’s most famous road — Duke of Gloucester Street — in the heart of the pedestrian-friendly Merchants Square in historic Colonial Williamsburg. Strung...
A Vegan Goes to Cogans Pizza and Orders a Philly Sub
By Betsy DiJulio If you went looking for a tasty vegan Philly Cheesesteak in a punk rock-leaning pizza and beer joint—with a custom 33 tap bar—you’d be wasting your time. That is, unless you went looking at Cogans Pizza in Ghent (where its known as a Philly Sub)....
Jikoni Café is Vegan Delight in Park Place
Words & Photo by Betsy DiJulio Until the 1960s, Norfolk’s West 35th street was a thriving commercial destination located within the solidly middle class neighborhood of Park Place. But then the strip of storefronts fell victim to urban decay and small business...
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