Dream Nation Project
About 10 years ago, longtime friends Shane Patrick Crews and Sam Anderson started talking about their childhood dreams. Crews had wanted to be a magician and Anderson, who came from a blue-collar family, had dreamt of being able to wear a suit to work every day. Both had followed their dreams, with Crews working as […]
An Instrument Built to Last
By Davy Jones Many would consider metal to be Richmond’s main musical export, but an instrument with a slightly more dulcet tone is bringing our city’s creativity and ingenuity to households all over the globe—the ukulele. From the Richmond office of Hohner, the storied German instrument manufacturing company, Leon Lewis heads up Lanikai, which has […]
Art Happens Here
Change is constant at 2016 Staples Mill Road. It was once Colonial Grocery. Then it was a beauty school. And from there, a mixed-use building that peddled everything from mattresses to flooring. For the past 13 years, the property, however, has served one purpose: the home base for Crossroads Art Center, a growing clearinghouse for […]
How A Local Publisher Created RVA’s Biggest New Year’s Bash
Tony Harris knows how to throw a party. In 2007 Harris orchestrated a 10,000-plus gathering of Richmonders in Carytown to ring in the New Year. And in 2008 he ramped up those numbers to 23,000 people, resulting in a legendary New Year’s Eve party that gridlocked nine blocks of Carytown and still has RVA talking […]
Independent Bookstore Publishes Skull-A-Day
On day 241, Noah Scalin took a loaf of bread out of the oven, stared at it, and wondered would happen next. “That was one of those days when I had no idea if it would work,” says Scalin of his medium of choice on that particular day of his ambitious Skull-A-Day project. The year […]
Artists Coloring Book BenefitS Art 180
Chuck Scalin arrived in Richmond just in time for the merger of Richmond Polytechnic Institute and the Medical College of Virginia in 1969. He was a young faculty member in the Art Department at the newly formed VCU, and new to living in a relatively quiet Southern city. The seeds of Richmond’s now-vibrant art scene […]
Richmond Storytellers: Secretly Y’all
Roald Dahl said that “the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places,” and Secretly Y’all—the storytelling series held every other month at Balliceaux—is proof that he was right. Secretly Y’all came to Richmond in 2010, having launched in Charlottesville by friends of current hosts Kathleen Brady and Colin King. “They passed us […]
James River Writers
Telling a story—a good story—is no easy task. It’s a skill that demands creativity, efficiency, research, a keen understanding of one’s audience, and most of all, a story worth telling. Achieving this mix has stymied even the most venerated storytellers, at one point or another, and can often prove an insurmountable hurdle for an aspiring […]
Richmond Storytellers: Greg McQuade
Not all stories are told in books, magazines, and online posts. Some are told in two-minute segments on local television news. During his 14-year career at WTVR CBS 6, Greg McQuade has earned more awards for storytelling—16 Emmys, 17 regional Murrows and three national Murrows than any other reporter in town. While the awards are […]
Revitalizing Richmond’s Oldest Park
Having served as an agricultural fairground, a Confederate encampment, and a rallying point for all manner of happenings, the site that’s home to Monroe Park has played host to its community for over a century and a half. Now poised to undergo its first large-scale revitalization in several decades, the elegant square at the heart […]