Charles comes in and gets coffee everyday so we thought we would go check out his hair studio across the street. What a tour. He cuts hair in the front room, has a tanning bed, and this incredible chunk of machinery he called a toner table. You just lay on it and it moves your body in ways to work certain muscles, keeping you tone. He also pulled out his bike and has been riding it around town. He commented, "Yeah, I've been riding my bike like you guys to the MUstanggg!" After our tour of his place he showed us his pictures of his travels all over the world from when he was in the Navy. Brian was asking him why, after having seen so much of the world, would he re-settle here. His response: "Because I can do anything I want to here. If I want to hunt, fish, golf, whatever, I can do it. People say there's nothing to do but I find a lot to do." This offered us valuable insight as we have been wrestling with the question, "Why Greensboro?" We have all tossed around ideas as to how to promote Greensboro to locals by glorifying the things here people might take for granted and to outsiders by really broadcasting the potential greatness of Greensboro. But then we get to "Why?" We have all enjoyed our time here, but why promote it? What is the appeal? If artists, designers, filmmakers, architects, anyone...were to come populate this as an artist community, what is here that is so great and bursting with potential? Stay tuned for some answers hopefully.
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Thanks Alissa
Another shout out for Pie Lab: http://www.gelatobaby.com/ Thanks for the recipe, Alissa. We'll definitely try it soon.
Le Tour
I've been trying to keep up with Le Tour de France while here just through email/internet updates. We usually ride bikes all over Greensboro. In a town where bikes are a rare mode of transportation, we always get comments shouted from the passing cars. One the other day was: "Get your d***a** off the d*** road!" I feel so welcome. The other night a guy let me pass in front of his car as he was exiting his driveway that I was riding over. He informed me: "You gotta stand up and ride like Lance Armstrong." If only it were that easy...…)
Mornings
My favorite time of day here in Greensboro is around 8:30 when our little area starts stirring, getting things in order for the day. We open wide the doors of Pie Lab, get the fans cranking, start grinding some coffee, boiling some water, turning some tunes on. It's so peaceful to sit on the back steps and watch everyone start showing up for work in the garden, at HERO, at area shops. Get a little mug of coffee, read a few pages in a book until our first customer, usually Charles, shows up. It's a time of day bursting with potential. Everyone shows up fresh, establishing the day's agenda. You don't know what things the day will hold or who will show up (and these days, what good produce they're bringing us).
Elevator Speech
Been working on my new business card (not so great photos).
Cool Hand Luke
Megan Deal and Ryan LeCluyse (www.themegryan.com) are here for a year working with Project M/HERO/Americorp. They are in charge of doing several community initiatives. They made this flier to promote the event they had last night where we all watched Cool Hand Luke in the (blank)LAB. It was so fun sitting outside in our little impromtu theater with homemade popcorn.
Garden Markers
Lydia, the HERO garden intern, has worked all summer to develop the garden behind Pie Lab...it's looking great and the produce has been delicious. We helped her make some quick garden markers yesterday. Nothing like fresh summer salsa made straight from the organic garden...mmm!
Blueberry Dump Cake
Made with fresh blueberries we picked from a local's patch!
Follow us on Twitter
http://twitter.com/pielab
Southern Hospitality
People around here take good care of us. I am constantly blown away by how generous people are here. Last week, Wayne Whitman, a local with a blueberry patch, let us come and pick some blueberries to put in our pies. When we left he also drove over and gave us some watermelon and pickles. Another local, Thomas Moore, stopped in that afternoon to give us some fresh tomatoes. He popped his head in the door and said, "Hello, yankee-doodle0-dandies." Everyone assumes we're all yankees here and then I get to just smile and say, "No ma'am/sir, I'm from Auburn, just three hours up the road." My grandmother's long time friend has stopped in twice and brought us banana bread and a coconut pie. Charles brought us a mosquito repellent plant this morning and some seeds to grow some more.
I continue to be amazed at everyone's eagerness to give.
Compost Pie
There is a garden behind Pie Lab where people (students/recent grads) have been working to develop an area where kids from the community can come and learn about gardening and sustainability. It's really fun to watch the kids so enthusiastically interact with the plants. We made a pie with squash, zucchini, basil, and tomatoes from the garden. I was calling it Veggie Pesto pie, but Brian (http://www.alwaysfeelwelcome.com) suggested we just call it "Compost Pie"...mmm.
Shaker Lemon Pie
My grandmother's Shaker Lemon Pie recipe I made last week. We tried some poppy seed in the crust, a successful venture.
Anonymous Advertisement
Thanks to whoever stuck this note on Mickey's (the town real estate agent) chair. He brought it over and said someone left it for him. That's my kind of advertisement.
Grown folks...
Amos Kennedy is a letterpress designer in Gordo, AL. He makes incredibly witty, absolutely creative posters and other collateral that always make me smile or think "Hmm." This one hangs in Hero's bathroom here in Greensboro.
Pie Bakers
Breanne, Amanda, Me, and Captain Jack Catfish's tail.
Thanks for the photo Jackie!
Pickles!
Pam made some fresh pickles...mmm! We're going to be selling them in Pie Lab along with from plum jam.
Flickr Photos
Amanda has been keeping a great flickr pool while here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mandabuck/
Crate Gallery
Tonight we converted half of Pie Lab into a gallery and had an art show for Scott Hamilton, a local who comes in to draw every day. He's very talented, drawing mostly comic book figures, architectural structures, and landscapes of the future. My favorites were his interpretation of four different states in the year 3000. I'll post photos if I get some soon--I think I accidentally deleted them because they definitely weren't on it anymore...woops! It was a big success with a room full of people. Half way through we moved to the shipping container the Project M participants have been turning into a mobile Pie Lab. He did several quick drawings on the dry erase board to christen our first use of the space. You can see his work at www.javacolors.com. At the end, I heard him on the phone saying, "I couldn't be no more happier." Worth every ounce put into this place.
It's making sense.
Yesterday, more than any has solidified for me what Pie Lab is about. The short version is that it is a neutral place to foster conversations that inform ideas that lead to meaningful designs for positive changes. People from the community stop in for pie and stay to chat. This leads to the discussion of ideas and and we get to describe why we're here, which sounds so odd at first but then seems to make perfect sense. It's like what Eric Heiman, an advisor in town last week explained to us: "Good design isn't 'Wow! Huh?'. Good design is 'Huh? Wow!'" That's exactly what Pie Lab is: "Huh? How do pie and design relate at all?" or "Huh? How does gardening or bikes, or fishing with fireworks or talking to priests relate to design?" But then you start to see how these connections and conversations all inform each other and "cross pollenate" ideas, and then, "Wow!..." After our dance party in the morning (see a few posts down), a couple stopped in on their way from New Jersey to New Orleans. They were on their way through town because they spent last night in Tuscaloosa, their reason being that when the guy was in Ohio at a RadioShack years ago when they asked for his address. He thought it was silly so just pulled "123 Main Street, Tuscaloosa, Alabama" out of the air because he liked the way it sounded. Since their travels were bringing them this way, he knew he had to make a stop in Tuscaloosa. On their way down from T-town to New Orleans today, they saw our Pie sign on Main Street in Greensboro and stopped in for lemonade and pear-berry pie Breanne made. We told them all about what we do here and how it's a place where we hope people do exactly like they did: come in for pie, stay to chat, share a story, leave inspired by such a random little treat. They were both Episcopal priests so we showed them the local priest's business card he gave us yesterday with the caption "Priest-in-charge." It was a vibrant conversation that left us grateful for another meaningful personal contact.
Two more library cards from today
