Uniquely grown in its native forest environment, Guayaki Yerba Mate is cherished as a sacred beverage. Reach deep into yerba mate culture and you’ll discover people have long gathered to imbibe mate to awaken the mind, perform extraordinary feats and to exchange confidences. Even Yari, the mythical goddess of mate decrees it the symbol of friendship. Guayakí’s 2020 mission is to steward and restore 200,000 acres of South American Atlantic rainforest and create over 1,000 living wage jobs.
— fall 20 1 6 —
CONTENTS F E AT U R E S
32
44
RED, WHITE AND GREY
FLAMINGOS OR BUST
BY JAMIE RICH
B Y T R I ST R A M KO R T E N
Going deep with poetic rocker JJ Grey on music, family and growing up Florida
Searching for the wild, rarely seen birds in the Everglades, where they’ve recently returned to roost
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62
WHIRLWIND TOUR: MIAMI ART WEE
POWER HOUSE
BY CHRISTINA CUSH AND RICARDO MOR
An exclusive at-home interview with Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trucks of Tedeschi Trucks Band
Our carefully curated guide to taking on Art Basel, satellite fairs, museums, parties and more
BY JAMIE RICH
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82
ORANGE CRUSH
BEST LITTLE MUSIC HOUSES IN FLA
B Y K AT I E H E N D R I C K
A personal narrative on the history of Florida’s family-run orange groves
BY KEVIN MIMS
A round-up of tiny music venues with big history and live-band stages across the state
Cover Photography by JEREMIAH STANLEY On location with JJ Grey at his home on Amelia Island
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D E PA R T M E N TS
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29
91
WADING IN
COLUMNS
ON THE FLY
12 /// COQUINA: Shore things from our waterways 13 /// THE SLICE: A noteworthy, numerical take
on our state
14 /// FLAMINGLE: A flock of fascinating
Floridians you need to know now
17 /// THE SPREAD: Florida-fresh bites and bevs 20 /// M ADE IN FLA: Home-grown products,
designers and shops
25 /// JUST HATCHED: Openings around the state
29 /// C APITAL DAME:
Unfiltered fodder from Diane Roberts
88 /// MY FLORIDA:
A first-person essay about the Sunshine State
93 /// PLUME: Author recommended must-reads 94 /// CULTURE: Commentary on travel, music and more 96 /// BIRD’S EYE: A walking guide to our
favorite neighborhoods
98 /// G ROVE STAND: Seasonal recipes
and chef profiles
105 /// THE ROOST: Regional real estate
comparisons
108 /// THE TIDE: Road-trip-worthy events 112 /// FLORIDIANA: All things
vintage Florida
FA L L 2 0 1 6 /// FLAMINGOMAG.COM
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EDITOR’S NOTE
Can’t Stop the Music has been called North America’s most important art fair. We unearth stories from the orange groves, straight from the families who’ve been caring for the iconic fruit over many generations. Author Diane Roberts tackles the ultimate autumn ritual, college football, and the tribal culture that surrounds it. And in our cover story, we get to know JJ Grey, a guitarplaying poet who draws inspiration from a variety of sources, most notably the land and people of Florida. His soulful voice and songwriting talent have reached far beyond his hometown audience, resonating with an international fan base. A cultural connection is just what Floridians need to find fresh perspective. When we struggle under the weight of a seemingly endless stream of heartbreaking stories, we should not forget or ignore them. But we also should not feel guilty if we pause to sing, to dance or to gaze at art, especially if doing so brings us closer to those we love. I can hear the pine trees sing to the sun I can hear the birds, they’re all having fun I’m going to sing along to the rhythm of one Singing along ’Cause everything is a song —JJ Grey
Editor in Ch ief & Pub lishe r
let us know what you think. Email us at editor@flamingomag.com
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PHOTOGR APHY BY INGRID DAMIANI; ST YLING BY ALIX ROBINSON
T
he past few months have left many of us emotionally drained, every day starting with a story more horrific than the day before. The list of cities recently marked by violence reads like a top-five of (formerly) carefree travel destinations: Baton Rouge; Dallas; Munich; Nice, France; and our own Orlando. When the Pulse nightclub shooting happened in June, I was transfixed for days, absorbing every detail of the tragedy as it developed. I stayed glued to the news for weeks as tributes to the victims poured out, sordid details In an interview for a story inside this of the killer’s troubled life unfolded and issue, guitar virtuoso Derek Trucks shared eventually celebrations and solemn with me some wisdom that strikes a chord marches took place around the world. and speaks perfectly to why an edition But shortly after news dedicated to arts and culture broke of the Orlando is important right now. shooting, a friend and I “There’s only so many went to a concert that we things in the world that give had been looking forward people real relief, and for me, to for a while. I felt guilty music is an amazing outlet. dressing up in anticipation I’ve certainly listened to of a festive night when things that have changed the the rest of the state, the way I’ve thought about the country and the world were world,” Trucks said. “And I reeling. In the auditorium feel like, a band like this, you After the tragedy in Orlando, waiting for the show to want to get in front of people we created this heart-icon to share on social media and start, I continued taking and give them a little bit of show support to everyone in the latest updates on that medicine.” touched by the event. my phone. In this issue we deliver a Then the lights came on, heavy dose of the art, music, the speakers exploded with sound and for literature and culture emblematic of our the next two hours I got lost in the music. home state. We unwrap Art Basel and I felt normal again. I took a time-out from present readers with our curated guide stress and sadness, and I think I needed it. to taking on Miami Art Week, which
AUTHENTIC
INTU ITIVE
A LW AY S I N Y O U R E L E M E N T â„¢
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ISSUE
FLAMBOYANCE
3
By Floridians. For Floridians.
O UR FLO C K H AS S P OKEN
• FOUNDED IN 2016 •
— fa l l 20 1 6 — Loving the new magazine!! Elegant, informative and enjoyed seeing a shout-out to my girl, Donna Orender, in the premier issue. Jennifer Chapman, Jacksonville
[On Tim Dorsey’s book picks] Agree wholeheartedly with John D. MacDonald, you can’t go wrong with a Travis McGee novel. Christina Jordan, Micco
Editor in Chief, Publisher, Founder JAMIE RICH jamie@flamingomag.com Executive Editor Christina Boyle Cush christina@flamingomag.com Consulting Creative Director Holly Keeperman h o lly @ f l a m i n g o m ag.com
No .
Looking forward to it! Read the last one cover to cover.
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Craig Pittman on the
RETURN OF THE PANTHER
For Floridians. By Floridians. /// Summer 2016
FLORIDA
WANDERLUST
Sharon Black-Floyd, Osprey
PERFECT TRIPS BY LAND, SEA & SKY
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OUR STATE’S PRESIDENTIAL BUMPER CROP
MOTEL READS
pg.27
SUMMER SUNDRIES pg.18
Reel Fresh Seafood and Craft Beer pg.62
Anna Bystedt, Lomma, Sweden
@TheFlamingoMag is an amazing read about all things Florida! Great job, Jamie Rich. Love it!
Yum, I’d love to share that six pack w/ members of NW FL’s Beach Bums Beer Club. Jeffrey Ellis, South Walton
I love the illustrated map of #AnnaMariaIsland by #loriweitzel in @theflamingomag! #flmaps ... TugboatCartographics, Jacksonville
Letters to the editor Our family just received our first issue in the mail ... We were excited to remove all the boring and lifeless magazines on our coffee table and replace it with Flamingo Magazine! Thanks to you and your Flamingo crew for putting together a much-needed Florida-focused publication—our state has been long overdue since Florida is the best and most beautiful state in the U.S.A.! Carmine Oliverio, Gainesville
Contributing Designer Ellen Patch e ll e n @ f l a m i n g o m ag.com
Cont ributin g Writers Judy Blume, Prissy Elrod, Melissa Farrell, Robin Hartill, Tristram Korten, Victor Maze, Christina McDermott, Kevin Mims, Irene Moore, Ricardo Mor, Emily Raffield, Craig Pittman, Diane Roberts Contributing Photographers & Illustrators Brian Garrett, Stephen Lomazzo, Jessie Preza, Jack Spellman, Jeremiah Stanley, Kelly Sterling, Vinnie Zollo Copy Editors & Fact Checkers Jennifer Kelly Geddes, Marcy Lovitch, Kate Norment, Sarah Scheffel, Kelly Staikopoulos
Chris Dudley, Tallahassee
I’d always wondered about Florida House when I’d walk or drive by in D.C., and I’ve gone by a million times. I’ll definitely check it out next time! Erin Wilcox, London, England
Departments Editor Katie Hendrick kati e @ f l a m i n g o m ag.com
Digital Media Beth Gilbert, Tera Williams
pg.94
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Callie Houfek, Jacksonville
I wish I was a Floridian.
[On the Springs feature] The memories make you happy, but the reality makes you sad; good read. Tom Carr, Tampa
TIM DORSEY
MADE IN FLA:
Oh just hanging on the shelf with Rolling Stone and Vanity Fair ... no big deal.
pg.80
THE TRAVEL ISSUE
“OLD JOE” the famous, stuffed gator from the Ed Ball era ... has gone to the “great stuffings” in the reptile world ... and no longer resides in his glass cage in the Lodge. Knox, Wakulla Station From a borrowed copy, I became aware of Flamingo. Nice articles, especially Katie Hendrick’s. We are avid readers of magazines and now want to subscribe to Flamingo. Bill Morgan, Sarasota
I n t e r n s : Brett Greene, Kelsey Magennis Advertising Sales Amy Dunigan, amy@flamingomag.com; Janet Hynes, janet@flamingomag.com; Manny Mejido, mannymejido@gmail.com General inquiries: ads@flamingomag.com Contact Us Phone: (904) 395-3272 Email: info@flamingomag.com TO GET A YEARLY SUBSCRIPTION (4 issues) go to flamingomag.com or send a $30 check to JSR Media, P.O. Box 3253, Ponte Vedra Beach, FL 32004-0018. All content in this publication, including but not limited to text, photos and graphics, is the sole property of and copyrighted by JSR Media and Flamingo. Reproduction without permission from the publisher is prohibited. We take no responsibility for images or content provided by our advertisers.
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CONTRIBUTORS
JUDY BLUME is an
award-winning author whose volumes have been translated into 32 languages. When not writing, Blume bike rides around Key West, where she lives, and works at a new location of the independent bookstore group, Books & Books, which she helped open.
PRISSY ELROD is a Tallahassee spitfire and memoirist (Far Outside the Ordinary). She attended Flagler College as a member of the inaugural class and later earned a master’s degree from Florida State University. The sought-after book club speaker also appears on syndicated radio shows.
BRIAN GARRETT
keeps his camera close to capture images of the animals he encounters in his work as the South Florida Water Management District’s primary wildlife coordinator, focusing on manatees, gopher tortoises and nesting birds.
ROBIN HARTILL has nearly a decade of writing and editing experience covering Southwest Florida. The Sarasota resident graduated from the University of Florida and has received numerous awards from the Florida Press Association.
CHRISTINA MCDERMOTT, MELISSA MITCHELL FARRELL AND EMILY RAFFIELD find inspiration in a shared love of their home place, Port St. Joe. The artist, the entrepreneur and the marketer combined their skills and passion for the Forgotten Coast to create a collection of stories, recipes and images in a beautiful coffee table book, Saints of Old Florida.
TRISTRAM KORTEN
specializes in environmental, political and criminal justice issues. The Miami-based journalist has written for Atlantic Monthly, Fast Company and Mother Jones, and his radio work has been broadcast on NPR and PRI.
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VICTOR MAZE is an award-winning art director and writer whose work has appeared in Coastal Living and Caribbean Travel + Life. He has a master’s degree from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism and lives in Coral Gables.
FLAMINGOMAG.COM /// FA L L 2 0 1 6
JEREMIAH STANLEY
graduated from the University of Florida’s College of Journalism and Communications. He’s an award-winning portrait photographer, avid barbecuer and enthusiastic kayaker. This is his third Flamingo cover photo.
KELLY STERLING is a triple threat: a food photographer, food stylist and classically trained chef based in Ft. Lauderdale. She won the 2016 award for best editorial photograph from the International Association of Culinary Professionals.
FA L L 2 0 1 6 /// FLAMINGOMAG.COM
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P V C L U B R E A LT Y. C O M
— f lor idians, far e, f inds —
WADING IN — COQUINA —
Saying Something with Sand
— THE SLICE —
A N u m e r i c a l Ta k e o n t h e S t a t e
— FLAMINGLE —
A Flock of Fascinating Floridians
— THE SPREAD —
Remembering the Forgotten Coast
— MADE IN FLA — Music, Art and Style
— JUST HATCHED —
PHOTOGR APHY BY LEAN TIMMS
Openings and Reboots of Note
FA L L 2 0 1 6 /// FLAMINGOMAG.COM
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WADING IN :COQUINA SH O RE TH INGS F R OM OUR WATERWAYS B y K a t i e H en d ri ck
||||| MR.|||||||||||
SANDMAN A daydreaming artist discovers his talent for sand-sketching by creating giant drawings on the beach that end up as aerial, fine-art photography.
massive “sky message” once a year. The messages have appeared all along both sides of Florida’s coasts. He spends months conceiving a picture that reflects what’s going on in the world, which he first drafts on paper and then replicates in gigantic proportions—as large as 10 acres—on the shore using a stick. He reinforces those lines with twigs before digging and dropping beach debris (added to provide contrast against the sand). Then he shovels a moat to cordon off his work zone. Brittingham works with entirely free-style. “People have wondered how it’s possible to draw things this precise without measurement or an aerial perspective to check your work,” he says, “but the Nazca civilization did a similar thing thousands of years ago in Peru to communicate to the gods that they were treating the land
Above: This sky message, “Sun & Moon,” was designed in 2011 on Cape Canaveral to commemorate the ending of NASA’s Space Shuttle program and to honor the people who perished in pursuit of space exploration.
with respect.” In the infancy of the sky messages, Brittingham had help from friends. These days, friends and random beachgoers join in. “This is meant to be a public event,” he says. “There aren’t many places you can stumble across art and participate. Art can be standoffish—you observe what’s already been created.” Among participants and passersby, a sky message stimulates conversation about the environment. For Brittingham, that’s what it’s all about.
Make an unusual Beach find? Send your pics and stories to info@flamingomag.com Your submission may appear in an upcoming issue.
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The makeshift crew of 30 spends two days on a sky message, which is positioned below the high-tide line so it eventually washes away. But before it does, Brittingham has a drone photographer immortalize it. The images have appeared in such institutions as the John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art in Sarasota and the Bass Museum of Art in Miami Beach. “This art is meant to be ephemeral,” he explains. “Messages live in our memories and in the documentation.”
PHOTOGR APHY BY CR AIG RUBADOUX
I
n the late ’80s, Todd Brittingham worked at a bronze foundry in Sarasota and spent his breaks relaxing on Lido Beach. One day, he picked up a stick and started sketching in the sand, impressing a photographer friend who asked him to make the drawing bigger so he could take a picture of it from an airplane. Eight months later, Brittingham revisited the scene of his creation and found that the drawing was mostly intact and that seeds had fallen into the design’s trenches and had started to grow. “Birds nested in the outgrowth and it occurred to me that this was affirmation from nature,” he says. Seeing his image come to life motivated him to use sand art as a medium to convey meaningful statements. Since then, Brittingham, now a working artist and teacher in Ft. Lauderdale, creates a
WADING IN :THE SLICE
A N OTE WO RT HY, NUMER ICAL TAKE ON OUR STATE
12.4
Liters of Wine That’s how much vino the average Floridian drinks each year, ranking us 13th in the U.S. for wine consumption. The top grape-juice chuggers? Raise a glass to the residents of Washington, D.C., who polish off more than 25 liters per person annually. Could this election cycle have anything to do with that figure? Vatican City residents take their chalices even more seriously, guzzling 54.26 liters every year—the most of any territory in the world.
OneFakeShark Eric Grimes, a fifth-generation Floridian and developer of an 18-acre motor-coach resort and marina by the Cortez Bridge, has commissioned a local artist to create a Styrofoam and fiberglass replica of Old Hitler, a fabled hammerhead shark that terrorized fishermen from the Sunshine
400 +
MUSEUMS
Proving that The Peninsula is way more than sexy beaches, hotels and wacky roadside attractions, the Florida Association of Museums recently tracked over 400 museums to confirm that they have been very busy, as in 31 million visitors busy. Between the palm trees, there’s a cultural destination for most enthusiasts. To name just a few of the state’s specialty pit stops: The Cade Museum for Creativity + Invention in Gainesville draws budding entrepreneurs, the Palm Beach Photographic Centre in West Palm Beach attracts a clicky clique, and the National Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola lands history buffs and airplane lovers.
Skyway Bridge into the Boca Grande Pass in the 1970s. The doppelgänger will hang (upside down, as though caught) adjacent to Cortez Road, sure to be an Instagram favorite or perhaps a Pokémon Go stop. Completing the finned installation is a fishing boat with a shark-bite-sized chunk taken out of its side.
Perhaps the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation was distraught after losing a 2016 appeal to overturn a $24.6 million settlement to three trustees of the late artist’s estate. But the foundation (headed by Rauschenberg’s son, Christopher, and several artists) licked its courtroom wounds and resumed the nobler
work of enhancing the revered American mixedmedia artist’s legacy. In 2013, five years after Rauschenberg died, his 20-acre property in Captiva was converted into a multidisciplinary artists’ enclave, where up to 70 creators a month strive to advance their work and try new artistic mediums or performancebased projects.
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Jackie and David Siegel’s infamously uncompleted 90,000-square-foot mega-mansion, named Versailles, houses approximately 20 bedrooms and six swimming pools and has starred in an award-winning documentary. Other ostentatious details include the abode’s 4,000-square-foot master bedroom closet. So far, the couple has spent about 12 years building this behemoth, set on 10 acres in Windermere, with constant on-again-off-again construction delays. If it ever is completed, (don’t hold your breath!), it would be the biggest single-family home in the country. Perhaps even more outrageous, the Siegels put the unfinished house on the market for $100 million, then slashed it to $90 million.
FA L L 2 0 1 6 /// FLAMINGOMAG.COM
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WADING IN :FLAMINGLE A FLO C K OF FASCINATING F LOR IDIANS
CULTURE CLUB If we planned an artsy-fartsy field trip to the theater, these are the creative Floridians we’d invite.
ROMERO BRITTO Global Artist
Teaching Author
The Haitian-American author’s stories, rooted in topics such as family relationships and diasporic politics, have won numerous prestigious awards, and her first novel, Breath, Eyes, Memory, earned a place in Oprah’s Book Club. She moved from New York to Miami “for love” in 2002 and says that “Florida looms large in the Haitian imagination.” The oral storytelling of her aunts and grandmother inspired her as a girl, while Haitian writer Marie Vieux Chauvet and American writer Toni Morrison have also influenced her career. The scholar regularly participates in readings and events in schools, museums and bookstores around town.
MARY ANN CARROLL Florida Painter
The Highwaymen—selftaught black artists who sold their Florida landscape pictures by the roadside during the Civil Rights Movement era—included one woman. In the mid1950s, a teenage Carroll spied Harold Newton, one of the group’s founders, in his Fort Pierce yard painting a poinciana tree and asked for a lesson. Her early works sold for $5 to $15. She’s since received as much as $5,000 for a painting and been honored by First Lady Michelle Obama. She illustrates sunsets, water scenes and forests, but not snakes. The artist (and pastor) sang and played guitar and piano in a gospel choir for more than 30 years.
JONATHAN ADLER
TOM PETTY
Dazzling Designer
Eminent Rocker
For about 13 years, this design guru and his fashion-forward husband, Simon Doonan, have been seasonal residents of Palm Beach. Though they put their Adler-decorated condo for sale at $1.1 million, they have alternate Sunshine State crash pads: the Eau Palm Beach Resort & Spa (where Adler orchestrated bold guest-room redos) and the Hall South Beach (where he customized the bath amenities). Adler, who has said, “Florida is a place of sunshine, optimism, fantasy and glamour,” has a deep love for our Palm Tree Peninsula: He actively supports the Boca Raton Museum of Art; gushes about Miami, the home of his biggest retail store; and wears white jeans 24/7.
During a day-trip to Ocala in the summer of 1961, 11-year-old Petty saw Elvis Presley filming Follow That Dream. In awe, the Gainesville native vowed to become a musical legend. In 1970, he and four friends launched a band called Mudcrutch and played regular gigs at Dubs, a local topless bar. Two of Mudcrutch’s members became Heartbreakers. Forty-six years after forming, Mudcrutch released its second album in May and toured briefly. Read about Petty’s troubled childhood and complicated relationships with his bandmates in his biography, Petty, released last year, or catch the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer on his SiriusXM channel.
ILLUSTR ATION BY STEPHEN LOMAZZO
Since arriving in Miami in 1988, the Brazilian-born Pop artist has (literally) become one of the city’s most colorful residents. His happy, multi-hued paintings and sculptures grace numerous local, state and international hospitals, museums and public places. His exuberant style and personality have won a legion of star-studded admirers, including the Bush family. Equally smitten with political juggernauts, Britto hosted a fundraiser for Jeb at last year’s Art Basel, where he unveiled a painting he created with Jeb’s wife. This summer, Britto received an honorary doctorate from Academy of Art University in San Francisco mere days before carrying the Olympic torch in his home country.
EDWIDGE DANTICAT
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FLAMINGOMAG.COM /// FA L L 2 0 1 6
“Here, I found inspiration and made life my canvas.”
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SUBSCRIBE TODAY
For an annual subscription (4 issues) Visit flamingomag.com for details or send a $30 check to JSR Media LLC, P.O. Box 3253 Ponte Vedra Beach, FL 32004
WADING IN :THE SPREAD FLOR IDA-F R ESH BITES & BEVS
Old-Florida Seafood Soirée
HOST AN AUTUMNAL GATHERING INSPIRED BY A DEEP REVERENCE FOR SALT-AIR–SURVIVING TRADITIONS ALONG THE PANHANDLE.
I
n the pages of their book, Saints of Old Florida, coauthors Melissa Farrell, Christina McDermott and Emily Raffield pay homage to small towns with saintly prefixes along the Gulf Coast by recounting stories and sharing recipes for the food that flavors the seaside way of life, from Port St. Joe to St. Marks. Here we celebrate some of our favorite tales and tastes beloved by the three friends.
BEHIND THE BLUE CRAB SHELL For centuries, blue crabs have played a vital role in Florida’s economy. Some say deviled blue crab recipes originated in Tampa, where they were served deep-fried as mini-football-shaped croquettes with a Spanish or Cuban twist. But the Panhandle’s riff is just as storied: A seafarer’s 1945 journal reveals that Gulf crabbing yielded an abundance (and still does today), and deviled crab was a “treat for the palate of the most critical gourmet.” In his words, “the fresh crab meat, whose delicate flavor of the sea whetted our appetites” was part of a “perfect meal.” A little more recipe background, before you get cooking: Rock Landing is a marina in Panacea, and this appetizer is indeed medicine to prevent a dull get-together.
PHOTOGR APHY BY LEAN TIMMS
This page: Reshell your crabs with crystal-clear containers.
FA L L 2 0 1 6 /// FLAMINGOMAG.COM
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WADING IN :THE SPREAD FLO RIDA-F R ESH BITES & BEVS
Rock Landing Deviled Crab
seasonings, and “use as much saffron as you can afford,” the trio advises. If you can’t find Alligator Point clams (known for the lingering richness of its waters and its salty, buttery and sweet taste), or Gulf shrimp, ask your local fishmonger for substitutes. Regardless of your ingredient blend, these happy hostesses recommend “making special effort to catch a bit of the caramelized rice layer at the bottom.”
S e rv e s 8 1 pint fresh blue lump crabmeat 3 celery stalks, finely chopped 1/2 red bell pepper, seeded and finely chopped 1/2 yellow bell pepper, seeded and finely chopped 3 green onions, trimmed and finely chopped 2 tablespoons fresh flat-leaf Italian parsley, finely chopped 1/2 cup saltine crackers, crushed 1/4 cup heavy cream 4 tablespoons butter, melted Juice of 1 lemon 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper 1/2 teaspoon dry mustard 1/2 teaspoon sea salt 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
ONE-PAN WONDER
PREPARATION: Pick through lump crabmeat to remove shells, using a colander in the sink to hold the crabmeat during inspection. Transfer crabmeat to a bowl and mix in all the other ingredients. Fill serving-size oven-safe glass dishes or ramekins with crab mixture. (Editors’ note: We love the look of the glass crustaceans on the previous page. You can find similar containers in a pinch at a variety of online retailers.) Bake at 375 degrees for 20 minutes. Serve immediately.
Serve up a restorative meal, Spanish style, with Gulf Coast gems like shrimp, calamari, Alligator Point clams and venison sausage. With ties to Valencia, Spain, paella is cooked via several different methods in its country of origin. Although the Old Saints’ scribes prepare their paella in a custommade iron pan over an open outdoor fire, a hearty Dutch oven on the stovetop should suffice. Just don’t scrimp on the
Panacea Paella del Mar S e rv e s 1 0 - 1 2
Above: Pass the platter and enjoy this paella with your pals. Below: A hardy pan-full of sea goodies
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1 pound smoked venison sausage, sliced 1/2 cup olive oil 1 onion, diced 1 red bell pepper, seeded and diced 1/2 cup chopped celery 2 garlic cloves, minced 1/4 cup white wine (preferably Cava, a Spanish sparkling wine) 1 (28-ounce) can of crushed tomatoes 9 cups chicken stock 1 pinch of saffron, or more if desired 2 bay leaves Handful of flat-leaf Italian parsley 1 teaspoon ground cumin Zest of 1 lemon 1 tablespoon sea salt 1 tablespoon black pepper 3 cups Valencia rice (the liquid-to-rice ratio is 3-to-1) 2 cups fresh or frozen peas, thawed 2 dozen Alligator Point clams, washed 1 pound Gulf shrimp, peeled and deveined 1 pound calamari, prepped and chopped PREPARATION: Heat oil in a large paella pan or Dutch oven. Add sausage, brown over medium heat. Add onions, bell pepper and celery, sauté until soft. Deglaze with a little Cava. Stir in tomatoes. In a separate pot, heat chicken stock over medium heat with saffron and mix. Gradually pour warm broth into paella pan and stir. Add bay leaves, parsley, cumin, lemon zest, sea salt and pepper. Stir in rice. Cook over medium heat for 5 minutes. Add clams, cook for 5 minutes. Add shrimp and calamari; cook for 5 minutes. Sprinkle peas on top and cover with foil. Turn off the heat and let stand for 15 minutes before serving.
WADING IN :THE SPREAD FLOR IDA-F R ESH BITES & BEVS
Hail Mary
ANSWER PRAYERS FOR A SPICY, PANHANDLE VERSION OF
THIS CLASSIC DRINK
T
oast autumn’s arrival, when the summer heat eases and a calming coolness creeps in. Saints of Old Florida writers cherish this magical time, which they call Indian summer, and enjoy spending it brunching with friends at Indian Pass, a petite peninsula tucked in the Panhandle’s crook. The Florida girls’ drink of choice? Well, a tall garnished Bloody Mary—with a local kick, of course. The cocktail’s name, Dunworryn, pays tribute to a historic home situated in the northwest corner of the state, which dutifully served one family as an escape from their day-to-day lives and business dealings, and provided countless carefree beach days. The hot sauce was created by a gent in Port St. Joe almost 15 years ago; it’s now sold online and found statewide in eateries and grocery stores.
Dunworryn Bloody Mary S e rv e s 6 36 ounces tomato juice Juice of 2 lemons Juice of 2 limes 1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce 1/2 teaspoon celery salt 12 dashes Ed’s Red Hot Sauce 1 1/2 cups vodka (Editors’ note: We suggest
PHOTOGR APHY BY LEAN TIMMS
one from the St. Augustine Distillery.)
PREPARATION: Combine all the ingredients in a pitcher and mix well. Pour into icefilled glasses. Garnish with celery stalks, pickled okra, pearl onions or green olives.
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WADING IN :MADE IN FLA MUSIC
Tree-mendous tunes
SURE THEY DEBATE about
strings and superstars, but Tampa-based guitar makers Ben Chafin and Mick Donner also banter a lot about wood— What’s a protected species? What can’t you import? With forest-friendly thinking, they challenged themselves to design a line of instruments constructed entirely of timber from their home state. Dubbed
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“Crackercasters” (an homage to Florida cowboys of the 19th and early 20th centuries), the guitars are composed of three native woods: cypress, hard ash and Florida rosewood. Staying local turned these aces of base into instrument innovators. “None of the materials we implement are part of the tried-and-true formulas guitar builders
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have always used,” Donner says. “They have a familiar look, but a unique voice.” Crackercasters may take up to six months to craft and range in price from $813 to $954. guitarrepairoftampabay.com Above and right: Built with a Florida
cypress body and shotgun-shells
Top left: This back shows the rich
age of pecky cypress from the Withlacoochee River.
PHOTOGR APHY BY GUITAR REPAIR OF TAMPA BAY, (OPPOSITE) CLYDE BUTCHER
Guitars to strum, born from domestic woods
WADING IN :MADE IN FLA A RT
Above: Butcher was taken
with this view of the grassland in Myakka River State Park. Below: The photographer’s latest book
Inspired Images
Photos by a celebrated Sunshiney shutterbug and conservationist
GROWING UP IN SOUTHERN
Above: Butcher captures stately
cypresses along the Apalachicola River.
California in the 1960s, Clyde Butcher’s favorite Floridabased television shows—Flipper and Sea Hunt—made him daydream about moving crosscountry. When he finally arrived in the Sunshine State in 1980, camera in hand, his new home exceeded his expectations. “I felt like I had found a whole
new planet,” he says. “Nowhere else in the country has an environment like ours. Our swamps, which never endure cold weather, have wonderful undergrowth. Our offshore waters are calm, clear and turquoise. And the clouds— they float so close to the earth, I often think I can reach out and touch them.” He uses his
lens to capture his passion and share it with other nature lovers. On display at galleries in Ochopee and Venice, his black-and-white portraits of Florida’s lush landscapes have won myriad awards. Fall in love with his Florida photos on his website, and you can purchase your own, with matt and frame (prices vary). clydebutcher.com
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WADING IN :MADE IN FLA ST YL E
Throwing Shade Dodge rays with sleekly-engineered canopies, umbrellas and more.
TUUCI FOUNDER
Dougan Clarke cut his teeth outfitting boats in South Florida. Leaning on his knowledge of marine-grade materials and engineering techniques, 18 years ago the Coral Gables resident launched a collection of parasols, cabanas and lounges built to endure the coast’s corrosive elements after
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years of daily use. As pretty as they are practical, Clarke’s Tuuci products appear at many high-end properties around the world, and in our state at the 1 Hotel South Beach, the Parrot Key Hotel and the Ritz-Carlton Key Biscayne. The Miami-based company makes sustainability a top priority by recycling leftover frame
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materials and packaging. In addition, the umbrella maker supports environmental causes, including the Coastal Conservation Association and the Friends of Biscayne Bay Association. Not exclusive to businesses or designers, some product lines can be found at home furnishing stores across Florida. tuuci.com
Left: A fab umbrella from one of Florida’s top outdoor designers
PHOTOGR APHY BY TUUCI
Above: Lounge poolside in a sunny state-made Tuuci hammock.
WADING IN :MADE IN FLA B y Vi ct o r M a ze
Below: Schmeid is
amped about his boxy creation. Right: A more
ornate cigar box with four strings
HEART STRINGS An international banker trades power lunches for power tools, moonlighting as a master craftsman of cigar-box instruments.
PHOTOGR APHY BY VINNIE ZULLO, LUIS SCHMIED
L
ike the smoke of a fine tobacco, the melodies that hang in the air of Luis Schmied’s garage-turnedworkshop in Weston are sweet, rich and smooth. Echoing elements of folk and blues, the soothing sounds come not from a stereo, but from his own fingers, working in harmony with his latest customized creation. A money maestro specializing in equipment financing, Schmied channels the precision required by his day job into an unexpected after-hours pursuit: building one-of-a-kind stringed instruments using repurposed
objects—like cigar boxes—as the base. Born in Argentina, Schmied, 44, says his first musical love was the drums, and he played with amateur bands in Buenos Aires before moving to South Florida in 2002. “I love the mixture of Latin, European and American cultures here. I also love the weather—even the summers,” he says. In 2006, Schmied began teaching himself to play the guitar and stumbled upon open tuning, which he calls a simpler way to learn the instrument. “You tweak the strings a bit, and when
you strum the guitar, you are already playing a chord, which is not the case with standard tuning,” he says. Open tuning has its origins in folk instruments like the banjo, although big-time musicians, such as the Rolling Stone’s Keith Richards, often play open-tuned guitars. Once Schmied discovered open tuning, he researched 19th-century guitar makers who built instruments from recycled materials, like cigar boxes, out of necessity. Curious, he bought a cigar-box guitar from an artist in Virginia, and a fascination was born. “The sound was sweet and a little weird,” Schmied says. “But I was hooked.” Captivated as much by the instrument’s construction as its sound, Schmied, who had a basic knowledge of woodworking, tried making his own cigar-box guitar. After building his first piece, guided by a combo of online research and intuition, he wondered how different construction techniques would affect the sound, and so he began working on second and third iterations. A year after Schmied built his first guitar, his wife, Silvia, suggested he put a few of his prototypes on eBay; he was surprised when they all sold. Six years and 100 instruments later, the accidental entrepreneur takes a week to several months to build a guitar, depending on the complexity of inlaid and laminated woods and the number of frets and scarf joints. Schmied’s favorite cigar boxes have beautiful artwork that also create a pleasing tone, like the Arturo Fuente brand, which was founded in West Tampa. Schmied spends a lot of time with each finished instrument, extensively chronicling its personality through beautiful photographs that feel more like portraits than product shots. He also records demos that he posts online, giving prospective buyers a detailed account of how
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WADING IN :MADE IN FLA While Schmied Handcrafted each instrument will appear and play Instruments has gained a loyal when it arrives. SCHMIED “For me, each guitar is like a Handcrafted following, its founder is hesitant to Instruments take on the business full-time. “It different person,” he says. And — SOLD AT — continues to be my therapy, releasing because the instruments are all ETSY.COM, REVERB.COM & handcrafted using materials and PENNY LANE MUSIC EMPORIUM my mind for a couple of hours at the 3038 N FEDERAL HWY end of the day,” he says. techniques that are difficult to FT. LAUDERDALE Schmied has branched into other replicate exactly, each has its own — PRICING — types of instruments and accessories, unique feel, look and sound. FROM $120 - $400 ranging from wooden wall guitar Most of Schmied’s customers are schmiedguitars.com hangers to guitar slides made from from the United States and Europe, wine-bottle necks. One of Schmied’s and though they include a mix of popular models is a banjo that uses ages and genders, they skew a bit a vintage-film-reel canister as a base. “Getting more toward middle-aged men. Although the canisters is the tough part,” he says. there are a few new players among them, Although these Hollywood relics may attracted to the ease of learning that an openbe elusive, luckily, his main staple—cigar tuned instrument provides, for most buyers, boxes—remains prolific in South Florida. this is not their first stringed instrument.
Be
low: Schmied winds a guitar strin g.
Whenever he stumbles upon a new tobacco shop, Schmied— who does not smoke cigars himself—makes sure to stop in and introduce himself to the owners. The shopkeepers often happily part with their extra cigar boxes because Schmied gives the containers a second life. Like the tobacco shop crowd, he has a play-it-forward attitude about his pieces. “I am making a tool for another musician, and that guitar could help someone find a new sound or write a new song,” Schmied says. “To me that is the most rewarding part.”
240 a1a north, suite 13
consultation.
ponte vedra beach, fl 32082
framing.
904.273.6065 stellersgallery.com Design by The Design Studio || Photography by Jessie Preza
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PHOTOGR APHY BY VINNIE ZULLO
fine art.
WADING IN :JUST HATCHED DEBUTS TO PER USE (NORTH) PANINI PETE’S •DESTIN•
PHOTOGR APHY BY WARD MEDIA GROUP (RIGHT); TANNER DEPRIN (LEFT)
PETE BLOHME, A GRADUATE OF the Culinary Institute of America and a recurring Food Network guest star, is a household name in coastal Alabama, where diners clamor for his signature beignets served with fresh squeezed lemon. In March, the owner of Panini Pete’s opened his first location in Florida. Serving breakfast and lunch, the restaurant specializes in savory pressed sandwiches and burgers dressed with homemade sauces and fresh vegetables and herbs (for those who can resist the powdered sugary goodness of the beignets) in a fast and casual atmosphere that was formerly a Wendy’s. “This is the fastest-growing segment of the restaurant industry,” says Blohme. “We want to be a part of this trend that offers consumers higher-quality food with fewer frozen or processed ingredients than a fast food restaurant.” Guests on-the-go can pick up a “beach box,” packed with a panini, side, beverage and more to enjoy while soaking up the sun. paninipetes.com
30A SONGWRITER RADIO MUSIC & COFFEE SHOP • S A N TA R O S A B E A C H •
FOR TWO-AND-A-HALF YEARS, Shannon Ireland hosted musicians in his living room and live-broadcasted the performances online. After several bands traveled long distances to play, he and business partner Josette Rhodes realized they needed a bigger venue. Intent on running a music hall/coffee shop, they entered a very caffeinated period “researching the heck out of” beans and brews. They fell in love with nitro coffee, which is brewed for 16 hours in cold water, chilled in a beer keg treated with nitrogen, and served from a tap. “It comes out smooth and creamy, with a foamy head,” Rhodes says. “It looks like a Guinness, but isn’t bitter at all.” 30A Songwriter Radio Music & Coffee Shop opened in January. The space is accented with vintage décor including a three-foot-tall AM tube radio from 1937 and a 1946 record player. It sells music supplies, household accessories, jewelry, incense, sage and crystals in addition to coffee, tea, beer, wine and sandwiches. Artists such as Bryan Kennedy (a Garth Brooks songwriter) and Heritage, a popular Destin-based reggaefusion band, have played there, as have dozens of locals at a weekly open mic night. “It’s important to us to have a nurturing place that’s safe for people to explore their talents and gifts,” Rhodes says. 30asongwriterradio.com
SAILORS SIREN
•NEPTUNE BEACH•
Left: Sailors Siren’s chic accessories
NINE MONTHS AFTER launching their coastal lifestyle brand online, mother-daughter duo Michele Toomer and Whitney Toomer Canney brought Sailors Siren to the brick-and-mortar world
Above: Lemon curd cake with torched meringue and strawberry jam at Preserved Restaurant in St. Augustine
in May. The Neptune Beach shop offers chic home accessories, such as Haand ceramic tableware, Sea + Stone jewelry, Love & Victory bar pieces and Jenna Alexander illustrations. “All of our favorite shops were starting to blend together, so we began hunting for small makers and more unusual goods that combined a sense of global travel, Southern roots and a relaxed seafaring lifestyle,” says Toomer. “We never carry anything we wouldn’t put in our own homes.” Upon entering, shoppers feel transported to the beach, thanks to the boutique’s neutral palette (resembling sand) and wealth of natural light. Ever hospitable, the ladies welcome each guest with a glass of champagne or a refreshing seltzer while Boo, their English lab, greets visitors with a tail wag. sailorssiren.com
PRESERVED RESTAURANT •ST. AUGUSTINE•
BRIAN WHITTINGTON, A 17-YEAR veteran of the restaurant industry, rose up the ranks from dishwasher to become the James Beard– nominated executive chef of
Jacksonville’s highly regarded Restaurant Orsay. This spring, he took his talents slightly south to St. Augustine, where he opened Preserved Restaurant, an elegant eatery with a slightly Southern tilt. Situated in Lincolnville, a neighborhood established by freedmen following the Civil War, Preserved sits in a threestory Victorian home that once belonged to Thomas Jefferson’s great-granddaughter. The name has a double meaning, explains hospitality and events manager Francesca Cooper: “We saved as much of the original structure as possible. We also pickle and cure many of our products.” Sourcing ingredients from nearby purveyors, such as Black Hog Farm in East Palatka and Twinn Bridges in Macclenny, Chef Whittington sums up his cooking philosophy as “simple, local and honest.” Among his popular dishes: shrimp and grits, roasted oysters, pork belly, braised short rib, and banana bread pudding dressed with caramel and buttermilk ice cream. preservedrestaurant.com
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WADING IN :JUST HATCHED DEBUTS TO PER USE (C E N T RA L )
HERMAN’S LOAN OFFICE • O R LA N D O •
Above: O Cocina & Flights serves “clean” Mexican fare and features this tapestry
of succulents running behind the bar and up the ceiling.
O COCINA & FLIGHTS • TA M PA •
THERE’S A NEW DESTINATION for date night in Tampa. O Cocina & Flights, which opened in April, offers upscale “clean” Mexican fare: entrées like pollo en mole and carne asada, and tapas such as black bean and plantain empanadas. “A lot of places drench their dishes with cheese,” says owner Andrew “Bear” Galavis. “I wanted a more modern menu. This is a place where you can actually see the protein and vegetables on your plate.” The ambiance matches the food’s sophistication. The concrete floor is stenciled with flowers. Edison bulbs dangle from a cloud of globes. Glass barn-style doors lead to a private dining room with a white marble table for 20 with brass and copper chairs. The most distinguishing feature, though, is the tapestry of succulents running behind the bar and up the ceiling. ococina.com
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TREASURE ISLAND BEACH RESORT • T R E A S U R E I S LA N D •
MARCH USHERED IN a new chapter of luxury for Pinellas County with the opening of Treasure Island Beach Resort. The Art Deco–inspired property features 77 suites swathed in an oceanic palette of beige, gray and blue with contemporary furnishings. Each suite boasts a spacious living room with a full sleeper sofa, armchair and flat-screen television and a wellappointed bathroom, complete with a rainforest shower, marble sinks and cozy bathrobes. Beds have crisp, white linens, and kitchenettes are outfitted with every convenience. Suites facing the Gulf of Mexico feature private glass-railed balconies. BRGR Kitchen & Bar, the on-site restaurant, serves custom-seasoned burgers with house-made sauces and freshly baked buns paired with handcut fries. Additional amenities
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ON THE HEELS OF Hanson’s Shoe Repair’s success, in January the speakeasy’s owners opened Herman’s Loan Office, named after the location’s tenant in the 1940s. “We can’t accommodate everyone at Hanson’s, so we added a similar concept for those who want a reprieve from Orlando’s club scene and its volume-style approach to drinks,” says general manager and head bartender René Nguyen. Herman’s serves “bespoke cocktails,” which bartenders create after asking patrons three questions about their taste preferences: “Light or dark?” “Refreshing or spirituous?” and “Comforting or adventurous?” Parties of four or more can also opt for punch, which arrives in a vintage bowl with matching cups and ladles (sourced from estate sales and antique shops in Central Florida). “It’s our version of bottle service,” Nguyen says. The aesthetic is light and airy, with a white marble bar, whitewashed brick walls and beige upholstered chairs. hermansloanoffice.com
Adams was “100 percent on board.” The duo started out selling at farmer’s markets and, after numerous questions about where they retailed, set up shop in Colonial Plaza last December. Smith & Adams Confections features a dining room and an open kitchen so guests can watch Smith create bonbons, macarons, brittles and gelato. The cornucopia of chocolates includes popular favorites, along with bonbons filled with more curious ingredients such as absinthe, Sriracha chili sauce and goat cheese. A popular destination for birthday parties, the shop recently added chocolate-making classes to its offerings. smithandadams.com
TAKODA VILLAGE •RIVER RANCH•
“GLAMPING,” AN EXPERIENCE that marries the great outdoors with opulent accommodations, has made its way to Central Florida. In April, Westgate River Ranch Resort & Rodeo opened Takoda Village, a cluster of luxe teepees
SMITH & ADAMS CONFECTIONS • O R LA N D O •
BELEAGUERED BY THE LONG hours and high emotions of the legal world, attorney Kim Adams turned in her briefcase to pursue a vocation that makes people smile. When her friend Kelly Smith, a confectionary artist who spent more than 25 years making treats at Walt Disney World, approached her about starting a dessert business,
Above: Takoda Village, a group
of luxe teepees beneath 100-year-old oak trees
PHOTOGR APHY BY CHARLES SKINNER (LEFT); WESTGATE RESORTS (RIGHT)
include turndown service and a personal concierge. treasureislandbeachresort .com
WADING IN :JUST HATCHED DEBUTS TO PER USE (SOUTH) sheltered beneath a canopy of 100-year-old oak trees. The 651-square-foot teepees graciously sleep four and include such comforts as a doublesided stone-hearth fireplace, screened-patio deck, microwave and refrigerator, leather chairs, king-size bed, full sleeper sofa and an air-conditioning and heating unit. Decorated in a Native American theme, the teepees feature private en suite bathrooms with a vanity table, shower and claw-foot bathtub. A communal chickee hut, built by the Seminole tribe of Florida, sits in the common area amid outdoor fire pits, hammocks, festoon lighting and
dining tables. Activities include horseback riding, trap and skeet shooting and airboat rides. westgateriverranch.com
CALUSA BREWING • S A R A S O TA •
WHILE STATIONED IN SAN DIEGO a few years ago, Sarasota natives Vic Falck and Geordie Rauch became infatuated with the city’s craft beer scene and discussed re-creating the experience back home one day. As they kicked around ideas for their prospective business, friends introduced them to Jason Thompson, an avid home brewer, who offered to take his skills cross-country—if they
were hiring. In April, the trio opened Calusa Brewing, an 8,500-square-foot brewing facility with a tasting room. They named the brewery in honor of a Native American tribe that inhabited Southwest Florida until the early 1700s. “We wanted something that represented who we are and where we came from,” Falck says. “The Calusa subsisted predominantly off fisheries and estuaries. We grew up immersed in the local aquatic scene, so it seemed natural.” Decorated with handmade wood furnishings and reclaimed tables made of wine and whiskey barrels, the tasting room has an affable ambiance. Its repurposed
bar and tables originated as wood beams in the historic Belleview Biltmore Hotel in Belleair. Twelve-foot-tall windows allow patrons to peer inside the brew house and fermentation farm. Calusa brews a variety of beers and serves 11 to 16 on tap, along with nitro coffee, and hosts a rotation of local food trucks outside. calusabrewing.com
1500 SOUTH • N AP L E S •
HE’S WON TWO James Beard Awards, appeared on numerous television programs, run a quartet of trendy restaurants spread across the country, and spent a decade as Oprah Winfrey’s
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WADING IN :JUST HATCHED DEBUTS TO PER USE (SOUTH)
BURLOCK COAST SEAFARE & SPIRITS • F T . LA U D E R D A L E •
DURING PROHIBITION, “FORT LIQUORDALE” had a thriving smuggling operation between Cuba and the Bahamas. In November 2015, the Ritz Carlton opened Burlock Coast Seafare & Spirits, a chic eatery paying homage to the city’s nefarious past. The name is a nod to rumrunner Bill McCoy’s invention that revolutionized the bootlegging business. The burlock was a package that held six bottles of booze and concealed the loot with straw. Intimate speakeasy-styled rooms contrast with breezy, open spaces decorated with weathered wooden planks, representing rum-running vessels of yore, and glass pendant lighting, reminiscent of rum bottles. The menu incorporates pork from Palmetto Creek Farms, greens from Hallow Herb Company, root vegetables from Two Doves Farm and bread from Zak the Baker. “We work with great farms that grow their products with love from start to finish,” said Chef Gavin Pera. “We approach the menu with
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the mindset of respecting the ingredients.” Burlock Coast’s bar stocks more than 150 rums, along with local beer. ritzcarlton.com
HYDE BEACH KITCHEN + COCKTAILS • H A L LA N D A L E B E A C H •
WITH THREE FLOORS offering three distinct experiences, Hyde Beach Kitchen & Cocktails, which opened in August 2015, draws a diverse crowd of beachgoers, foodies and nightlife connoisseurs. The first floor has cabanas, daybeds, and a volleyball court and serves quick bites and fresh-pressed juices. On the second floor, Chef Danny Elmaleh—best known for his award-winning concept, Cleo, in South Beach—creates casual yet refined dishes, such as mushroom gnocchi, pumpkin butter rolls, corvina with spiced tomato sauce and Niman Ranch short ribs. A membersonly lounge, which features a hot tub, sits on the third floor. The restaurant hosts weekly events, including Sunday brunch with bottomless mimosas and Bellinis, discounted margaritas on Mondays and complimentary beachside movies on Thursdays. sbe.com
a concept catering to diners seeking “convenience without compromise.” Serving breakfast, lunch and dinner with a fullservice drive-thru, grab-andgo choices and family-style meals, the restaurant, which opened in May, sources from local purveyors. The menu includes omelets, pancakes, organic soups, salads, free-range rotisserie chicken, slow-cooked grass-fed brisket, gluten-free items, fresh-pressed juices and more. Grown’s rustic façade is crafted from reclaimed barn wood. A palette of crisp whites and ocean blues lend a blithe atmosphere to the dining room. The restaurant also boasts a rooftop garden, a play area with an interactive iPad bar equipped with nutritional- and fitnessthemed games, and a private space, “the Kindergarden,” which houses cooking classes and wellness demos. grown.org
ZEST
•MIAMI•
IN FEBRUARY, CHEF Cindy Hutson, of Ortanique on the Mile, introduced her brand of fusion cooking to Miami’s Southeast Financial Center, the state’s tallest office building. Zest features an ethnically diverse and seasonally driven menu with influences from the Caribbean, Latin America and Asia. Hutson describes her philosophy to “create without limits and cook everything under the sun.” Culinary notes: “Peppa” shrimp cocktail with cane vinegar, chayote and carrot served with guacamole and plantain chips, and the “50/50 Meatball,” made with ground lamb and beef, spiced marinara and goat cheese ricotta. Wood floors embellished with a curlicue motif, along with chairs and sofas upholstered in shades of tangerine and chartreuse, set a buoyant mood. zestmiami.com
Below: Burlock Coast Seafare & Spirits pays homage to the city’s nefarious rum-running past, with a bar menu including more than 150 rums.
GROWN •MIAMI•
SHANNON ALLEN, host of the Pregame Meal, loves preparing delicious, nutrient-dense meals for her five children at home. These days she seldom has time to do so. “Like most busy families, we juggle homework, afterschool sports and everyday commitments,” she says. Unwilling to wait for someone else to create a fast, healthy food option, she and her husband, 10-time NBA AllStar, Ray Allen, started Grown,
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PHOTOGR APHY BY BURLOCK COAST SEAFARE & SPIRITS
personal chef. Now Art Smith, a sixth-generation Floridian, is back in his home state at the helm of 1500 South, an airy waterfront eatery at Naples Bay Resort. The menu is Southern with an Italian twist (think: Key West pink shrimp mac & cheese) and includes his famous fried chicken with homemade rosemary biscuits and signature hummingbird cake. Decorated in soothing shades of white, cream and beige, the restaurant exemplifies the nearby beach. Picture windows and abundant outdoor seating provide diners with a coveted view of Gulf Coast sunsets. 1500southnaples.com
— Unf ilter ed Fodder —
CAPITAL DAME By Di a n e R o b ert s • I l l u st ra t i o n b y Ja ck S p el l m a n
IT’S IN THE BLOOD Examining the ire of college football fans and why Noles love to hate Gators—and vice versa
THE ONLY THING AMERICANS AGREE ON is that we don’t agree on much of anything. Cat people look askance at dog people, craft-brewery hipsters sneer at Bud Light drinkers, Star Trek aficionados think Star Wars lovers need to get a life, United Methodists find Southern Baptists just a shade too literal in their Biblical exegesis, and the country remains deeply torn between those who prefer a vinegar barbecue sauce, those who will
ingest only the mustard-based variety and those who are prepared to fight for the tomato–brown sugar genre. Things get even worse when it comes to politics. Democrats despise Republicans as race-baiting, Republicans treat Democrats as plague carriers. Bernie Bros still refuse to believe that Hillary Clinton beat them, while the Bushes have practically sworn a blood oath against
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CAPITAL DAME UNF ILTER ED FODDER
House Trump, and Trumpeters blame the media and the elites and the immigrants and the elite media immigrants. Social commentators and professional jeremiad writers act as though the country’s fragmentation is new, to which I say: Where have y’all been? College football has been proudly dividing Americans since 1869, when Rutgers played the College of New Jersey—later known as Princeton—and won 6–4. There is no hatred like football hatred. In 1893, the University of Georgia and the Georgia Institute of Technology took the field against each other for the first time. Georgia fans threw rocks at Yellow Jacket players during the game, which Tech won 28–6. The Bulldogs still sing “Glory, glory to ‘ole Georgia, and to hell with Georgia Tech!” The Jackets counter with the even less friendly So then it’s up with the White and Gold Down with the Red and the Black Georgia Tech is out for a victory We’ll drop our battle axe on Georgia’s head, CHOP! Michigan and Ohio State have loathed each other since 1897; it seems legendary Buckeye coach Woody Hayes wouldn’t even utter the word “Michigan,” referring to it as “that state up north.” Clemson and South Carolina began their long series in 1896 but had to suspend it for a few years after the 1902 game, when a three-day riot broke out. The Gamecocks beat the Tigers (coached at the time by the great John Heisman) 12–6, but the real trouble began when SC fans started parading around with a poster of a victorious rooster pulling a tiger’s tail. Outraged, Clemson cadets marched to the enemy campus with swords and bayonets. A bloodbath was prevented by the concerted efforts of preachers, cops and coaches. Texas versus Texas A&M, USC versus UCLA, LSU versus Ole Miss, Notre Dame versus anybody—we call these “rivalries.” Yeah, like the Sunni and the Shi’a are “rivals,” the Romans and the Visigoths were “rivals” and Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr were “rivals.” More like blood feuds, vicious grudge matches. During the 1894 game between Harvard and Yale, nine players had to be hauled off the field: some bleeding, some concussed, one in a coma and two who got into a fistfight. Partisans of Mississippi State and the University of Mississippi have been known to impugn each other’s Christianity. In 2010, Ole Miss Rebels seem to have planted rumors that the MSU head coach was a Scientologist. In retaliation, MSU fans posted an online video juxtaposing the riots in 1962, when Ole Miss integrated, with a hooded Klansman and a modern-day frat boy drunkenly hollering racial slurs while the University of Mississippi band played “Dixie.” Then there’s the Tide and the Tigers. A fan named Harvey Updyke
became so unhinged by Alabama’s loss to Auburn in the 2010 Iron Bowl that he drove from Tuscaloosa to Auburn and doused the town’s Toomer’s Corner oak trees with a fearsome herbicide. These two live oaks were much beloved by the War Eagle Faithful, who were wont to festoon them with toilet paper in celebration of their victories. When asked why he killed two blameless trees, Updyke explained, “I just have too much ’Bama in me.” And some people still think college football is “only a game.” Football has never been “only a game” in the Midwest, the South or especially, God knows, in the state of Florida, which, according to SBNation, ESPN and the rest of the sports-industrial complex, produces more top-drawer college talent than anywhere else, even Texas. I was born and raised in Tallahassee, identifying myself as a Seminole before I was quite clear what one was, before I understood that I was a girl or redheaded or a Presbyterian. When I was eight years old, my daddy died—right at the beginning of football season. Naturally, I inherited his season tickets. Some families, shocked with grief, would have given up football. Or ignored it. Not us. My parents had been cheering for the Seminoles since 1949. It was culturally mandatory: football on Saturday, church on Sunday. Besides, my mother wanted a date to the game against the University of Florida. In November 1967, we traveled with my godparents across the Sewanee down to the hostile town of Gainesville, down to where the world was orange and blue, to where the Gator frat boys mocked us, yelling, “Girls’ school!” Some history: Before the Civil War, the juvenile versions of the University of Florida and Florida State were twins, the seminary east of the Sewanee and the seminary west of it. In 1905, the Florida Legislature decided that the college in Gainesville would be for white boys only, the college in Tallahassee for white girls only, and the Florida Agricultural and Mechanical College for black students. That changed in 1947—for the white people anyway. Both UF and FSU went co-ed. Men invaded the campus of the old Florida State College for Women, and within about five minutes put together a football team, named “The Seminoles” by a campus plebiscite (“Tarpons” and “Crackers” were other mascot possibilities), and demanded to play the Gators. UF, longtime members of the mighty Southeastern Conference, reacted as if a back hills sharecropper had applied to join the country club. It took three years of negotiations, the threat of legislation and the intervention of Gov. LeRoy Collins to finally force UF to play FSU in 1958. The Gators won almost all the games in the first ten years. “Never, FSU, never!” they’d say.
The Gators won almost all the games in the first ten years. “Never, FSU, never!” they’d say.
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J.L. BAINBRIDGE & C O M P A N Y, I N C . Investment Advisors since 1981
They shouted “Never, FSU, never!” that afternoon in 1967 as we sat huddled with the other Seminoles at Florida Field. Then, they stopped. FSU won 21–16, the first time a Seminole team had beaten the mighty Gators in their own house. The adults jumped up and down like puppies. My godfather said he hated that my father wasn’t there to see it. But for me, joy was, as Mark Twain says, unconfined. I got my first taste of the pure, identity-fired rapture that comes from your tribe, who are virtuous, noble and fearless, vanquishing the tribe from down the road—who had behaved like complete and utter jackasses. After that, I was hooked on the blood rush and the tackle lust of the game—even if I was only in the fourth grade. People like me say they bleed garnet and gold, or crimson and white or orange and blue or orange and green—physiologically unlikely, but then we don’t say we are “fans” of the Bulldogs or the Longhorns or the Wolverines or, God help us, the Horned Frogs; we talk as though we actually belong to those species, as in: “My daddy is a Bulldog, and I’m a Bulldog, but my sister went to school in Oregon and now she’s a Duck.” We are who we are because we aren’t those jerks over there in Knoxville or Ann Arbor or Starkeville or College Station or Tempe. College football divides the universe into Us versus Them, validating Us and dissing Them. That’s the whole point. Those of us who love the game are citizens of a psychic fiefdom, a country with invisible borders. You might belong to the Auburn Family or the Wolfpack. I live in the Seminole Nation—which is ridiculous, because there’s a real Seminole Nation, populated by real
Diane Roberts is an eighth-generation Floridian, educated at Florida State and Oxford University. A long-time NPR commentator, her work has appeared in the New York Times, The Guardian
Native Americans. I’m appallingly white; they’re descendants of people who refused to surrender to the genocidal Andrew Jackson, who tried to run them out of Florida. In college football, nothing is too trivial to fight about. At a bachelor party last April, a Mr. Everett L. Beauchamp IV took exception to the comments another guest made about his UF shirt, tried to fight the guy who disdained Gatordom, chased the guy in his truck and shot at him. According to the police report: “Shortly before 3 a.m. uniform patrollers found an impaired Beauchamp and his vehicle after he drove into the LSU Lakes at East Lakeshore near Stanford Avenue.” It should be clear by now that the love of college football is a form of madness, a mental disorder that often takes hold in childhood. There’s no rational reason FSU and UF should despise each other so extravagantly. FSU and UF have a great deal in common: both red brick Gothic conglomerations set amidst the oaks of North Florida, both big state universities in smallish towns. Seen from space, Tallahassee and Gainesville look a lot alike. Yet Seminoles will tell you that there’s something fundamentally wrong, wrong at the cellular level, with Gators. Gators will tell you there’s something fundamentally wrong, wrong in the DNA, with Seminoles. Everybody’s correct. But as we limp through this unedifying election season, it might be worth clinging to the evident truth that politics is temporary— presidents come and presidents go—but college football is forever. Unless the concussion thing gets so bad that we have to send the game the way of bear baiting, venatio (gladiators versus lions or elephants) and Viking skin pulling.
and the Tampa Bay Times. She has also authored four books, including Dream State, a historical memoir of Florida, and Tribal: College Football and the Secret Heart of America.
With 35 years of professional portfolio management experience, we deliver a highly disciplined, long-term investment approach to help you achieve your financial goals. We don’t sell products. Instead, we use our decades of experience, our integrity and our commitment to quality and risk minimization to build investment portfolios that help our clients finance their children’s education, build and preserve the resources for an enhanced retirement, and achieve a meaningful higher standard of living. We don’t get paid unless you’re satisfied. Please call for a free investment review.
Portfolio Management Team From left to right, Robyn E. Messer, Fay E. Bainbridge, Kip D. Schoonover, Jerry L. Bainbridge, John B. Leeming, Jeanmarie Giambra, Joel G. Oldham and Jennifer D. Chauvel.
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Red, White
e
Grey By JAMIE RICH • Photography by JEREMIAH STANLEY
Going deep with JJ Grey, the free-spirited, soul-stirring rocker, on the moments that changed his career, the home place that inspires his lyrics, and discovering new meaning in old songs.
Then my grandmother, one day she’s sitting
there, you know, crocheting, looking at the TV, and she just stops and is like, “What the hell is Mofro?” —JJ Grey
q
Floridian with talent as wild as the state from which he hails grew up the son of a police officer and a homemaker in the rural town of Whitehouse, 10 minutes from his grandparents’ poultry farm, in Northeast Florida. With the thundering force of a freight train and the quiet power of a poet, the humble artist celebrates the land, culture and people of his home state like few before him. The band, known as JJ Grey & Mofro, plays its signature funk-blues-swamp-rock sound to packed houses, from St. Augustine to Denver to London, delivering raucous performances and lyrical storytelling. With salt-and-pepper hair and a harmonica slung around
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his neck, the 48-year-old Grey belts out biographical anthems, taking issue with land developers, honoring his grandparents, mourning the loss of a friend and just stirring up a good time. Flamingo recently shared a basket of boiled shrimp and chowder with Grey at his favorite neighborhood dive, Chowder Ted’s, near his home on Amelia Island. And while the waitress filled his glass with iced tea on that scorching summer day, he was brimming with stories about which songs still make him cry, his chicken coop and his quest to “build a better me.”
So many people have tried to describe your music—how would you explain it? JJ: It’s impossible for me to describe it, not because it defies description. It’s like describing yourself: “Right at six feet. White, sort of.” It’s kind of tough, you know what I mean? You can look in the mirror for 40, 45 years, in the morning when you brush your teeth, and you still don’t
Above left:
Grey strums a Dobro guitar while sitting on the tailgate of his truck at home in North Florida. Center:
The Renaissance man writes songs, sings, plays guitar and harmonica, and also knows how to fix a tractor. Right:
When he’s not on tour, Grey spends his time with his family and fixing things at his home and the farm where his grandparents once lived.
know who the hell you’re looking at. So I don’t really know what it sounds like. I know who I wished it sounded like.
playing Tedeschi Trucks Band). Everything from Marvin Gaye to Wilson Pickett, George Jones to Jerry Reed, AC/ DC to Lynyrd Skynyrd, Donny Hathaway to Stevie Wonder, James Brown. I want to sound like all that.
conversation on Earth? You’re singing about your daddy in another song. You’re singing about your boy Trey dying on OxyContin. Are you ashamed of us?” I’m like, “No, what are you talking about?” She said, “Johnny Cash is just Johnny Cash. Some people, they don’t even sing songs about their own people, and they still got their name. Why don’t you put your name on there? Is it embarrassing?” I called my manager the next day and said, “I’m putting my name on the music.”
What’s the story behind Mofro? JJ: A guy at work used to say that to me, “’Sup, Mofro.”
What are you playing on tour now? JJ: My thing with the set is, however I start—whether
It just sounded Southern and didn’t mean anything specific so I was like, “I’ll call what I’m doing Mofro.” Then my grandmother, one day she’s sitting there, you know, crocheting, looking at the TV, and she just stops and is like, “What the hell is Mofro?” Just like she’d been rolling it around. Then she’s like, “You know that song you’re singing about mine and your granddaddy’s last
it’s quiet or I come out BANG!—I break it down, and then build it back up, and then break it down, and then build it back up, and then break it down, and then build it back up and don’t come back down until an encore. Then I usually play something really subdued as the first song of the encore, like This River or The Sun is Shining Down. I don’t like to play The Sun is Shining Down in the middle of the set.
who do you wish you “sounded like?” JJ: Like this stuff (pointing to the restaurant speakers
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with This River. There’s a couple of them that get me. And I don’t mind that, I enjoy that.
Even though you’ve played the songs thousands of times? JJ: So whenever I go up there and sing the song, it’s this minute, this second. That’s all there is. And I just try to let that inspire each moment as it unfolds in front of me. You know, you go on stage for two hours a night and you go into what people call the zone. For a period of time, when I [first] started, I was in the zone once out of every 20 shows maybe, and the rest of them I was thinking all the time.
Every Minute
Why wait to play those songs at the end? JJ: I always wind up tearing up on that one, and same
I TRIED SO HARD TO BE THE PERSON EVERYBODY THOUGHT I WAS I PUSHED MYSELF AND EVERYONE ALMOST OVER THE EDGE THIS MIRRORED LIGHT THAT SENDS BACK EVERYTHING THAT YOU SEND OUT THE GRACE YOU GIVE GIVEN BACK LOVING EVERY MINUTE YOU LIVE FEELS SO GOOD TO BE WARM IN THE SUN
What were you thinking about during those shows when you weren’t in the zone? JJ: Stupid stuff. Like you’d be playing at a festival in front of 10,000 people, and 9,999 of them are totally enamored. But one person’s walking away. And you’re like, “Why are they walking away? Am I not doing enough?” The point is, the small person in us running its mouth all the time in your head, and won’t shut up, and always trying to make you feel like somebody else’s success is your failure can talk you into anything. It can talk you into never walking onstage again. It can talk people into sticking a loaded gun to their head and pulling the trigger. So eventually you’ve got to learn that it’s not you. That’s the giant illusion. I eventually figured a lot of that out. So when I went onstage, I went onstage with a joy to do it. And then it affected my whole life, just turned into this quest to build a better me.
Was there some moment or event that forced you to change? JJ: Well, it was a bunch of things. One thing was the car crash on the second leg of the tour in 2001. I was driving home, and a car hit us from behind, spun us out, flipped [us] two or three times. My wife was in intensive care for a month, and wonderful people helped us through that whole thing. Anyway, that moment of being so in my own skin, I didn’t think about it, just filed it away. And then I went back to being me again. I was staying perpetually sick on the road. I had pneumonia for a year and a half on the road, and I kept singing, and I had to take cortisone shots to get the swelling down in my throat and that just prolonged getting well. I stayed sick, sick, sick. My manager was like, “Hey man, I want you to go see this friend of mine. He’s a doctor. But he’s more than a doctor.” It was in Boulder, I was like, “This is some kind of hippie thing?” And even though
LOVIN’ EVERY MINUTE OF LIVIN’ (IT’S) SO GOOD TO BE WARM IN THE SUN LOVIN’ EVERY MINUTE OF LIVING THE EVIL DEEDS THAT WE DO SCREAMIN’ FROM THE HEADLINES CAN’T STOP TO READ OR TO WATCH CAUSE I AIN’T GOT THE PATIENCE OR TIME TO LIVE A LIFE OF DESPAIR TO LIVE BY ANOTHER MAN’S WORD IT’S ALWAYS BEEN IN YOUR HANDS TO LIVE A LIFE YOU WANT WHILE YOU’RE HERE I DON’T CARE WHAT YOU SAY TO ME EVERYWHERE BEAUTY IS ALL I SEE AND IT DON’T MAKE A DAMN CAUSE THERE AIN’T NOTHING TO TAKE FROM ME I’M LOVIN’ EVERY MINUTE I’M LOVIN’ EVERY MINUTE I’M FREE
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I’ve got a lot of friends that are hippies, you know, I was a super-redneck kid back then. This was in like 2008. Anyway, I went in there and he didn’t want to see me at first. I was like, “Look, hoss, I didn’t come to you to fix me. I came to you to find out how I can fix myself.” So that was the beginning of changing for me.
EVERYTHING IS A SONG
How do you write songs? JJ: The songs write themselves, so I try not to do too much. But I’m in midstream with about seven or eight tunes right now. Rule number one, don’t take any of it too serious. Rule number two, there aren’t no rules. And rule number three, let it happen when it happens.
Why do you tell so many stories about your life and Florida? JJ: It speaks to me, living here does. I took my daughter surfing just a little while ago, and driving here, looking around going, golly, it’s like living a dream. And most of the dream is because of all that out there. It’s speaking whether we hear it or not. At the same time, so often I didn’t know what any of the songs were about early on. You know, the song This River? People are like, “That’s about the St. Johns River.” It’s about the real world out there, not the world that men make up. The world that men make up, it comes and it goes. If you lived in Colorado, just sitting and looking at that mountain for five minutes, you feel small and it feels wonderful. That’s my tie to Florida with so much of the songs—it’s about feeling small and loving it.
If you didn’t know when you first wrote the songs, what have they become about now? JJ: So there was this recurring theme over and over again in the music that I wasn’t purposefully putting there to “wake up.” So when I finally kind of woke up, I looked back on those songs and I felt like a guy who was desperately trying to put together some equation that was going to make everything make sense. You’re there like a scientist working day and night. And it’s killing you because you want to come up with this equation. And then one day you finally come up with it, it finally happens. You have this moment of clarity—wham!—and the equation comes and you write it down and you run into your laboratory and there it is written over and over again on your chalkboard. You’ve been writing this equation down all these years, and you never knew it ’til you knew it.
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HOMESICK BUT IT’S ALRIGHT LOCHLOOSA IS
Lochloosa
ON MY MIND SHE’S ON MY MIND I SWEAR IT’S TEN THOUSAND DEGREES IN THE SHADE LORD HAVE MERCY KNOWS, HOW MUCH I LOVE IT EVERY MOSQUITO EVERY RATTLESNAKE EVERY CANE BREAK, EVERYTHING EVERY ALLIGATOR EVERY BLACKWATER SWAMP EVERY FRESHWATER SPRING – EVERYTHING ALL WE NEED IS ONE MORE DAMN DEVELOPER TEARING HER HEART OUT ALL WE NEED IS ONE MORE MICKEY MOUSE ANOTHER GOLF COURSE ANOTHER COUNTRY CLUB ANOTHER GATED COMMUNITY LORD I NEED HER LORD I NEED HER AND SHE’S SLIPPING AWAY IF MY GRANDFATHER COULD SEE HER NOW HE’D LAY DOWN AND DIE CAUSE EVERY MINUTE EVERY SECOND EVERY HOUR EVERY DAY, LORD SHE’S SLIPPING AWAY HOMESICK BUT IT’S ALRIGHT LOCHLOOSA IS ON MY MIND SHE’S ON MY MIND
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Is the song Every Minute about finding clarity? JJ: I was in Jamaica on a Jam Cruise at Ocho Rios, and I was having breakfast with some friends of mine in Galactic. I was mad about something that’s going on in some country halfway around the world that I’ve never been to, and I don’t even really know what’s going on over there other than what I’ve been told. I was sitting there with my ass on my shoulders, as my dad would say, just mad, not mad at nobody I’m with. And then I realized, wait a minute, I’m in Jamaica in the middle of the winter and it’s warm, it’s beautiful, and what the hell have I got to be mad for? I realized that watching the news was poisoning me. It doesn’t mean there’s not a need for people to be informed at all.
HOME-GROWN
Surfing’s a big part of your life. When did you start? JJ: Fourteen. I had half of a surfboard, and [some guys] had hit it with a machete and a hammer and poked holes. So I took a rubber car mat and glued it over all those holes and that was my boogie board. I rode that thing out at the jetties. That was me surfing until I could get a surfboard. My parents wouldn’t buy me one. I got a board for 10 bucks, and it was about two steps [up from] the car-matted half a surfboard. It was bad. I got a real surfboard a little bit after that.
So how often are you surfing when you’re home these days? JJ: Anytime there’s waves, as long as it’s halfway decent. I don’t go as much as I’d like, but I’m also working on stuff all the time, too, trying to catch up. Fixing the mower. The Dixie Chopper slung a belt, so I got to go out there and fix that. I got to fix the tractor out t here, at the other place, and I’m finishing up the chicken coop.
I realized that watching the news was poisoning me. It doesn’t mean there’s not a need for people to be informed at all. —JJ Grey
You have chickens? JJ: I got them because we inherited them when we bought the house. They were already there. We got 14 now. But I grew up with chickens, so I love chickens. I grew up with a lot more than that. When I was a kid we had maybe 60,000 a cycle, a fryer cycle.
Where were the 60,000 chickens? JJ: My grandparents had the chicken houses. They’d bring them as biddies, and then my grandparents raised them up to fryer size. Back then it took about eight weeks. Now it takes four weeks with all the crazy steroids, God knows what. They done moved chicken growing out of America, for the most part. That’s why I won’t eat a chicken unless it’s organic.
Above left:
The cover of the band’s most recent album, Ol’ Glory, which was recorded at Retrophonics Recording Studios in St. Augustine. Right:
Grey works on building a new chicken coop for the 14 chickens he keeps at home.
When you think back on your childhood, what comes to mind? JJ: Fishing with my grandfather in Lake Lochloosa and Ocean Pond, which is out near Olustee. And Katie’s Night
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Limit. I can still hear bands playing there. It was an old juke joint in Baldwin, right behind my grandfather’s house, or trailer [in an] old trailer park he had out there.
You hung out at Katie’s and listened to music? JJ: No, I couldn’t hang out there. I’d get in trouble because I was a kid. But on Saturdays they’d barbecue and I’d be trying to get bottles, because then you could get a nickel for them. I had a cheap-ass uncle that had an old grocery store there, he’d pay us two and a half cents and he’d pocket two and a half cents. And it’s like, “Why would I do that? The Lil’ Champ [store] right there will give us a straight nickel.” Anyhow, I’d see bands that’d be up there playing the Isley Brothers, that kind of music. Now it’s gone.
I got bussed 30 miles to school every morning to James Weldon Johnson downtown. All my friends did. It was called desegregation. —JJ Grey
What was your dad like? JJ: My dad was a
man’s man as far as I was concerned, and he didn’t cuss in front of us. Every now and again he’d get mad and say “damn” or “shit” or something, you know, busting his hand with a hammer or whatever. My grandmother told me something I’ll never forget. She was getting on to me about something, and I was just a little kid. She said, “Your dad’s out there right now rebuilding that tractor, and right now he can come in this house and bake a better cake than I can. You got to be like your dad. You got to be able to do everything.” So I’ve tried. I’m still trying.
Do you bake? JJ: I can’t boil water. You’ve suggested your family is racially mixed. Is that the case? JJ: I grew up around people on both sides. I don’t know. My grandmother had an Afro. I asked my dad, and my dad said, “Yeah.” Seventh grade, I got bussed 30 miles to school every morning to James Weldon Johnson downtown. All my friends did. It was called desegregation. They were taking
The Island
SO MANY THINGS YOU’VE SEEN SO MANY STORIES LONG FORGOTTEN SO MANY DEEDS BETWEEN SHOUTING OUT ACROSS THE BOTTOM BENEATH A GHOSTLY TWILIGHT HER BOSOM FILLED WITH SHINING STARS HER SECRETS SING DOWN THROUGH THE AGES AS BRIGHT AS LIGHTNING BUGS IN JARS ALL BENEATH THE CANOPY OF AGELESS OAKS WHOSE SECRETS KEEP FOREVER IN HER BEAUTY THIS ISLAND IS MY HOME HER ROLLING HILLS BY HANDS WERE BUILT BY NATIVES WHO WERE NEVER FOUND THE ONLY HINTS LEFT OF THEIR PASSING ARE ANCIENT SHELLS THAT GHOST THE GROUND BONE WHITE THEY TELL A STORY OF ALL THE SLAVES WHO GRACED HER SHORES OF COTTON FIELDS SO LONG PLOWED UNDER A JUNGLE NOW UPON HER STORES ALL BENEATH THE CANOPY OF AGELESS OAKS WHOSE SECRETS KEEP FOREVER IN HER BEAUTY THIS ISLAND IS MY HOME ALL BENEATH THE CANOPY OF AGELESS OAKS WHOSE SECRETS KEEP FOREVER IN HER BEAUTY, AH IN HER BEAUTY THIS ISLAND IS MY HOME
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COMEDIC TIMING poor white kids and making them go to poor black schools and poor black kids were going to poor white schools.
And you were one of the poor white kids? JJ: I learned a valuable lesson. That kids are the same. Pretty much mean. Like baby birds, man. By the end of the school year I had X amount of friends, and I had a couple of, not enemies, but a couple of cats I’d just as soon not run into, you know, bullies or whatever. It was the same way when I went to the all-redneck school. Wasn’t no different. Everybody’s the same. People like to think everything’s different. That’s how I got hip to a lot of the music, too. Because when I was a kid, brothers was listening to stuff like Time, you know. It was called Morris Day and the Time eventually, but it was just called Time back in the day. Isley Brothers, stuff like that.
FLORIDA SON
What Florida artists were influences on your early career? JJ: Lynyrd Skynyrd, Gold & Platinum was the first album I ever owned. My sister had a bunch of disco 45s that were killer. KC and the Sunshine Band, the Bee Gees, Main Ingredient, a bunch of stuff like that. My sister bought me Gold & Platinum for Christmas one year. My parents let me keep it. Back then, we used to listen to Casey Kasem’s Top 40 countdown, as long as the songs weren’t too risqué, on the way home from church. If they got risqué, my dad shut it off.
Do you have favorite venues around Florida where you love to see or play shows? JJ: I love playing Jannus Landing. I like playing the House of Blues in Orlando. I love playing in Fort Myers at, aw, what the hell’s the name of that place? It’s a blues joint, but you play outside on an outdoor festival stage— Buckingham Blues Bar! I’ll tell you another place, too. I like playing Fort East Martello in Key West. You drive right by it on the way into
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Key West. And in the middle of the museum, in the courtyard inside the fort, they put up a big old festival stage. And they put on a concert. I don’t know if they still do that or not. That was awesome.
So let’s talk football. Seminole or Gator? JJ: Well, I’m split, right down the middle. But I’m a Florida State Seminole and then the Gators. The Gators was only an hour from where we grew up. And then my brother went to Florida State in ’79. They were terrible back then. I went to a game. I was a little kid, and I was already a Gator fan. I saw that guy come out with the spear—spear in the ground— and I was like, alright, Seminole fan! Then all my Gator friends made fun of me, to the point where I almost hated the Gators, but then I wasn’t going to let them change that. I just like watching college football. If I had to, I’d probably lean Florida State’s way. But I always lean the underdog’s way, and right now it makes me a little bit more of a Florida Gator fan.
Can you clear the air about Disney? JJ: Yeah I like it. Even though it’s in a song, people think I don’t like Disney. No, no, no, no, no. But how many more Disney Worlds do we need? One’s enough.
What’s your most memorable performance in Florida? JJ: Playing with the Jacksonville Symphony was one of the highlights of my life. And I’ve done a lot. I don’t mean that to sound like, I’m great, but I’ve had a lot of wonderful opportunities, is the best way to put it, because it’s the truth. But they had this medley called Mofro and Mo’ Overture. A guy combined a bunch of my songs, the melodies from them, and wrote this piece. To hear a 52-piece outfit playing it, it was great. And then to sing—I did it one or two more times after that. I remember the first time we did it, one of the vice presidents of Gate Petroleum was up
Talented jokesters of the ’50s and ’60s sparked JJ’s love of storytelling.
B
rother Dave Gardner was a big influence on me. Brother Dave was a jazz drummer, ordained minister, a beat poet kind of dude from back in the day. And Jerry Clower. Those were two comedians. Jerry Clower, he was a Grand Ole Opry comedian. He didn’t sing, but he had this whole thing about the Ledbetter family from Yazoo City, Mississippi. I used to could recite Live In Picayune from start to finish—I mean, every word—as a kid. In Florida, Gamble Rogers—phenomenal guitarist, great singer, but he was also a storyteller. I know if I’d heard Gamble when I was a kid, it would’ve been the same way. Because, instead of Yazoo City, Mississippi, he had a fictional place called Ocklawaha, Florida, and they had the Purina feed store there and had all these characters, and he’d just tell these hilarious stories. Then he’d break out into a song with the acoustic guitar. He was a master guitar player and just a phenomenal storyteller, I mean just lights-out one of the best. — JJ Grey
there dancing with his wife, going crazy. I was like, “That guy’s cool, man. That’s why he’s successful— because he’s having fun.” That’s what the world needs.
ROAD HARD
What’s your routine on the road? JJ: I eat less when I’m on the road, which is great. I always lose a little weight when I’m out there. I just exercise some, stuff like that. I come home, and I eat too much.
Do you drink alcohol on the road? JJ: I used to. I quit. It’s easy to drink on the road. People want you to get drunk. People buy shots and send it to the stage. But the fun feeling that you have with whiskey or weed, all those things are cool, but they’re all training wheels. Sooner or later you’ve got to ride the bicycle on your own, man. And I don’t need to get shitfaced to have fun. I never did a bunch anyway. I was too much of a control freak to get too drunk or too wasted on weed. Now, I’m not a control freak, but why do I need that shit? First thing, smoking pot, good weed, that doesn’t really hurt. You might cough a little bit, but that’s not the same thing as the first time you pull off a cigarette you’re like, “God Almighty, this sucks! How does anybody smoke these sumbitches?” But it’s the same way with booze: “Oh my God, this tastes like panther piss.” But then after a while, you’re like, “This tastes good.” So anything you have to develop a taste for is probably something that you should have in moderation.
Does turning 49 in October scare you? JJ: I don’t pay attention to age. I don’t really care. I don’t never celebrate my birthday. Not because I’m scared of getting older. I love it. I physically feel the same as I did when I was 20.
Are you spiritual? JJ: I don’t know. I’m not into religion in terms of rules and regulations. I grew up Christian, but I’m not in anybody’s club. When people talk about spiritual stuff, I think of unicorns and the little hippie shop in Cedar Key, you know what I mean? I don’t know anything about that kind of New Age stuff. There’s wisdom in Muslim teachings. There’s wisdom in Confucius, Jesus, everybody. I could keep going. I’ve no claim to any of it because I don’t know. I know one thing: not knowing is part of the gig.
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We sent a writer deep into the Everglades in search of wild flamingos, which have returned to roost in an unlikely home after centuries of absence. after centuries unlikely home roost in an
FLAMINGOS returned to
which have
wild flamingos,
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in search of
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By
TRISTRAM KORTEN
Below:
All flamingos live in tropical and subtropical areas. Their habitats include estuarine lagoons, mangrove swamps, tidal flats and sandy islands.
or BUST Photography by BRIAN GARRETT
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T
The helicopter was heading east over the man-made wetlands that buffer the Everglades, called storm-water treatment areas (STAs). Mark Cook stared out the window absentmindedly. Cook is a lead scientist with the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD), which owns and manages the STAs. He had just spent the day surveying the ibis population to the south. Now he was headed to the airport in West Palm Beach and home. Suddenly the sky around him blossomed into pink. Cook adjusted his eyes and looked. Then he looked again. More than a hundred flamingos had materialized in the air in front of him. He asked the pilot to circle around so they could view the birds again. It was Cook’s first glimpse of the some-
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what elusive band of wild flamingos that had been visiting South Florida regularly. That was 2014, the year a flamboyance (the exquisitely poetic name for a flock of the big pink birds) of 147 flamingos roosted in a 15,500-acre storm-water treatment
area called STA-2. Reports of flamingo sightings there had been occurring for at least eight years, prompting avid birders, and the just plain curious, to illegally sneak onto the property, which was not open to the public. The arrival of the big group in 2014, however, created more interest than the agency could handle, as the attention was potentially disruptive to the birds’ feeding and roosting. As a result, the SFWMD reached out to the Audubon Society of the Everglades for help with the crowds, who would now be allowed controlled access through public tours and advanced ticket purchasing. In 2015, Audubon volunteers began organizing the first flamingo tours, which filled almost immediately. “Within three weeks I had requests from 1,200 people,” Susan McKemy, vice president of the Audubon Society of the Everglades and one of the
volunteers organizing the tours, tells me. “There were people from four foreign countries and 21 states. One guy flew in from Massachusetts for the day!”
Above:
In 2014, a surprisingly large flamboyance arrived at STA-2 in the Everglades.
Bonding with Bir ders To get to STA-2, I have to drive west along State Route 80 in Palm Beach County for over an hour, until the cities scale down to strip malls, and the strip malls dissolve into flat fields of sugarcane, rice and corn. Eventually, the Everglades’ soggy borders stop the roads, the horizon opens up and the world belongs to the birds—eagles, ospreys, hawks, owls, ibis, egrets, roseate spoonbills. They soar and hunt in the skies and roost in the mud and snags here, thriving in a man-made oasis.
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The storm-water treatment areas begin where the farmlands end. In these zones, acres of flooded land act as massive organic filters, whose plants leach out phosphorus and other excess nutrients from fertilizer run-off before it flows into the Everglades. They were developed as part of the Everglades Restoration Act, the vast and long-term federal and state effort to preserve one of the world’s most remarkable wetlands. In the process they’ve become mini wildlife sanctuaries. STA-2 is a desolate swath of wetlands crisscrossed with dirt access roads. McKemy greets me on the dusty roadside where I leave my vehicle. She loads me into a car driven by Rick Schofield, a devoted and knowledgeable birder, who happens to be a snowbird himself, a Massachusetts native who winters in South Florida. With half a dozen cars packed with scheduled bird-peepers trailing us, we head into the STA looking for flamingos, while keeping our eyes out for other interesting birds. Almost immediately, Schofield pulls the caravan over by a snag, a dead upright tree trunk, in which a red shoulder hawk has made a nest. One of the birders then alerts everyone to a fluttering bit of yellow, gray and green plumage in the cattails where a tropical kingbird has alighted. People are fascinated. Schofield explains that this is because the bird is not from around here. “It belongs in Texas or Arizona,” he says. “Must have been blown off course.” We continue on. At one point we pass a large alligator on the banks of a water cell (which is part of the STA) ferociously gnawing on what looks like a turtle shell. Overhead a long-winged osprey flies, carrying a fish in its talons. In fact, the sky is filled with raptors: hawks, harriers, peregrine falcons. In the water, wading birds, such as wood storks, herons and egrets, stalk the shoreline. But no flamingos. I don’t take it personally. It’s mid-March and so far none of the tours have seen them. “This year we haven’t had any,” Cook notes. “But we’ve been getting an unusual amount of rain, and this is a bird that’s pretty sensitive to water depth.”
Florida’s most iconic bird, an animal with spindly legs and a sinuous neck appears so frail a stiff wind might snap one in half, yet it’s capable of transnational flight, and has only sporadically been seen in Florida’s wilds over the past two centuries. That was not always the case. Up until the late 1800s, huge flamboyances would congregate along Florida Bay at the southern end of the Everglades down to the southern Keys. It’s not clear whether a permanent colony ever bred here. Instead, the birds may have used Florida as a seasonal feeding ground. But they were regular enough visitors to catch the attention of European settlers. The birds
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PHOTOGR APH BY
Fl a m in g os Tak e Flo rida
Flamingos are capable of transnational flight, yet they have only sporadically been seen in Florida’s wilds over the last two centuries.
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your pink feather finder Where to see this beloved bird—in a more Accessible environment—at zoos and sanctuaries around the state
north: American Flamingos (the brightest colored of the species) are part of the Range of the Jaguar exhibit at the JACKSONVILLE ZOO. In the spring, 36 African Greater Flamingos were added along the African boardwalk. jacksonvillezoo.org
central: Tampa’s LOWRY PARK ZOO features the African Greater Flamingo as part of the Florida Wildlife exhibit, where pink-plumed Rosebreasted Cockatoos and Scarlet ibis also reside. lowryparkzoo.org
south: Originally founded in 1927 as a citrus orchard, FLAMINGO GARDENS became an Everglades wildlife sanctuary in 1990. Today, visitors can feed the Caribbean Flamingos in a tropical pond area. flamingogardens.org
PHOTOGR APHY BY JOHN LOPINOT
The branding of the flamingo as Florida’s iconic bird happened in the 1930s, when aristrocratic horse-racer Joseph Widener imported a flock from Cuba for his racetrack in Hialeah.
were too pretty for their own good. The settlers short-sidedly Up Close, but Un-W i ld hunted them for their eggs, meat and feathers, until they were I’ve also been snubbed by the wild flamingos, after three hours in the Everglades searching for them. So I take my gone from Florida. The branding of the flamingo as part of Florida’s image disappointment to Miami’s Jungle Island, which has a came afterward, in the 1930s, when aristocratic horse-racer captive flamboyance. Jason Chatfield, the vice president of Joseph Widener imported a flock from Cuba for his race- zoological operations, has invited me to help build the mud track in Hialeah, just outside Miami. That colony has since mounds the birds lay their eggs on. Chatfield and I roll up our pants and wade across a reproduced and made a permanent home at the track. These are the birds seen in movies and postcards, including the man-made pond to a small island where the right kind of opening credits of the 1980s TV show Miami Vice. Their muck has been carefully cultivated. We start building up a proliferation at the racetrack was the first instance of few mounds that the birds will then, hopefully, add to. The flamingos successfully reproducing outside their wild state, goal is to see baseball-size eggs on top of those mounds in according to Hialeah officials. The racetrack’s infield is now the coming weeks. The birds, curious, cluster together on the shore to watch. a National Audubon sanctuary. Then, in 2006, an SFWMD maintenance crew spotted a Finally, I’m able to see them close up: the improbably delifew birds in STA-2, according to the district’s wildlife coor- cate legs and necks, the black trim along the wings, that dinator, Brian Garrett, and again in 2007, then 2008 and so ridiculous beak. There’s a moment of cognitive dissonance. on. The numbers weren’t large, no more than 10 at a time. The birds hardly seem exotic to me. The shape and color are At first the assumption was that they were escapees from so familiar. Of course they are—their image is reproduced Hialeah or from Zoo Miami. But the arrival of the big group everywhere from lawn ornaments to our state’s lottery logo. in 2014 almost certainly showed they were wild. That meant And then the irony settles in. The bird’s image is ubiquitous they flew hundreds of miles from their breeding homes in the in Florida, but its actual existence here is a mystery. In late April, at the end of what has become Florida’s wild Bahamas, Cuba or Mexico. The question now was, would flamingo season, I get a note from McKemy, saying that the they stay? The 2014 sighting caught the attention of Dr. Frank flamingos have finally been seen in STA-2. A day later ChatRidgley, Director of Conservation and Research at Zoo field tells me that two of his flamingos have laid eggs (the Miami, who, along with his group of researchers and Tony number would grow to 11). Then the SFWMD’s Garrett sends me pictures of the birds Pernas of the National Park Service, had been researching the bird’s natural history in Florida. The official record was that alighted in STA-2 this year after my visit. There they are, inconsistent to say the least. Their interest was spurred when wading in mirror-smooth water. Then they appear to run on a stray flamingo ended up in the Everglades with a band on the water to gain lift and fly away. Finally, they are in flight, its leg indicating it was born in the Yucatan. Then, last year their long wings extended, the edge feathers turned up delicately. Their necks are stretched straight they found a flamingo in the Keys that they ahead and their legs extend straight back. were able to tag. They’ve been waiting for it to Left: In 2014, 147 flamingos They are frail-looking on land, but elegant leave Florida to see where it calls home. Their roosted in a and in control in the air. I wonder where goal now is to capture one of the STA-2 birds 15,500-acre water treatment area they’re headed: across the pond, or across and tag it to see where they’re coming from. in Palm Beach the Florida Straits? Will they come back next So far, no luck. County—and the bird-watching year? And, most pressing, will they ever make “There’s a reason researchers don’t band crowd went Florida home again? adult flamingos,” Ridgley says. “They fly away.” photo wild.
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WHIRLWIND TOUR TOUR:
Miami *
Art Week *
synonymous with its anchor show, Art Basel, attracts both the experienced art enthusiast, able to spot a Jeff Koons animal sculpture from a mile away, and the novice patron partygoer, equally adept at sniffing out celebrity hangouts. But whatever the attendees’ motivation, the revelries offer experiences for every interest and expertise level. In our guide, Flamingo breaks down the pomp and outlines the circumstances for navigating one of the state’s marquee cultural events. Miami Art Week, for the uninitiated, generally refers to the roughly two dozen art fairs and countless exhibition openings, pop-up installations, performance art presentations, concerts, cocktail parties and cultural tourists canvassing the city, this year from November 29 through December 4. Art Week’s signature event, Art Basel
Artists, gallerists and party people from around the world flock to Florida’s biggest cultural event of the year—a series of fairs, exhibitions and performances showcasing the most coveted and cutting-edge contemporary works. Here’s where to stay, eat, play and experience the creative fervor.
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here else can two polar bear sculptures covered with indigo ombre feathers face off, while Sly Stallone exhibits his paintings in the former Versace mansion, and a giant boulder with painted-on googly eyes glares at passersby from atop a crushed car? As the Will Smith song goes: Welcome to Miami—Art Week. Miami Art Week, as pretentious as it is outlandish, as brilliant as it is bawdy, and as elite as it is accessible, presents established global artists and up-and-comers in a fabulous, and at times chaotic, week of fairs, exhibitions, performances and parties held from South Beach to Wynwood and all points in between. Now in its 15th year, Miami Art Week, which has become
Left: Fairgoers appreciate works by Dorothy Iannone at Art Basel Miami Beach 2015. Below: A visitor takes in Wisdom Teeth by He Xiangyu.
MUSEUMS OUTSIDE OF THE FAIRS, the city’s larger art museums, such as the Bass Museum of Art and the Institute of Contemporary
(pronounced baa-zel) Miami, an American adaptation of a Swiss exhibition considered to be the most prestigious art fair brand in the world, takes place inside the Miami Beach Convention Center (MBCC) in South Beach (a neighborhood in Miami Beach). Hundreds of galleries apply every year to be selected for inclusion in Art Basel, which featured 267 participants last year. Launched in 2002, Art Basel is arguably the most important art showcase in North America, with as much as $3 billion worth of art on display by artists of the highest caliber, from emerging stars like Rolls Royce–commissioned Isaac Julien to bluechip powerhouses like John Currin, Elizabeth Peyton and David Salle. Despite an anything-goes dress code bordering on the ridiculous (fairgoers have been seen in everything from full-body unitards with amoeba-like motifs to silk ball gowns to jeans and T-shirts), Art Week means serious business for wealthy collectors snapping up
Art, host their
most ambitious exhibitions during Art Week. Last year, the Nader Latin American Art Museum
exhibited 15 large-scale sculptures by worldrenowned Colombian master Fernando Botero in Bayfront Park. At the Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM),
musician Devonté Hynes and artist Ryan McNamara took over the terrace to present “Dimensions,” an immersive collaboration that blended dance, music and sculpture. Dozens of arts nonprofits also exhibit during the week.
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TOGETHER, ART MIAMI AND ITS SISTER FAIR, CONTEXT, ENCOMPASSED 250,000 SQUARE FEET AND 200 GALLERIES IN 2015.
insanely priced pieces at a healthy clip. Some of the most expensive works on view in recent years have included an enormous Alexander Calder mobile made of painted sheet metal, wire and rods, which hung from the MBCC’s rafters and was valued at $35 million, and a Jeff Koons sculpture of a blue elephant at David Zwirner Gallery’s booth that sold for more than $20 million.
Above:
Bears by Paola Pivi at Galerie Perrotin Below:
An assemblage of 760 bicycles called Stacked by Ai Weiwei Opposite:
Fairgoers perusing works inside galleries at the Miami Beach Convention Center
PHOTOGR APHY BY (OPPOSITE, BELOW) DANIEL AZOUL AY; ART BASEL MIAMI
Last year, heavy doses of rain and even a bizarre, nonfatal X-Acto knife stabbing, initially presumed to be a performance art work, didn’t deter the crowds from viewing and spending. Art Basel reported 77,000 visitors in 2015, up from 73,000 in 2014. And 2015’s Art Basel saw mega transactions, including the sale of a Francis Bacon oil painting for $15 million. Art Miami (the art fair that started it all in the Magic City) had a lucrative 2015, selling a 1955 Alfonso Ossorio painting, just 45 minutes into an opening party, for $175,000. Eight-figure transactions aside, for the culturally curious, Art Week provides the perfect place to immerse oneself in contemporary art and an astonishing array of works created in the last decade. More than two dozen satellite fairs bustle under pop-up tents throughout the city, allowing hundreds of additional galleries, often with more affordable works, to have a presence outside of Art Basel. Each of these fairs— including NADA, Art Miami and Untitled, Art—host a robust roster of events and programs throughout the week. For a more bespoke experience, VIP passes for satellite fairs abound and are available on fair websites in advance of Art Week. With a little notice, regional museums and galleries throughout Florida are often happy to help members secure passes to Art Week events ahead of time. Tougher to come by are Art Basel VIP passes, reserved mostly for the professionals— strongly represented artists, collectors, museum leaders, curators and art advisers. But real people in search of real art culture need only follow our guide to Art Week and Art Basel. Tell ’em Flamingo sent you.
A Tale of 2 Art Weeks One Weekend, Two Itineraries, in Miami Beach and in Town
S
eparated by the sparkling Biscayne Bay, marquee Art Week events take place both on mainland Miami and in Miami Beach. The nowlegendary Art Week traffic crossing the bridges between the two areas can quickly kill the festive, enlightened mood of the weekend without a well-thought-out plan. Simplify logistics and minimize car time by booking a hotel on the side of the bay where you intend to do the majority of your exploring. Stay in Miami Beach for Art Basel and mainland Miami for the Design District and urban museum and gallery experience. Research trafficbusting ride-share programs and download relevant apps onto your smartphone. Last year, UberBoat made a splash shuttling culture tourists between Miami Beach and the mainland on luxury yachts.
STAYING IN
MIAMI BEACH Hot spot: ART BASEL is the vortex and signature fair of Art Week. The sprawling show takes up the entire MBCC and deserves at least half a day to see it properly. Grab a guided tour for intros to artwork and backgrounds on artists. Book tours ahead of time at 1901 Convention Center Dr., artbasel.com. TIME: Half a day
Hot spot: BASS MUSEUM OF ART, a jewel in the Art Deco District, is situated only a short walk from Art Basel. After a major expansion that increased the exhibition space, the stone-faced museum is scheduled to reopen in time for Art Week. Every year, the museum, which features a lush grass promenade leading to its entrance, hosts
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STAYING IN
MIAMI BEACH
bassmuseum.org TIME: 2+ hours
beach, both present a selection of galleries specializing in trailblazing artworks and have a reputation for attracting heavyhitting collectors seeking new talent. 6701 Collins Ave.,
newartdealers.org;
Hot spots: NEW ART DEALERS ALLIANCE (NADA) and UNTITLED, ART fair highlight works by emerging and more well-known artists for serious collectors. NADA, located this year in THE DEAUVILLE BEACH RESORT, and Untitled, Art fair, held outside on the
Below:
The fabulous Faena Hotel, which opened earlier this year
Ocean Dr. and 12th St., art-untitled.com TIME: 2+ hours each
Hot spot: DESIGN MIAMI caters to furniture junkies and Mad Men lovers. Design Miami is a must-see for those who appreciate innovative design, plus it’s housed in a venue adjacent to the MBCC. Billed as the premier venue for design, this fair displays 20th and 21st century furniture, lighting and objets d’art. Last year, there were works from New York, Rome, London, Brussels, Beijing, São Paulo and more. Meridian Ave. and 19th St., designmiami.com
TIME: 1+ hours
ART BASEL IS THE LEADING NORTH AMERICAN ART PLAYER WITH AS MUCH AS $3 BILLION WORTH OF WORK ON DISPLAY.
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THIS YEAR’S ART WEEK RUNS FROM NOV. 29 THROUGH DEC. 4.
on the sand at
Hot spot: In the heart of the Art Deco District, THE WOLFSONIAN–FIU stands out as a tall, white Lego-castlelike building with an ornate beige trim. Recognized as one of the best design and decorative arts museums in the country, the Wolfsonian–FIU hosted a 2015 collaboration between a Brazilian musician and the Miamibased Phenomenal Experience Agency, which transformed
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the place into an immersive performance installation tying into the museum’s World War I collection. 1001 Washington Ave., wolfsonian.org TIME: 1+ hours
MIAMI BEACH HOTELS in 1940, *THEBuilt RALEIGH
hotel reigns as an Art Deco landmark known for its beachfront swimming pool and super-chic private cabana service. Within walking distance of the MBCC, it welcomes guests with a dreamy, stripedcurtain canopy at the entrance.
1775 Collins Ave., raleighhotel.com
FONTAINEBLEAU, *a fabulous midcentury treasure, offers several dining options, making it easy to grab dinner after a long day of painting and sculpture appreciation. Prepare for possible paparazzi, as it’s a favorite for the A-list jet set, including Kate Hudson, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jennifer Lopez and Alex Rodriguez. 4441 Collins Ave., fontainebleau.com
One of the newer *super-luxury setups, the FAENA HOTEL houses numerous art installations and the nearby FAENA FORUM, an arts
space with public programs. This 5-star hotel earns its rep with gilded columns and stunning architectural details throughout, as well as butler service providing Frenchpressed morning coffee and charming bartenders creating just-right nightcaps. 3201 Collins Ave., faena.com
MIAMI BEACH EATS want *to Iftryyou an all-star chef, consider the MATADOR ROOM at the uber posh Edition hotel and the Caribbean and Latin American– inspired cuisine by the Michelin-starred chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten.
PHOTOGR APHY BY: FAENA HOTEL, JUSTIN NAMON, NOAH FECKS, MATADOR ROOM, THE R ALEIGH, ROBIN HILL, ART BASEL
a large sculpture installation in nearby COLLINS PARK, a free public space offering a great oceanfront respite after meandering through the convention center. 2100 Collins Ave.,
Above left: 27 Restaurant & Bar with cozy mid-century modern furnishings Above: Revitalize with a kale and chickpea salad at 27 Restaurant & Bar Far left: Avocado pizza by Jean-Georges Vongerichten at the Matador Room Left: A gathering at the Dutch Miami, led by a two-time James-Beard-winning chef
A chic, circular dining section with sleek, earth-toned decor encompasses intimate tables, making everyone feel like part of the in-crowd. Do consider sharing plates like the avocado pizza, but don’t let the cocktails give you the liquid courage to try on the golden matador jacket on display. 2901 Collins Ave., matadorroom.com
For more relaxed, *casual fare, try the 27 RESTAURANT & BAR at the Freehand hotel and savor a super social,
communal-table adventure. The music and food beautifully meld Caribbean, Latin American, Asian and Middle Eastern cultures and cuisines. This space connects with a craft-cocktail bar called the BROKEN
SHAKER, a James Beard Award semifinalist. 2727 Indian Creek Dr., thefreehand.com
to Art Basel, *THEClose DUTCH at the W Hotel provides New American fare from two-time
James Beard– winning chef Andrew Carmellini. Start with a savory treat from the trendy Oyster Room, such as stone crabs, and end with a delicious slice of pie, made fresh every day. 2201 Collins Ave., thedutchmiami.com
Below: Art Basel’s outdoor installations; Right: The Raleigh hotel in South Beach; Bottom right:The Bass Museum near the MBCC
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STAYING ON
MAINLAND MIAMI
Above: Fairgoers peruse works at Art Basel 2015. Right: Julio Le Parc’s La Longue Marché Below: Ladies and Gentlemen
by Hassan Sharif
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Hot spotS: ART MIAMI with its sister fair, CONTEXT, is the leading international contemporary and modern art fair outside of Art Basel. Now in its 26th year, it is Miami’s
longest-running art fair, showcasing important works from the 20th and 21st centuries. This fair occurs in midtown Miami at a complex in the Wynwood Arts
District. Context, launched in 2012, spotlights emerging and mid-career artists and promotes robust and fluid dialogue between artists, gallerists, collectors and enthusiastic learners. 3101 NE 1st Ave., artmiamifair.com;
2901 NE 1st Ave., contextartmiami.com TIME: 2+ hours
PARTIES
Right: Pérez Art Museum
Miami (PAMM)
Below: Julio Le Parc’s
Martha Le Parc with lunettes pour une vision autre.
that celebrates Miami’s lush, tropical climate with bayside views and cascading green gardens. Inside, take a trip around the world with works by international artists, particularly from Latin America and the Caribbean.
ON THE GROUND IN MIAMI, don’t worry that the
1103 Biscayne Blvd., pamm.org TIME: 1+ hours
4040 NE 2nd Ave., icamiami.org
TIME: 1+ hours
Hot spot: INSTITUTE OF CONTEMPORARY ART, MIAMI (ICA MIAMI), located in the Design District, has mind-blowing Pop, Conceptual, and Op art exhibitions. Led by chief curator Alex Gartenfeld, the ICA has attracted the attention of the glitter-arti. This spot has staged some of the most engaging shows in the city, such as The Van (Redux) by video and performance artist Alex Bag.
PHOTOGR APHY: ART BASEL, PAMM
Hot spot: The PÉREZ ART MUSEUM MIAMI (PAMM) is the largest museum in the region dedicated to international contemporary art and was designed by award-winning international architects Herzog & de Meuron, currently working on the Tate Modern in London. It’s a stunning structure
OUT OF SEVERAL HUNDRED GALLERY APPLICANTS, ONLY 267 MADE THE ART BASEL CUT LAST YEAR.
Hot spot: The private holdings of THE MARGULIES COLLECTION AT THE WAREHOUSE and the RUBELL FAMILY COLLECTION in Wynwood, and the DE LA CRUZ COLLECTION in the Design District contain some of the best contemporary works in the world. These places provide a uniquely personalized art outing, and are all relatively close to each other. 591 NW 27th St., margulieswarehouse. com; 95 NW 29th St., rfc.museum.com;
23 NE 41st St., delacruzcollection.org TIME: 1+ hours each
Hot spot: For al fresco art, visit the WYNWOOD WALLS, a public space where some of the world’s most renowned muralists, street and graffiti artists are invited to share their supersized skills on the exterior walls of nearby buildings.
The Walls reside in the WYNWOOD ARTS DISTRICT, an area that was once considered up-andcoming but now has most certainly arrived, with an edgy but polished mix of eateries, shops and, of course, galleries. Notable spaces include DINA MITRANI GALLERY and THE SCREENING ROOM. (Check our Bird’s Eye map for more must-sees in this hip area.) 2520 NW 2nd Ave., thewynwoodwalls.com TIME: 1+ hours each
Hot spot: Miami has a sprawling gallery scene in LITTLE HAITI (also known as Lemon City) filled with several privately owned spaces including Michael Jon & Alan, Noguchi Breton, Mindy Solomon Gallery, Gallery Diet, Pan American Art Projects, and IRL Institute. Between 54th St. and 79th St., and NW 6th Ave. and NE 2nd Ave, miamigov.com TIME: 1+ hours each
best events are exclusive, velvet-rope-only affairs. Whether you fly by the seat of your pants or plan in advance, parties await. Plenty of spontaneous pop-up cocktail parties and art shows are open to the public. Hundreds of Art Week parties, private and public, have cropped up all over town as companies spend lavish amounts to attract the highly affluent culture tourists. In 2013, Louis Vuitton hosted a fabulous fete at The Raleigh hotel’s beachside garden, to showcase a reconstructed beach house by the late French modernist Charlotte Perriand. Two years later, Bacardi and Swizz Beatz presented a hybrid art fair and three-night house party concert series in Wynwood, with an open bar sponsored by the former and performances by Alicia Keys, DMX and Wiz Khalifa. Last year PAMM embraced a kinetic theme, entertaining guests with eight moving sculptural platforms featuring live dancers and musicians. 2016 party details will emerge closer to Art Week.
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STAYING ON
MAINLAND MIAMI MIAMI HOTELS Although it’s *considered an integral part of the MiMo movement (resort glamour and tropical modern buildings from the ’50s and ’60s), led by prominent architect Robert Swartburg, THE VAGABOND HOTEL has a cartoonish, Technicolor facade. Far from tired, it’s been recently refreshed and renovated in a “retro-luxe” spirit. With 44 happily hued guest rooms, a gym, restaurant, sizable pool and outdoor bar, it sits just minutes from the Design District and Little Haiti. 7301 Biscayne Blvd., thevagabondhotel.com
Downtown *Miami’s EPIC HOTEL has wide-open views of Biscayne Bay and the city’s famous skyline and is approximately a mile from
PAMM, the MIAMI DADE COLLEGE MUSEUM OF ART + DESIGN, CISNEROS FONTANALS ART FOUNDATION and DIMENSIONS VARIABLE. Situated right alongside the buzzing Brickell business district and the vibrant Biscayne Bay area, the hotel’s rooftop pool, private cabanas and Exhale spa might just have to wait for your next visit. 270 Biscayne Blvd. Way, epichotel.com
EAST, MIAMI is *convenient for outof-towners, as it’s just a 15-minute drive to the airport and located in the middle of a semi-completed shopping and dining zone called BRICKELL CITY CENTRE. Though it’s a new space in a developing area, the hotel adds cachet and warmth with bright public installations and a rooftop bar with a stunning outlook, SUGAR. 788 Brickell Plaza, east-miami.com
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Tips FOR NOVICE ART BUYERS Prices throughout the fairs range from a few hundred dollars to a few million dollars. Be prepared to see more four- and five-figure buys than threefigure deals. Engage with gallerists (they won’t bite) and ask questions about artworks of interest. If your taste in art exceeds your budget, ask about similar but less expensive works and artists.
Haggle. A discount or a payment plan may be realistic possibilities for novices. Don’t buy art as a financial investment. Buy art because you can’t live without it.
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MIAMI EATS MICHAEL’S *GENUINE FOOD &
DRINK, in the Miami Design District near the ICA MIAMI, is the debut effort of James Beard
Award–winning chef and owner Michael Schwartz. His mission to provide food made from fresh and local ingredients via a neighborhood bistro has panned out, satisfying appetites of all sizes with a variety of yummy
options, from Greek farro salad to duck confit to a hearty wood-oven-roasted snapper. 130 NE 40th St., michaelsgenuine .com
the center of *theInWynwood Arts District, ALTER has
PHOTOGR APHY BY: ART BASEL, PAMM, EPIC HOTEL
Join gallery mailing lists to keep informed about future works.
ART WEEK TURNS 15 THIS YEAR!
quickly gained a glowing reputation for its intricate, seasonal fare thoughtfully created by Jean-Georges Vongerichten–trained chef Bradley Kilgore. (See Grove Stand in this issue for an in-depth look at what
makes this restaurant special.) 223 NW 23rd St., altermiami.com
With prime real *estate inside PAMM, VERDE is a beloved brunch and lunch spot that closes at 5 p.m. on weekends. Check ahead for
Art Week hours. Regardless of when you dine there, be proactive and reserve an outdoor table for superior Biscayne Bay views. 1103 Biscayne Blvd., pamm.org —Reported by Christina Cush and Ricardo Mor
Above: Anton Kern Gallery at Art Basel 2015 Left: An array of desserts
at Verde inside PAMM
Opposite, right:
Performance art and artwork on display at PAMM Opposite, left: Rooftop
pool cabanas at Epic Hotel in Miami
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Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trucks, the married duo at the helm of the Tedeschi Trucks Band, have rocked their way from the House of Blues to the White House with a sound even they can’t quite define. Flamingo recently caught up with the couple at home in Florida. By JAMIE RICH
T
ogether, Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trucks front a Grammy award–winning, 12-member ensemble that both defies and exalts the genres that have shaped them—blues, jazz, funk, roots, Southern rock. Their soul-stirring, roof-raising performances, featuring Susan’s soaring voice, Derek’s emotive slide guitar and a crew of world-class musicians blowing horns, tickling keys and singing harmonies, have inspired an international following. And it all started here in the Sunshine State. The Tedeschi Trucks Band (TTB) released their fourth album, Let Me Get By, in early 2016 to rave reviews and began a world tour that will keep them on the road nearly 200 days this year. Derek, 37, is a guitar virtuoso, who famously played with Bob Dylan as a preteen, toured with Eric Clapton in his late 20s and was a member of the Allman Brothers Band for 15 years. Susan, 45, a lauded blues singer and guitarist, was nominated for several Grammy awards throughout her solo career. The couple formed the Tedeschi Trucks Band in 2010, recording albums—and raising their two children—in Jacksonville, where Derek grew up. During a recent break from touring, the couple opened up about their home life, offshore fishing on their Hatteras, eating shrimp and grits with Herbie Hancock and why Derek leaves all the talking to Susan onstage. ON FLORIDA AND FAMILY How does the natural setting in Florida seep into your music? Derek: You know, I think for us, we have our studio built right into the swamp here, behind our house, and we’ve made our last five or six records here. In a lot of ways, the band formed in that building. It’s definitely in the mix. Susan: Recording here, being in the nice weather, actually promotes a positive spirit. It comes out in the writing and everything. Derek: We’ve recorded the swamp itself a few times. The frogs and crickets end up on our records. There’s a little segue between a song called “Crying Over You” and another one
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called “Hear Me.” The night we were recording, we stepped out of the studio, and the swamp was loud and alive, so we threw some microphones out in the middle of it. How do you keep family and business separate? Derek: I don’t think we separate it at all. That’s the beauty of loving what you do and meaning it. There’s nothing about the music we play, or what we do for a living, that feels unhealthy or unholy. It’s not one of those things you have to wash off, and I’ve certainly been around bands and parts of the music scene that would feel that way—where, when you’re home, you don’t want to think about it. We love the people we get to play music with, and we love the music we get to make.
PHOTOGR APHY BY TEDESCHI TRUCKS BAND (LEFT, RIGHT AND PREVIOUS PAGE)
“We’ve recorded the swamp a few times. The frogs and crickets end up on our records.”
How do you balance family demands with being on the road so much? Susan: Derek’s mom moves right into the house when we go in to work and will take [the kids] to wherever they need to go—to school or baseball or horseback [riding]. And then Derek’s brother and sister-in-law live —Derek Trucks right up the street, too, so they can help out as well, and they have two little ones. It’s sort of like a little village. Derek: It’s kind of the only way to make something like this work. I know me and Susan wouldn’t be comfortable being in a band together and out on the road if we didn’t have family that close that we can fully trust and rely on. It’s a pretty amazing situation. It’s not just work, and it’s not just music. This whole thing is one big circus. Describe your Jacksonville for folks who aren’t familiar with the Bold City. Derek: There’s just a ton of great new restaurants, and it feels like downtown, there’s a little bit of vibe there, which is nice to see. And you know, we travel so much, you start to get a feel for these things, you can feel cities, when they start turning a corner and revitalizing. And I feel like Jacksonville’s starting to take that turn for the better. And it’s such a
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Ephraim Owens
Kebbi Williams
2 WTrumpetX
2 WSaxophoneX
Dallas, TX
Atlanta, GA
TTB since 2015
TTB since 2010
2
2
Mike Mattison
2 WHarmony VocalsX Minneapolis, MN
TTB Since 2010 2
Derek Trucks 2
WGuitarX Jacksonville, FL
TTB since 2010 2
Susan Tedeschi 2 WVocals & GuitarX Boston, MA
TTB since 2010 2
Elizabeth Lea 2 WTromboneX San Diego, CA
TTB Since 2015 2
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Mark Rivers
2 WHarmony VocalsX
J.J. Johnson
Charleston, SC
TTB since 2010
2 WDrums & PercussionX
2
San Antonio, TX
TTB since 2010 2
Tim Lefebvre 2
WBassX Foxboro, MA
TTB since 2013 2
Alecia Chakour 2 WHarmony VocalsX Amherst, MA
TTB since 2015 2
Kofi Burbridge
2 WKeyboards & FluteX Bronx, NY
TTB since 2010 2
Tyler Greenwell
2 WDrums & PercussionX Pensacola, FL
TTB since 2010 2
Tedeschi Trucks Band
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beautiful place. There’s so many things to do, especially outdoors. And it’s really relatively cheap, kind of insanely cheap for what you can do. Is there some place or thing that welcomes you back to Florida every time? Derek: I don’t like airports at all, but whenever I get home, there’s something about the calmness of the Jacksonville airport that just feels different than other spots. So that’s the first thing that reminds me, “Alright, you can unwind for a few days.” And the Dames Point [bridge]—once I get there I realize I’m pretty close to home. And then it’s hanging with your kids and dropping them off at the bus stop in the morning for school. Then at about 11 on the first day home, sitting on the back porch looking at the studio, take out a
the sound of the room, we draw up plans and my brother and Bobby knock it out. There’s a great place in town where we find old reclaimed wood. We redid part of the control room with just old barn wood. So, the whole thing’s a personal touch. ON THE ROAD How do 12 band members travel in two buses o n t he r oad? Susan: Each bus only holds 12 people, and we have 22 of us out on the road. We’re all smushed together and don’t have a lot of space. Thank God we like each other. I mean, we’re used to it, but other people think it’s so glamorous and they think it’s something that it’s not.
Above:
Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi perform at the Capitol Theatre in Port Chester, N.Y.
cigar, relax, unwind, that’s kind of my only ritual. It forces me to just sit in one spot. Turn your phone off, leave the house phone inside. Let it ring if it rings. I figure if it’s an emergency somebody will come get me. They know where I am. What are some of the personal touches at your home studio, Swamp Raga? Derek: My brother David, who lives right down the street, and Bobby Tis, who’s the engineer, they really built most of it by hand. Bobby and his dad. He got the blueprints that we initially had and turned it into a proper studio. Anytime we need to soundproof something or change the feel and
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TTB headlined so many major festivals this year, How does that feel? Susan: It’s a big accomplishment. We both have worked so hard, even separately, before we had this band, and then with this band. Everyone in this band knows how unique and special this group is, because we have so many talented musicians and we all work really hard and we appreciate any good stuff that comes around, and we’re really thankful to get to places like Jazz Fest, never mind headline it. Derek: It’s funny because those things sneak up on you. Every once in a while it’s nice to step back and go, “Wow, we headlined Jazz Fest, or we played Royal Albert Hall [in London] or the Budokan in Tokyo.” You start [out] playing small clubs that are empty, and then a year or two later you’re playing the same small clubs, and it’s less empty, and then a few years later, it fills up. Then a tour or two later, you’re playing bigger venues, and it’s been that way for a long time. Susan: It’s not like it just happened overnight. It’s been a long time coming. Derek: There are certain festivals we get to headline now that, for 10 years, we couldn’t get on the bill. It seems like our band is tailor-made for that festival [but] they won’t even return our calls. So it is nice to conquer some of those, finally, and then not only do it but have really great shows doing it.
PHOTOGR APHY BY GEOFFRE Y TISCHMAN (THIS PAGE); TEDESCHI TRUCKS BAND (PREVIOUS PAGE)
And w hy be suc h road warriors ? Derek: We could certainly have a smaller band and spend more money on hotel rooms and nicer buses, but then your music sucks. You just have to put everything you have into what you do, and not the other side of it. There’s only so many things in the world that give people real relief, and for me, music is an amazing outlet. I’ve certainly listened to things that have changed the way I’ve thought about the world, and I feel like, a band like this, you want to get in front of people and give them a little bit of that medicine.
truck stops
Susan and Derek’s hometown chill-andchow spots JULINGTON CREEK FISH CAMP, 12760 San Jose Blvd., Jacksonville
“ Food is pretty great, and a really good bourbon list.” HONG KONG CAFÉ, 4660 U.S. Highway 1 North, St. Augustine
Above: (left to right) Derek Trucks during a Made Up Mind studio session; the singers pose with their children after a Jaguars game; the duo study lyrics at a Let Me Get By studio session
“ Dive hole-in-thewall on the side of the road that’s got unbelievable food.” BOWL OF PHO, 9902
What’s the future of your annual Sunshine Music Festival in South Florida? Susan: When it comes to our festival I’m just excited to keep doing it, and have people like the Wood Brothers, bands that we like to see. Derek: It seems to be growing a little bit every year. I’d love for that to catch so we could keep adding bands that we love to hear and play with.
PHOTOGR APHY BY TEDESCHI TRUCKS BAND
DOWN TIME How do you relax at home? Susan: When I’m at home, I’m kind of more in Mom mode. I’m trying to do yoga and pay bills and pick kids up from school and make lunches and bring kids to baseball practice or horseback [riding], so there’s not a lot of actual free time, but when I do get it, I want to go fishing with the boys, or I’ll go do whatever I can, get out on the water. Derek: We have an offshore boat; it’s a Hatteras. We go offshore as much as we can. Our son and daughter have a little jon boat, the tiny boat on the creek here. We spend time on any water we can get on. Tell us about the Hatteras. Derek: It’s a 60-footer. It’s an older one. We had a center console for 15, maybe 20 years that we fished, and now we just recently got this boat. It is a lot of boat, but it’s a dream come true for us. You have these ideas of these things that you’d maybe be able to do at some point. You can find used boats out there that are well maintained. Ours is a ’99, but really well maintained, low engine hours. We do all of it ourselves. There’s no captains. We clean that sucker. We do the maintenance. We captain it. That’s the only way we could
pull off having it. But it’s more rewarding that way, when you get out there and catch fish, and it’s all on you. It’s a huge chunk of time and energy, but we love it. What’s her name? Derek: Son House, after the old Delta Blues musician. And probably, my son will live on it at some point. The first trip we took him out on that boat, he caught a 60-pound wahoo, and ever since then, when I’m on the road, he’s sending me ocean reports. Just recently, I was in Ames, Iowa, and he’s sending me these fishing reports, and I was like, “Charlie, you can’t send me those while I’m here. It’s not fair. There’s no ocean here!” As Jaguars fans, have you ever thought about playing a stadium show at EverBank? Derek: We’ve been season-ticket holders really from the beginning, my dad and his friends from the first year. And then I kind of took over their tickets. But we’ve always gone, so our kids grew up going to those games, and it’s a great way to kind of detach from the road and everything else. You know, they’ve talked about building a theater connected to the stadium, a little amphitheater similar to the St. Augustine Amphitheatre, and there’s been some rumors about this band playing it. ON MUSIC Is there a term of art that you use to describe the music you make? Derek: I don’t. There’s so many different influences that the band pulls from. I mean, it’s not a blues band. It’s not a jazz group. It’s not a rock band. But it definitely pulls from all of
Old Baymeadows Rd., Jacksonville
“ Pho soup that’s as good as I’ve had anywhere. We went to Vietnam recently and I was like, ‘That spot in Jacksonville kind of holds up.’” BEACH ROAD CHICKEN DINNERS, 4132 Atlantic Blvd., Jacksonville
“ You can’t do it if you want to work a lot afterwards because everybody needs a nap.” AARDWOLF BREWERY, 1461 Hendricks Ave., Jacksonville
“ Fridays and Saturdays they’ll bring food trucks in, so there’s some pretty amazing food down there.”
SIDECAR, 1406 Hendricks Ave., Jacksonville
“ A nice little bar that we hit from time to time.”
CORNER TACO, 818 Post St., Jacksonville
“We go there a lot.”
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This September will be your sixth run at the Beacon Theatre in New York. What’s the connection with the Beacon? Derek: Well, you know, I played the Beacon for maybe 15 years with the Allman Brothers, and they would do multiple nights, I think 15 or 18 shows. It just became this legendary run. You get a connection with the venue and the people that work there and the crowds that come out. When this band formed, we decided we’d book a few shows there and see how it went. We started with a show or two, and we’re upping it to six shows this year. I don’t think I ever want to get up to a dozen, not that we have that option. But when it’s four, six, eight, every show remains really exciting. That really is one of the highlights of the year for the band because you know there’s gonna be a lot of people out front that are there for multiple nights, some people for every show, and you want to make sure that you’re showing different sides of the group. Both you and Susan have played with musical greats and legendary performers. Are there heroes you haven’t worked with? Derek: Just recently we got to sit in and play a few songs with Stevie Wonder. That was pretty surreal. He was certainly at the top of the list. And before that, it was B.B. King. We got a chance to tour with him quite a bit and really get to know him, and that was magic. We’ve been fortunate. We had Herbie Hancock down to our studio. We recorded a track for his album here, at home, and that was a pretty surreal moment—my dad making fried shrimp and shrimp and grits for Herbie Hancock. I feel like our heroes that we grew up listening to, the ones that are still around, we’ve run across and a lot of times made great connections with them. We’re incredibly fortunate and blessed in that way. But you never stop listening, you’re constantly looking for things that move you, so maybe there’ll be new names. What do you have to say to fans who want you to engage more on stage verbally? Derek: I just go into that mode, like when you’re on your boat, captaining the ship. I’m listening to what everyone on stage is doing. That’s the part that I’m engaging, making sure the horn section is doing what they’re supposed to do, and the drummers are locked in with the bass player, and Susan’s aware of the next turn that we’re gonna take, and all
PHOTOGR APHY BY TEDESCHI TRUCKS BAND
L i v e : E v e r y b o d y ’s Ta l k i n ’ 2 0 1 2
Made Up Mind, 2013 R e v e l a t o r, 2 0 1 1
those. All of my favorite musicians and all the people that I continue to listen to, whether it’s current or old, you just don’t accept any of those labels. You’re making music that feels good, and wherever it falls it falls. You’re not worried about what box it fits in.
“I’ve seen plenty of guitar players that make faces and hop around...But it’s never been all that intriguing to me.” —Derek trucks
PHOTOGR APHY BY GEOFFRE Y TISCHMAN
of these things. And I think maybe early, early on, watching footage of, whether it was John Coltrane or Duane Allman, or my heroes at the time, it just seemed like when they hit the stage they were tapping into something else. I’ve seen plenty of guitar players that make faces and hop around and pretend that when you bend a string it hurts your fingers. But it’s never been all that intriguing to me. I’d rather see somebody dig down deep and show me something I haven’t seen before, you know? What’s your view on music-streaming sites? Derek: I think in a lot of ways it’s wrecked the whole game for a lot of people. We survive from touring. That’s what makes it work for us. There’s no income from making records. You do that because it’s something you wanna do for artistic reasons only. You can’t go to a movie and see it for free when it first comes out, but you can sure listen to a record for nothing. So I think there’s a lot of great records that probably will not get made because of the streaming stuff. I get it, if there’s a record I wanna hear, you’ve got to either go to iTunes and buy it, or order an old copy on Amazon, or you can just go listen to it right now for nothing. So it’s the easiest choice. I do tell my kids, “If there’s a record you really like, you’re
gonna buy it.” I do it just on principle. But you don’t expect the whole world to do that. Are you listening to a lot of vinyl? Derek: Yeah, a lot of bands sell their records on vinyl at shows. Most people listen to music on their phone with really shitty earbuds or Beats, which are just awful. Not many people are hearing things the way they were intended to be heard. I guess new records are made to be heard on shitty speakers. But [when you consider] a lot of the great classic records, people back then had a pretty good hi-fi stereo in their house. When you got a new record, you put it on and you listened to that thing, and you had a pretty good idea of the way it was supposed to be heard. That’s changed. But when we make records, we still pretend that people care and people have decent stereos.
Above:
Tedeschi Trucks Band members, pictured at the Capitol Theatre in December, started out playing to small empty clubs.
Plans for a new album soon? Derek: Yeah, there’s talk with the band members, and a lot of song ideas floating around. Everybody’s ready to get back in and start writing again as a group. Right now, it’s just finding time between tours and one of our drummers just had a baby a few days ago. So it’s busy, but we’ll get back in it.
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O R A N G E
By KATIE HENDRICK Photography by JESSIE PREZA
The juice on Florida’s citrusgrowing history and the a-peel for family farmers, despite facing sticky situations with the iconic crop
Above: A train-car loading platform, circa 1930
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CITRUS EXPRESS It’s hard to believe oranges aren’t true Florida natives. Originating in China and Southeast Asia, oranges traveled to Europe via Italian traders and on to North America with Spanish and Portuguese conquistadors. Ponce de Leon, historians say, planted the state’s first orange trees around St. Augustine somewhere around 1513; gradually, more and more grew along the St. Johns River, then down through Gainesville and Ocala. Town names such as Orange Lake, Fruit Cove and Citra reflect this fruity development. Florida’s sandy soil and subtropical climate proved ideal for citrus, but the industry didn’t take off on a commercial level until after the Civil War, when improved railroad transportation helped growers ship their product out of state and made it easier for prospective investors to visit groves. This is when the citrus story gets more personal for me. In the 1870s, my great-great-grandfather, Wade Hampton Harrison, moved from South Carolina to Micanopy, where he started a cattle ranch and planted a few orange trees. “That was typical of pioneer families,” says my grandfather, William Harrison Jr., 88, a Sarasota attorney, who has carried on the legacy of raising cattle and growing citrus on
PHOTOGR APHY BY ROBERT E. DAHLGREN
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any beverages conjure the upcoming winter holidays: mulled wine, hot cocoa, peppermint-flavored tea and lattes. But for my family, nothing more aptly toasts the season than an icy, pulpy glass of orange juice, just-squeezed from Hamlins grown on my grandfather’s grove in Zolfo Springs. (It’s great with a splash of champagne, too.) My family relishes several orange-based treats and traditions, and so does the rest of our state. From vintage postcards that beckoned tourists with depictions of a pastoral wonderland, complete with ruby-lipped beauties plucking fruit, to the standard-issue state license plate, those bright orbs are emblematic of Florida sunshine. Long offered at state welcome centers, orange juice has colored many motorists’ first impressions of Florida. There’s even a state statute that prohibits disparaging comments about our oranges. “When you say ‘Florida’ to folks up north, they think of three things: beaches, Mickey Mouse and orange trees,” says Ray Royce, 58, a sixth-generation Floridian and former grower, presently an industry lobbyist. “Citrus is a big part of our economy, but an even bigger part of our identity.”
From left, above:
The author visits the family ranch for her citrus fix (2012); A Hamlin ripe for the Harrison family’s 2006 Thanksgiving orange-juice toast; William Harrison mows his grove in Zolfo Springs. Middle: Approximately 90 percent of
Florida’s oranges are processed into juice; A piece of fruit growing on one of Harrison’s reset trees (2016).
PHOTOGR APHY BY NANCY HARRISON, K ATIE HENDRICK , ROBERT HARRISON, FL DEPT. OF CITRUS, ISTOCK .COM
Below: Harrison oversees his grandchildren picking oranges for a Thanksgiving meal (2006); The orange blossom is the state flower; Following five freezes in the 1980s, most groves north of I-4 disappeared.
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a ranch in Hardee County. “They grew a little citrus for personal consumption and to share with friends in town. That was the thing to do.” Back-to-back freezes in 1894 and 1895 drove most of the state’s ranchers and farmers (occupations that tend to go hand in hand) further south, to cities such as Clermont, Lake Wales and LaBelle. The Harrisons chose Manatee County.
FAMILY FARMERS In the next generation, my great-granduncle, Wildes Harrison, ran a 3,500-acre cattle ranch in Parrish with a 60-acre grove. “Growing up, on Sundays, the whole family would gather at Uncle Wildes’ place,” my grandfather says. “He grew some tangerines and I could zip them open in a jiffy.
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GROVE LOVE As my family was winding down its citrus endeavors, another was just getting started. Joe L. Davis was a self-made man who, in 1940, at age 17, hitchhiked from Wauchula to Tampa to find work. He ran through a string of jobs—stock boy, restaurateur, insurance salesman and car salesman—before he started his “love affair with agricultural real estate” back in his hometown, says his son, Joe Davis Jr. The more he helped clients locate their perfect piece of land, the more enamored Davis became of farming, particularly with oranges,
PHOTOGR APHY BY (THIS PAGE) FL. DEPT. OF COMMERCE; (OPPOSITE) ISTOCK .COM, DEANNE BRIGGS, DON BALL, K ATIE HENDRICK
Above: Fruit pickers competing in the second annual National Orange Picking Contest in Orlando, 1951
I couldn’t wait to raid those trees after church.” Inspired by his brother, my great-grandfather, William Harrison, a circuit court judge, purchased a 15-acre grove in Palmetto, which his two sons helped tend on weekends and school breaks. Their childhood, during the Great Depression, “involved a lot of pruning and chopping up weeds,” and their diet, a lot of vitamin C, my grandfather says. In February 1959, William Harrison Sr. passed away and my grandfather and his brother inherited the grove, as well as their uncle’s property. They were especially excited about the Parrish grove, for it was “beautiful and very productive,” my grandfather recalls. Sadly, just one year later, Hurricane Donna demolished it. “I went out the morning after the storm and saw all the fruit on the ground,” my grandfather says. “It was up to my knees.” He estimated that rehabbing the grove would require a hefty financial investment and upwards of 30 hours of physical labor a week. “We were young lawyers with young children. We didn’t have the time or the money to make it work.” They held on to the Palmetto property for nearly a decade. During those formative years, my mother, aunt and two uncles, all under age 10, developed sweet citrus memories. To entertain his children, my grandfather would peel an orange in one long, curly strip. “We’d twirl it while singing our ABCs and whatever letter we were on when the orange dropped off was supposed to correspond to our future spouse’s name,” says my aunt, Nancy Taylor, 52. Once the kids “unwound” their oranges, they’d hand them back for my grandfather to cut a hole in the top. “Then we’d throw our heads back and suck the juice out,” she recalls. “There were no straws or napkins involved. We were a sticky, but happy, bunch.” Rapid development in Palmetto convinced the brothers to sell their grove in the late 1960s. “It wasn’t terribly productive and it was getting crowded out,” my grandfather explains. It would be nearly a quarter century before he revisited his healthy hobby.
SELLING SUNSHINE When it came to exporting Florida citrus, crate labels were designed to grab attention. Now, they are highly collectible reminders of a golden era.
A
fter the Civil War, Florida growers began shipping their citrus in crates by railway to fruit auctions in northern markets. To wow buyers, growers needed a way to stand out. Enter bright, eye-catching crate labels. Popular motifs included flowers, animals, sports themes and Native Americans. Others simply used the company name in an alluring font with an illustration of the fruit. Mindful of Jewish buyers in New York, some growers wrote their names in Hebrew, says Deane Briggs, former treasurer of the Dundee Citrus Growers Association, who has collected vintage Florida citrus labels for more than 20 years. At first, growers painted designs
and in 1959, he bought half of a 20-acre grove. An only child, Davis Jr. cherished time spent with his dad checking on the orange trees. By the time he returned from the University of Florida in 1976 with a law degree, his family had 500 acres of citrus groves. He promptly joined the family business. “I passed the bar, but deep down, I knew I’d never practice,” he says. “My dad’s business was expanding like crazy. I liked real estate and I loved citrus. I came in when the industry was at its peak, which was really exciting.” The father-and-son duo worked together for 38 years, until Joe Davis Sr.’s death in 2014 at age 91. During that time, they increased their citrus property by a factor of five, with groves spread among Hardee, DeSoto, Highlands and Polk counties.
STICKY BUSINESS
on crates with a stencil. In the 1920s, lithography rose in popularity, and printed labels were glued to crates. World War II created a wood shortage, so fruit was shipped in cardboard boxes. “By the 1950s, preprinted cardboard boxes became the standard, thus ending the production of citrus labels,” Briggs says. Available on auction sites such as eBay, labels run from about $1 to more than $200, depending on their rarity. Briggs and a handful of other collectors participate in a sale hosted by Florida’s Natural Growers in Lake Wales (fall) and in Winter Garden (spring).
Looking back, Davis Jr. (who still runs the operations) remembers many years of prosperity accompanied by an abundance of adversity. “Ask any farmer about the 1980s and they’ll recall it as the decade of the freezes,” he says. During half of those years, temperatures dropped into the 20s, killing millions of trees around the state. “By 1990, citrus production in Florida had been halved. Practically all the groves north of I-4, the corridor from Tampa to Daytona Beach, disappeared.” Today, the citrus belt covers approximately 515,000 acres and extends from Davie to Winter Haven, with the highest concentration of groves in the landlocked central counties: Hardee, Highlands, Polk and DeSoto. Employing nearly 62,000 people, Florida’s citrus industry is valued at approximately $10.8 billion. Growers who survived the freezes contended with three major storms in quick succession in 2004. Hurricanes Charley, Frances and Jeanne ripped fruit and leaves off branches, uprooted trees and flooded groves, decreasing the state’s citrus production from 291 to 169 million boxes. It took a costly three years to recover, which was made all the more difficult by canker (a disease often spread by rain, wind or insects) and another hurricane, Wilma, in 2005. Other challenges of the twentieth century
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clem
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We’ve been through it all. Agribusiness is not for people looking to get rich quickly. They’d be better off gambling in Las Vegas.
na
—Barbara Carlton
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included droughts, low prices, viruses and fruit flies. Now the industry faces citrus greening, considered by many growers and scientists to be the most catastrophic problem yet. (More on this later.) “We’ve been through it all,” says Barbara Carlton, M.D., a retired physician in Wauchula who, in 1959, married into a seventh-generation cattle and citrus family that owned ranch land in Sumter, and at one time had 700 acres of groves in Hardee and DeSoto counties. She recalls winter nights in the 1960s, before growers used irrigation methods to protect fruit from the cold, when she and her late husband, Albert, had to run around the groves turning on heaters or starting fires. “That was just one of many hardships,” she says. “Agribusiness is not for people looking to get rich quickly. They’d be better off gambling in Las Vegas.”
es
TREE HUGGERS About 10 years ago, Carlton noticed troubling signs in her groves. The leaves on trees were turning yellow, and their fruit was unusually small and dropping prematurely. “We had no idea what was going on,” she says. “Today, every grower in the state recognizes those as symptoms of citrus greening.” Citrus greening is a bacterial disease, spread by the Asian citrus psyllid (a bug), which infects a tree’s phloem (the vascular tissue that transports nutrients), effectively starving it. Researchers at the University of Florida’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences have developed methods to treat greening, but nothing to cure it. “Greening is like the plant version of AIDS,” says Davis. “We have treatments to keep an infected tree alive, which are expensive, but the tree is left exceptionally weak and susceptible to any kind of stress,” ranging from drought to excessive rainfall to cold temperatures. Many growers, like my grandfather, pull up diseased trees upon detection and replant seedlings. Some have bulldozed their groves, replacing them with crops like strawberries, cucumbers or olives. Others have expanded their cattle business instead. “Greening affects virtually every citrus grower in the world,” says Royce, executive director of the Highlands County Citrus Growers Association,
which represents about 175 growers and 195 businesses connected to the industry. “It’s created tons of problems, but has also made our growers better agronomists.” Growers who once operated on autopilot now constantly monitor what’s happening in their groves. “They’re educating themselves—both from academic sources and fellow growers,” he says. “They’re very mindful and meticulous with fertilizer treatments these days, basically spoon-feeding the trees nutrients.” Additionally, Royce has noticed a surge in camaraderie, at the county and state level. “Growers aren’t competing with each other,” he says. “They value dialogue and are working together to solve the greening problem.” Neighbors have begun coordinating their pesticide applications to improve the odds of controlling the bugs that spread greening from grove to grove.
PASSION FRUIT In 2001, the Harrison brothers sold the Parrish ranch because shopping centers were encroaching on the property. But my grandfather, then 73, still longed for a country retreat to escape the rigors of his law practice. When he toured a ranch on Charlie Creek in Zolfo Springs later that year, he was simultaneously smitten with and wary
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of the 110-acre grove it featured. “I could tell it was a good grove that produced a lot of fruit,” he says. “But my first thought was, ‘Whoa, I’m not prepared to get back into the citrus business.’” Then the owners said they had competent maintenance people to oversee day-to-day operations, and he was hooked. Unlike previous family groves, this one is not just for enjoyment—though my relatives and I devour plenty of oranges, as does my grandfather’s toy poodle and even his cattle. If we can resist eating them directly from the trees, we juice them or pull the cells apart and make ambrosia with banana slices, cherries and coconut flakes. The bulk of his fruit, however, goes to a citrus cooperative that sells to a big beverage conglomerate.
Growers aren’t competing with each other. They value dialogue and are working together to solve the greening problem.
Left:
Employing nearly 62,000 people, Florida’s citrus industry is valued at approximately $10.8 billion.
PHOTOGR APHY BY FL.DEPT. OF CITRUS
—Ray Royce
For 15 years, my grandfather has put in three full days a week at the office in Sarasota, leaving—usually before sunrise—each Thursday for a 60-mile drive to the ranch, where he spends the weekend. The quietness, fresh air, wildlife and scent of orange blossoms help him hit the reset button. “My citrus hobby has been immensely therapeutic,” he says. “I’ve worked out many tricky real estate and tax issues while mowing the grove.” Echoing Davis, Carlton and Royce, he reiterates that a grove requires substantial attention, even for a “gentleman grower” whose livelihood does not depend on production. He spends at least two days a week examining his trees and conferring with his grove manager. He also regularly reads trade magazines and communicates with other growers to stay on top of industry issues. “There are many things you worry about—the weather, disease, prices, and so on,” he says. “But you’ll go crazy if you dwell on what could go wrong.” He focuses on quality-control practices and quickly replacing diseased trees. He intends to be in the citrus (and legal) business for the rest of his life. “My goal is to keep the grove in the best condition possible to pass on to my four children,” he says. “For generations, my family has had a relationship with the land. This is my heritage.”
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BEST LITTLE MUSIC ( ) HOUSE S IN FLA. TINY venues drawing
BIG talent and live-band fans
By KEVIN MIMS
Photography by JEREMIAH STANLEY
w
ith each long, dark mile that passed, and with a turn onto a dirt road, I was starting to realize the description “blues club 20 minutes outside downtown Tallahassee” didn’t quite fit. Finally, the headlights brought me to a hill topped with live oaks and a nondescript block building with a bonfire outside and life pulsing within. Even from there, I could tell something special was happening. You see, I’d been a fan of the blues since I was a teenager, when I’d borrow (and usually not return) cassette tapes from my uncle’s stash. He had some good stuff—Big Bill Broonzy, Charley Patton, Muddy Waters and Bukka White. I didn’t know then that I’d eventually happen on a club where the world of those old greats is alive and well. But here I was, at a juke joint out in the middle of nowhere, transported back in time. This place, the legendary Bradfordville Blues Club (BBC), is the only Florida location on the Mississippi Blues Trail. A well-obscured treasure, if not a secret one, the BBC shows us what it was like to hang out at a low-key, authentic blues club over 50 years ago— without pretense, bright lights, flashy signs or highway frontage. “There is a magic in the air,” says owner Gary Anton, who’s run the spot for 14 years. “Many of the old players, when they walk in there, they walk in the door, put their guitar cases down, look around and pretty much say the same thing: ‘This is the type of place I cut my teeth on, and there don’t seem to be many of them left anymore.’ It
has a great vibe to it with all the music and everything that has transpired through the years. That’s something everybody knows—the musicians and the customers—it just has a feel to it.” For decades, the club operated without any written records, so oral history is all that remains for long stretches of the club’s existence. “Depending on who you talk to and how much you’ve had to drink—or how much they’ve had to drink—you’d be surprised to hear who played here,” Anton says. Among the past performers: Johnny Winter, Pinetop Perkins, James Cotton, Willie “Big Eyes” Smith, David “Honeyboy” Edwards, Bobby “Blue” Bland, Jimmy Rogers, Clarence Carter and Percy Sledge. “Legend has it B.B. King, Chuck Berry, Ray Charles and Fats Domino may have sat in during the after-hours weekends,” Anton adds. What’s at the BBC can’t be found in most places. The focus is on the music, and it unites people from all walks of life. “It’s a pure music venue and both the bands and the customers feed off that. You get the older folks and the younger folks dancing together,” Anton says. “When it comes to that dance floor, it’s like everybody’s family. It’s palpable.” The BBC is one of a kind, but it’s far from being Florida’s only hidden music gem. In my travels across this diverse state, I’ve gone on roads less traveled, and have discovered other foot-tapping treasures, making sure I’ve talked to the musicians and patrons who make them what they are.
Ybor City has always been a time capsule for the history of that area, and that’s somehow
Hoy Como Ayer (translation: “Today as Yesterday”) might not be the biggest venue in the Magic City, but that is part of the appeal of this Little Havana nightspot on Calle Ocho. It’s a must-visit for any fan of Latin rhythm, especially Cuban music and culture. A local favorite rather than a tourist stop, Hoy Como Ayer is “a place you can leave and say, ‘Wow, Miami is freaking awesome,’” says writer and Miami native Vanessa Garcia. Just pull your car up to the valet and let them take care of your wheels while you get lost in the music. Hoy Como Ayer’s atmosphere is energetic and cozy, thanks to warm wooden paneling and a few small tables and chairs, putting patrons and musicians in close proximity. “It’s smaller than you think it’s going to be,” says Garcia. “It’s like a big living room. It reminds me of Christmas and my family bringing out instruments and playing. I like that they haven’t torn down walls and made it this huge thing.” To Garcia, who has Cuban roots, this place feels authentic, and that’s why it draws others with similar backgrounds. “There are new waves of Cubans that come in, and there are bands playing that they’ve heard in Cuba,” she adds. Garcia’s family members are also hooked on Hoy Como Ayer, not just for Cuban bands and musicians, like Amaury
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Top left: The Ponte Vedra Concert Hall is set in a former Baptist church.
Gutiérrez; they recently enjoyed rocking out to Spam Allstars, a nine-piece hip-hop, Latin, funk and electronica band from Miami. Regardless of who’s jamming, you can sit back and listen or you can get up and dance. Garcia digs that flexible attitude. “I’m not the type of person who’s going to get up there and dance, but I love this music,” she says. “Whether you are one type of person or another, you can participate in this place.”
More Ritz in Ybor City Distinctly Yborian, it’s hard not to love the classic Ritz Theater, from the bold ruby-trimmed marquee sign out front to the crush of people dancing inches from the stage and performers. The shows and music have changed at the Ritz through the years. But the place still evokes its glory days in the early 1900s, when it first opened, and you can feel that history as you make your way to the Theater Ballroom across the building’s original terrazzo floors in the main foyer. The ballroom has a classic black-and-white tile floor, with a big R insignia in the center, and lush red velour floor-to-ceiling curtains flank the stage. The century-old, 17,000-square-foot theater has seen Ybor through many stages of development, from its beginnings as
CONTRIBUTED PHOTOGR APHY BY THE MUSIC VENUES FEATURED IN THE STORY
Miami’s Latin Magic
a cigar-manufacturing town occupied by Cuban and Spanish immigrants to what it is today—a vibrant historic district full of arts and culture, restaurants and entertainment. “Ybor City has always been a time capsule for the history of that area, and that’s somehow magnified at the Ritz, due in part to the renovation several years ago, converting from the grungy rock venue feel of the Masquerade, to the classy and historic feel of the Ritz today,” says Matt Reisinger, a Tampa-area sound engineer, composer and musician. Reisinger began his musical career at the Ritz, but before that, he was attending concerts such as the Reel Big Fish show in 1996, when the Ritz still went by its former name, the Masquerade Nightclub. “I must have gone to more than a hundred shows there by now,” Reisinger says. “I literally grew up in that place.” The theater has hosted everyone from megastars such as Lady Gaga to local bands. “There have been so many great acts throughout the years,
magnifi ed a t
Top right: Standing room only at Vinyl Below: The crowd at
the Ritz Ybor
th e R i t z, due i n part t o t h e re n o v a t i o n se v e ra l y e a rs a g o . — Mat t R ei s i nger
it’s hard to rank them,” Reisinger says. Pressed to name his favorite shows, he includes Underoath, Deadmau5, Passion Pit, Manchester Orchestra, RX Bandits, Feed Me and Gwar.
Pensacola Rock ’n’ Roll-a Who wants to rock out inside a converted circa-1900 Masonic Temple located on Palafox Street in the heart of storied downtown Pensacola? Vinyl Music Hall fans do. This spot attracts a diverse mix of patrons hailing from the beaches of Florida, Georgia and Alabama—and music that is even more varied. Since opening its doors in 2010, Vinyl has booked regional bands and national artists such as Chris Thomas King, The Supervillains and Diplo. Acts often draw standing-room-only crowds, but not every performance results in a hip-to-hip mosh pit. More mellow musicians, such as native Floridian Laney Jones, a folk rocker and Vinyl first-timer when she opened for Cowboy Mouth in 2015, have brilliantly entertained the audience. “The crowd was awesome. I got to talk to some people afterwards and it was really exciting,” Jones recalls of the show. “It could be easy to get intimidated. You sort of have nothing to lose and everything to gain, and you have a great time. That’s what makes the best performances.”
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Above:
Hoy Como Ayer Latin club Right:
Doug Deming & The Jeweltones featuring Dennis Gruenling on harmonica at the BBC in Tallahassee
Vinyl has a large, high stage, overlooking the audience pit, but the setting retains a somewhat personal atmosphere. Vinyl fans get that big-show feel while being in relatively close proximity to the performers. “The stage—it’s cool from the artist’s perspective,” Jones says.
Ponte Vedra Revival Not far from the northeastern coast of the Atlantic Ocean, there is what appears to be an ordinary, contemporary sanctuary, sitting back from scenic State Road A1A on a manicured lawn. However, in 2011, the building metamorphosed from a Baptist church into the Ponte Vedra Concert
Hall. Now, it’s a place to worship musical talent, entertaining up to 900 people at a time. This small beach box has the bandwidth to attract big names, such as Anders Osborn, the North Mississippi Allstars and the Robert Cray Band. Music buff Chad Pearce recently drove two hours from Orlando to see Foals, an indie rock band from England, at the Ponte Vedra Concert Hall. “The atmosphere was pretty mellow, and it was a large enough space that the show didn’t get too crowded, even though I believe it was sold out.” Though it’s not as legendary as the BBC, this destination has made quite an impression with concertgoers so far. “The lighting and sound were great,” says Pearce. “There’s a bar, parking was cheap and easy, the staff seemed friendly, the performance was stellar.” The salt air and beach breeze is refreshing as you exit the hall, savoring the reverberations of the night’s music. Back in Tallahassee at the BBC, hungry fans head outside to wait in line at the fish fry, where a crackling bonfire casts an orange glow on a canopy of ancient oaks, and the smell of smoke and seafood hangs heavy in the air. You can still hear music pulsating from the one-room cinderblock dive—not loud, but audible enough to tap your toes while swapping stories and waiting for a meal. Plugged into something deeper—history, music, food and easy kinships—that blues music gets into your soul, and so does the BBC.
It has a great vibe to it with all the music and everything that has transpired
Music Venue Cheat Sheet What to know before you go
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Bra d ford ville Blu e s Club
Ho y Como Ay e r
bradfordvilleblues.com
hoycomoayer.us
Friday and Saturday nights mean fried mullet, catfish or sausage from the outdoor fish-fry shack. Upcoming acts: Little Boys Blue on September 10 and Katy Guillen & The Girls on October 1. Advance tickets go for $5 to$60. If bought at the door, tickets start at $10.
Wear your dancing shoes, expect to pay a cover charge ($7 and up, depending on the show) and order tapas and drinks. Don’t get tongue-tied—brush up on your Spanish (the website is en Español). Check online listings for upcoming acts. For reservations, call (305) 541-2631.
through the years. That’s something everybody knows ... it just has a feel to it. —Gary Anton
Th e Rit z Yb o r
Head upstairs to the balcony for a perfect view of the show. (Bonus: a private bar with very little wait time!) Upcoming acts: Ja Rule on September 8, the Foals on October 26 and Tegan and Sara on November 15. Tickets run around $15 online or at the box office.
theritzybor.com
Vi nyl Mu sic Hall
Park in the lot behind the venue on the cheap. Check out the adjacent 5 1/2 Bar for bartenders shaking up creative cocktails. All events are standing room only. Upcoming acts: The Ataris on September 14 and For Today on October 4. Tickets start at $15 online or at the box office. vinylmusichall.com
P onte Ve d ra Co n cert Ha ll
Plan to pre-show at the beach. Mickler’s Landing Beach offers public access about a mile away. Bring cash for snacks, local beer and spirits from concessions (there’s a $10 minimum for credit cards). Upcoming shows: The Dandy Warhols on October 4 and Henry Rollins on October 9. Tickets start at $20 online or at the box office. pvconcerthall.com —Christina Cush
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[
MY FLORIDA — sunshine state stor ies —
B y Prissy Elrod
Above: (left to right) The author in front of her college roommate’s graffiti-riddled car, “Boop Head”; Busting a move in her red brassiere with her Flagler besties
bohemian rhapsody
I
I didn’t realize it at the time, but my appreciation, understanding and love of art was seeded at that moment inside the stunning walls of Ponce de León Hall. It would be years before I cultivated this infatuation, and even longer before I realized artistic talent was in my blood. Lake City, Florida, is where I was born and raised. Originally, it was a Seminole town named Alligator Village, but rumor has it that the name was changed in 1859 when the mayor’s wife didn’t want to hang her lace curtains in a town named Alligator. What a brat! Clearly, she ruled the mayor.
[
first arrived at the Spanish Renaissance palace as an 18-year-old freshman wearing new tweed slacks with an invisible zipper that sat below the waistband. I’d made the pants from a Vogue Paris Original pattern and installed the difficult zipper myself, in perfect symmetry, with my new Singer sewing machine. I spent more money than usual for the required two-plus yards of fabric. But as I took in my new surroundings, I was happy I did. The year was 1968, and I was a freshman entering the inaugural class of Flagler College.
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I grew up on the edge of one of the city’s many lakes. Black water moccasins and alligators frequented our cypress dock, which stretched over the lake’s murky water. The nasty reptiles resting on our sun-bleached dock were ordinary fixtures of life in Lake City. Consequently, it desensitized me to snakes, gators, spiders and just about all bugs (excluding roaches). It was all part of life in the Sunshine State, the place where I was planted and nourished, and where I eventually sprouted and blossomed into who I would become. In elementary school, I was taught by nuns straight from Ireland.
PHOTOGR APHY BY PRISSY ELROD, FL AGLER COLLEGE
A demure Tallahassee housewife rediscovers her true grit and her hippie heart.
Above: The author, far right, preparing to perform
at the Orange Bowl halftime show
By the time I left Epiphany Catholic School, the moral fiber threading through my being was thick. It’s a darn good thing, since I was a wild child with a free spirit and a bohemian twist. Football was the beating heart of Lake City; the towners anticipated the game all week. In high school, I was a cheerleader at this championed event every Friday night of the season. Our stadium seats were always packed. To be honest, I never understood the game. Sometimes I wasn’t sure who even had the ball. More than once I cheered for the wrong team, even did a split midair when the other team scored a touchdown. And it was my best split ever. Every Saturday night was the VFW dance when the Jades, a local band, played. My boyfriend at the time was one of the singers. Deborah, my older sister, and I would head to town after lunch to buy designer patterns and fabric to sew our Saturday-night outfits: bellbottoms and halter tops. It was a time when girls could sew. And we did, every Saturday. We wore the new outfits hours later. We’d do it again the next week, thinking ourselves so original, despite the fact that our designs came straight from the Butterick pattern book. Everyone knew everyone’s business in Lake City. And, by the way, nothing’s changed—they still do. It was hard to get away with anything, though we certainly tried. My sister was blamed for everything that happened to us, and rightly so. Our father, Lou Landrum, was the town doctor who specialized in everything: obstetrics, gynecology, cardiology, internal medicine, geriatrics, urology, psychology. His medical clinic
housed a laboratory, an X-ray center, a physical therapy department and a host of employees, which included my sister and me. I was fourteen and she was sixteen when he hired us. We never applied for jobs; it was a nonnegotiable hiring. With only minimal training (we quickly watched these procedures done once), I irrigated ears, dispensed B12 shots, assisted in surgery (dabbed blood with sponges while wearing too-big surgical gloves), filed insurance claims and failed miserably at sheeting female patients for Pap smears. Their feet would be so tangled up I could hear my father yelling from the examination room. “Goddammit, Prissy!” I also secretly dispensed birth control pills to girlfriends who wanted them. I’m thinking I’m safe writing that now, right? What with the statute of limitations—not to mention the fact that my poor daddy has been buried for many years. One particular day, my sister and I made the unanimous decision that we needed to tan our pasty white bodies. It trumped tending to sick people. We packed up our baby oil and iodine, snacks, water bottles and the latest Seventeen magazine and took off for the Ponte Vedra Inn and Club, a few miles down the road from Jacksonville Beach. We timed the whole deceitful day to the minute. It would take two hours to drive there, three hours to tan our fronts, three hours to tan our backs, then drive the two hours home. We’d beat our daddy/employer back to the house, then tell him we were way too sick to be around
his delicate patients. Our sunburns should have been punishment enough. Not so. He threw our skinny, sunburned bodies into the car the next day and hauled us on a ten-hour car trip to North Carolina to deliver Gina, our baby sister, to summer camp. When we finally arrived, he discovered there was no room at the inn for his two delinquent daughters. He boarded us at the nearby boys’ camp right next to where they stayed. I swear. I couldn’t make that up. You would think that experience would have tamed us. Hardly. Our next jaunt came a few months later when we snuck off to Daytona Beach for spring break—in the middle of the night on a Greyhound bus. I know. Crazy! Stupid! Yes, we got caught. And yes, it was brutal. Was it worth it? Honestly, I think so. We had a blast, and it remains one of my more priceless adolescent memories. What makes it so is the identity of the inebriated guy who drove us home when we had no money for the return ticket on the Greyhound. He turned out to be one of this country’s favorite college football coaches, taking his team to the championships more than once. I smiled every time I watched him on the sidelines of another big game, recalling that day at Daytona Beach. The combined smell of rum, Coppertone and sea air had infused my senses and turned an ordinary day—for this smalltown girl—into an adventure.
Below: Elrod in a homemade suit leaving her wedding reception (not pictured: super high—and super cool—platforms that matched her beanie); Right: Flagler College in 1968
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MY FLORIDA
sunshine state stor ies
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Above: Elrod has been broadcast on syndicated radio.
an art class, and soon my paintings of children, pets, landscapes and barns were hanging in the homes of my family and friends. I gifted all my beautiful, ladylike jewelry to my daughters and began to replace it with funky, one-of-a-kind treasures made by local artisans. I donated all the clothes and shoes that had stifled me and replaced them with the boho-chic style I loved. I joined a Tae Bo class and kicked ass three times a week. And, after almost three decades, I entered the dating world and met my second husband. Seated next to the president of Flagler College, inside the breathtaking dining hall filled with exquisite murals, I await my introduction as keynote speaker to an audience of more than 350 women. It’s my first time back in this room after 48 years. What brings me here is my first go at being an author, my memoir of my first husband’s illness, Far Outside the Ordinary. It may be the personal story of a Florida girl and her imperfections, mistakes and regrets, but it is a universal story of survival and finding your way through the darkness. As I climb the stairs to applause inside the Ponce de León Hall, my heart skips. So much has changed since the first time I was here, yet so much is the same.
PHOTOGR APHY BY GARRET T ROBINSON
After high school, I headed off to Flagler College. With no car, the most adventurous thing I did was buy motor oil and use it to help accelerate my suntan. Okay, maybe I smoked a joint or two. But I never inhaled. Love for a boy drew me from Flagler College to Florida State University. I wouldn’t know it then, but one day I would learn how this boy would change my life. He would become my second husband, and part of the journey that brought me back to the stage at Flagler College. I met my first husband in the fall of 1970, my junior year at FSU. He was a serious law student and had no time for a sorority girl’s partying ways. Piece by piece, I began the transformation that would define me for the next three decades—a left-hand version of my right-handed self. I parked my gold snake bracelet, the one that wrapped around my upper arm, inside my jewelry box. I pulled the pearl necklace I’d received as a gift over my head and clasped it. My combat boots were stashed away. They were replaced with Pappagallo flats and the conservative fashion trending that year. I was invited into the Junior League, though I’d never heard of it. I answered to Priscilla when I was introduced to an important client, a politician or a dignitary. I was another version of me, just dressed to match everyone else, but remained my happygo-lucky self. Then the unexpected came. Cancer reared its ugly head. It happens. A lot. Tragedy sabotaged our family and stole my husband in the prime of his life. I cycled through grief on the overused road called survival. In the aftermath of my husband’s death, I retreated within my own being to search for answers—mainly, how to find joy again. I elected to pull out my combat boots and go to work rediscovering my original self, the girl who was forgotten. Piece by piece, day by day, came strength and resurrection. I enrolled in
— Fine arts, favor ites, f lings —
ON THE FLY — PLUME —
Must-Reads from a Literary Legend
— CULTURE —
The Florida Lottery and Juke Joints Collide
— BIRD’S EYE —
H o t s p o t s A r o u n d M i a m i ’s W y n w o o d W a l l s
— GROVE STAND —
Cutting-Edge Cuisine from a Rising Chef
— THE ROOST —
Signature Architecture of the Sunshine State
— THE TIDE —
PHOTOGR APHY BY JESSIE PREZA
E v e n t s W o r t h Ta k i n g a L o n g D r i v e
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ON THE FLY:PLUME
Bibliophile’s LIFE A prolific reader and novelist for kids, teens and adults shares the books that shaped her story.
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udy Blume, a bike-riding, beachwalking, art-loving Key West resident, has penned 29 books that have sold more than 85 million copies worldwide. While her latest novel, In The Unlikely Event, just came out in paperback, she’s rolled up her sleeves to co-launch a local indie spine-seller, Books & Books at The Studios of Key West. This bookshop carries on the island’s rich literary tradition and is part of the adjacent nonprofit arts center, where creatives can enjoy residencies and longterm studio spaces and the public can view exhibits and performances. Enjoy Blume’s annotated list of books that fed her writer’s soul through the years.
1. Eligible
PHOTOGR APHY BY JESSIE PREZA
by Curtis Sittenfeld
“Am head over heels in love with this book. Thanks for hours of pleasure. Will be hand-selling.” (RANDOM HOUSE, 2016)
What’s the first book Blume fell in love with? “Madeline (by Ludwig Bemelmans), which I found at the Elizabeth, N.J., public library. It’s the first book I bought for my daughter’s library when she was born,” she says.
2. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
by Dave Eggers
“And it is just that. I laughed through tears. I’ve never forgotten those boys or their story.” (VINTAGE, 2001)
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3. Them
by Joyce Carol Oates
“I could not put down this book. It was unlike anything I’d ever read. When my then-husband came home and found me reading and the children still playing outside, he was not happy. But I was.” (MODERN LIBRARY, 2000)
4. The Adventures of Augie March by Saul Bellow
“One of the books I found in the bookshelves flanking the fireplace in our living room. I was 12 and interested in the world of adults and the secrets they kept from children.” (VIKING, 2003)
5. The Atomic Weight of Love
6. American Pastoral
“Finding it hard to put it down.” (ALGONQUIN BOOKS, 2016)
“One of my go-to novels for inspiration as a writer. It never fails to amaze me.” (VINTAGE, 1998)
by Elizabeth J. Church
by Philip Roth
7. Martha Quest
by Doris Lessing
“This remains my favorite in a series of five novels. I was swept into another world by them; I went from reading one to another to another. My husband, George, introduced me to them.” (HARPER PERENNIAL CLASSICS, 2001)
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ON THE FLY:CULTURE By Cr ai g Pi t t m a n • I l l u st ra t i o n b y S t ep h en L o m a zzo
thanks a lot-tery Florida’s gambling governor and a jook-joint hero
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walked into my neighborhood Publix one night in 2012 and immediately spotted a man in line for Powerball tickets who was far better dressed than the usual gamblers. The lottery line offers a cross section of the Sunshine State’s poor to middle-class residents: young and old, fat and skinny, gay and straight, white, black, Hispanic, Asian, you name it. This guy had deeply bronzed skin and white hair, and he wore a classic blue blazer, expensive slacks and tassel loafers. The other folks in line were chatting with him and snapping pictures of him with their phones. “Hello, Governor,” I said to ex-governor Charlie Crist, aka the Tan Man. He gave me his broadest smile, one so bright it could be the bulb atop a lighthouse. When I asked what he was doing there, he reached for the oldest cliché possible: “You can’t win if you don’t play.” Someone else asked him what the state could do with the money if Florida itself won the jackpot. He shot back: “We could pay our teachers better!” Ah, the irony. The justification for starting the Florida lottery in 1987 was to raise money for education—but it turned into a classic shell game. Once the lottery money started pouring in, the legislature siphoned off money from the original
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education budget to spend it elsewhere. Schools wound up worse off than before. The lottery money that does go to education doesn’t go to elementary, middle school or high school classrooms. Instead, it’s been spent primarily on college scholarships and school construction. Meanwhile, to assure everyone that the games are honest, lottery officials hired a former cop as an inspector general, who was once accused of (but never charged with) participating in a home invasion. Somehow he didn’t catch that 18 stores were selling tickets that produced a mathematically impossible number of winners. One player collected 568 times in 15 months. That’s the Florida way, of course: Step right up and try your luck at a crooked game! Every Florida resident knows this is happening, yet all they do is grumble about it, usually while standing in line to buy tickets. Living in Florida is a daily gamble anyway, what with the sharks and sinkholes and lightning strikes. Thus it shouldn’t be a surprise that Floridians are inclined to throw away—excuse me, risk—a lot of money on games of chance. In addition to the lottery, we’ve got horse racing and dog racing and jai alai. But bring
up the idea of allowing casinos to set up here (a move backed by one part-time resident named Donald J. Trump), and you’ll hear a lot of people (including Jeb Bush) start howling. The voters have repeatedly shot that plan down. Instead, we have cruise ships that take gamblers into international waters, where they can sail around and lose money playing slot machines, roulette and baccarat all night, then return to port. Florida has more of these Cruises to Nowhere than any other state—and don’t tell me that’s not symbolic. We Floridians have always had mixed emotions about gambling, condemning it even as we embrace it. Back before Florida became a state, all gambling was illegal, yet Floridians frequently entertained themselves by betting on horse races, dog fights, cock fights, cards, dice and spinning wheels. There were times during that era, one historian noted, “when gambling seemed to overshadow all other illegal activity.” The legal system did little to discourage it. Grand juries might indict a score of gamblers, but they were seldom punished—too many jurors were players. In those days the state was infested with crooked faro dealers, toting their rigged layouts from town to town, fleecing the unwary
and hustling away. The itinerant gamblers tended to show up in a town anytime a crowd of suckers ripe for the plucking did. They always flocked to Tallahassee, for instance, when the territorial legislature was in session. The gambling bug didn’t fly away after Florida became a state. Gambling became a way for Floridians to entertain tourists and separate them from their money. What could be more Floridian than that? In the depths of the Depression, when Florida became desperate for revenue, the legislature voted to legalize wagering on horse and dog races so the proceeds could be taxed. Then betting on jai alai was legalized, and for a while even slot machines were allowed. But the casinos and so forth were designed to appeal to the wealthy snowbirds. The games that filched pennies from the poor were the ones that really had an impact on the rest of the country, thanks in part to Florida’s toughest writer. Over the years, Florida has been a refuge and a muse for plenty of writers—science fiction authors Piers Anthony, Jeff VanderMeer and Hugh Howey; and thriller writers Charles Willeford, Randy Wayne White and Paul Levine. But when I say “Florida’s toughest writer,” you probably think I mean Hemingway, who loved to take a poke at a passing poet. Or you might think I mean Carl Hiaasen, who was a hard-nosed investigative reporter before he became a columnist and author. I’m not referring to either. I believe Zora Neale Hurston, the darling of the Harlem Renaissance, could whup them both. Hurston grew up in Eatonville, one of the few Florida towns back then with a black mayor and marshal. During the Depression, she traveled
around the state collecting folklore for FDR’s Works Progress Administration. She hit the phosphate mines, sawmills and turpentine camps—places far from civilization. She knew that was where she’d find plenty of songs and stories, as well as plenty of trouble. “All of these places have men and women who are fugitives from justice,” she wrote, finding they were “quick to sunshine and quick to anger. A little word, look, or gesture can move them either to love or to sticking a knife between your ribs.” As a result, her life “was in danger several times.” Sometimes she packed a pistol, but mostly she relied on her quick wit. “If I had not learned how to take care of myself in these circumstances, I could have been maimed or killed,” she wrote. She’d drive into camp and tell people that she “was also a fugitive from justice, ‘bootlegging.’ They were hot behind me in Jacksonville and they wanted me in Miami. So I was hiding out. That sounded reasonable. Bootleggers always have cars. I was taken in.” From her research she brought back fresh reports about the way people really talked, including one word nobody had ever put in print before: “jook.” Florida has contributed some memorable phrases to the English language (“Don’t tase me, bro!” “the Cuban relatives,” “Stand Your Ground”), but “jook,” also known as “juke,” is our greatest single-word contribution. Hurston’s 1935 book Mules and Men was the first place the word was used in print, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. In her book’s glossary, she defines a jook as “a fun house. Where they sing, dance, gamble, love, and compose ‘blues’ songs incidentally.” In another essay, she expounded: “Jook is a
word for a Negro pleasure house. It may mean a bawdy house. It may mean the house set apart … where the men and women dance, drink and gamble. Often, it is a combination of all these … Musically speaking, the Jook is the most important place in America.” Hurston loved hanging around jooks, watching the dancers grinding away (“jooking”). She would sing along with the guitarist providing the music. She picked up a lot of folk songs that way—and occasionally something more. “It was in a sawmill jook in Polk County that I almost got cut to death,” she wrote. She was saved by a friend named Big Sweet, who was gambling at a nearby table. The ensuing brawl involved women and men armed with “switch-blades, ice picks, and old-fashioned razors.” “Jook” expanded to mean any roadhouse. In 1939, the WPA Guide to Florida (to which Hurston contributed) commented on one particular stretch of pavement: “Strung along the highway west of Jacksonville are many ‘jooks’ of the type found on the outskirts of almost all large Florida cities,” in which “patrons … drink and dance to the music of a ‘jook organ,’ a nickel-inthe-slot, heavy-toned, electric phonograph.” Thus we got the jukebox. Over time, “juke” became a sports term for dodging an opponent with fancy footwork. More recently, it came to mean dancing around the truth and faking things. In the TV show The Wire, the cops talk about underreporting or misclassifying crimes to hide their failures, calling it “juking the stats.” But that’s another story. Excerpted from OH, FLORIDA: How America’s Weirdest State Influences the Rest of the Country by Craig Pittman. Copyright © 2016 by the author and reprinted with permission of St. Martin’s Press, LLC.
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ON THE FLY:BIRD’S EYE VIEW
A WA L K I N G G U I D E TO O U R FAVO R I T E N E I G H B O R H O O DS
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WYNWOOD ARTS DISTRICT Absorb the artsy charge electrifying this area, an inside-out art gallery of sorts, with a maze of painted buildings, open-air cafés, shops and an eclectic mix of locals and savvy sojourners.
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1. ALEJANDRA VON HARTZ GALLERY Geometric abstraction
vertical gardens and sleek home designs. 2511 NW 2nd Ave.
2. WYNWOOD LETTERPRESS
5. FRANGIPANI Olive-wood bowls, beaded animal sculptures and other fanciful goods line the shelves of this stylish store. 2516 NW 2nd Ave.
and Latin American works are the highlights of this contemporary art gallery. 2630 NW 2nd Ave.
Pick up paper goods and gifts here— including several imprinted with our favorite bird! 2621 NW 2nd Ave.
3. WOOD TAVERN Grab an indie
beer or spirit at a watering hole known for its vibrant graffiti and rotation of DJs and musicians. 2531 NW 2nd Ave.
4. PLANT THE FUTURE Fusing a greenhouse and a gallery, this eco-wonderland sells terrariums,
6. WYNWOOD WALLS Murals by internationally renowned artists such as Kenny Scharf and Shepard Fairey decorate several blocks of this neighborhood. 2520 NW 2nd Ave. 7. WYNWOOD KITCHEN & BAR This Latin-mode eatery turns
out small plates and creative cocktails. Try the Tony G (bourbon, house-made spiced lemonade, Drambuie and a
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rosemary garnish), a tribute to the developer behind Wynwood Walls, Tony Goldman. 2550 NW 2nd Ave.
8. GAB STUDIO Works by
ILLUSTR ATION BY STEPHEN LOMAZZO
photographers and mixed-media artists are shown here, plus a boutique that sells products made from recycled materials. 225 NW 26th St.
wine and beer, along with occasional live music. 2390 NW 2nd Ave.
11. COYO TACO “Fresh” fanatics
flock to this Mexican place, which serves guacamole smashed to order, tortillas baked onsite and margaritas made from scratch. 2300 NW 2nd Ave.
9. ZAK THE BAKER Zak Stern traveled through Europe to learn the art of natural leavening. South Florida restaurants clamor for his loaves and pastries. 405 NW 26th St.
12. ALTER James Beard–
10. PANTHER COFFEE This
Italian siblings and their mother curate this collection of urban and graffiti art.
artisanal shop roasts small-farm beans onsite and serves desserts, small bites,
nominated chef, Brad Kilgore, executes intricate American cuisine in a casual setting. 223 NW 23rd St.
13. HAUSAMMANN GALLERY 251 NW 23rd St.
14. RUBELL FAMILY COLLECTION An impressive
array of contemporary art, along with the Contemporary Arts Foundation, is housed in a 45,000-square-foot repurposed DEA confiscated-goods facility. 95 NW 29th St.
15. THE WYNWOOD YARD
A culinary incubator, events venue and all-day hangout which hosts a smorgasbord of food, fitness, music and cultural activities. 56, 64 and 70 NW 29th St.
16. FIREMAN DEREK’S WORLD-FAMOUS PIES This
neighborhood favorite offers house-made cakes, pies, cookies,
croissants, savory quiches, pizzas and empanadas. 2818 N. Miami Ave.
17. BEAKER & GRAY A former
ice factory now serves as a hot spot for globally inspired dishes and inventive cocktails. 2637 N. Miami Ave.
18. MADE IN ITALY GOURMET A huge wine library
distinguishes this eatery and market. 10 NE 27th St.
19. GARY NADER ART CENTRE The 55,000-square-foot
gallery exhibits works by famous artists, such as Abu Naba’a, Monet and Picasso, and features a bonus sculpture garden. 62 NE 27th St.
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ON THE FLY: GROVE STAND SEASON’S EATINGS
By Vi ct o r M a ze • P h o t o g ra p h y b y K el l y S t erl i n g
Above, from left: Chef Brad Kilgore chills before heating up the kitchen with high-concept culinary techniques and imaginative ingredient blends; Alter’s spring peas and stracciatella dish; a dinner crowd at Alter enjoys the unpretentious atmosphere and attention to artistically plated food.
ALTER EGO Wielding Florida-fresh ingredients like a painter’s brushes, Chef Brad Kilgore creates culinary masterpieces, drawing national acclaim and foodies to his Alter restaurant in Miami’s artsy Wynwood District.
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( chef profile continued on page 102 )
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PHOTOGR APHY BY ALTER RESTAUR ANT
Fine Dining’s
he most popular appetizer at Miami’s Alter restaurant appears deceptively simple: a white-on-white bowl of sea scallop foam, perfectly brûléed with torch-charred speckles. Beneath this minimalist surface, however, a mélange of unexpected ingredients awaits: Italian truffles, encapsulated in ready-to-burst pearls; a dehydrated Gruyère crisp, delivering umami flavor with a satisfying crunch; and the golden yolk of a barely poached egg, comforting in its rich familiarity. Deceptive by design, the result is a surprising spoonful of salty, eggy, cheesy excellence—and that’s just the first bite. “I like when a dish is minimalist on the eye but has a really aggressive flavor,” says Chef Brad
Above: Alter’s shaved cobia with sliced olives recipe awaits at flamingomag.com.
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This page: Chef Kilgore’s braised
short ribs with malted yogurt grits, red onion caramel, wild garlic oil and peanut crumbs. (Recipe opposite)
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ON THE FLY: GROVE STAND SEASON’S EATINGS
Braised Short Ribs with Malted Yogurt Grits, Red Onion Caramel, Wild Garlic Oil & Peanut Crumbs
RED ONION CARAMEL
1 cup sugar 3/4 cup filtered water 3/4 cup red onion, thinly sliced 3 sprigs fresh thyme 1 sprig fresh rosemary 1 tablespoon butter 10 tablespoons heavy cream, warmed, plus more as needed Salt to taste
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SHORT RIB BRAISE
4 tablespoons vegetable oil, or enough to thinly coat pot, for searing 8 boneless short ribs 2 large red onions, diced 2 garlic bulbs, tops sliced off 1/4 cup fresh ginger, peeled and sliced 1 cup cremini mushrooms, sliced 1/2 cup red wine vinegar 1 bottle (750 ml) red wine 1/2 cup molasses 1/2 cup soy sauce 2 tablespoons espresso beans, finely ground PREPARATION: Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Heat vegetable oil in a deep pot until very hot. Sear unseasoned short ribs on all sides, then transfer ribs into a braising pan in an even layer and set aside. Add red onions, garlic bulbs (cut side down), ginger and mushrooms to drippings in the deep pot, and cook until slightly charred. Deglaze with red wine vinegar, scraping up any browned bits, and immediately follow with red wine, then cook until liquid is reduced by one-third. Add molasses, soy sauce and ground espresso and bring to a simmer. Let the sauce reduce until desired thickness. Pour the braising liquid over the short ribs, dividing it equally among the ribs. (Make sure the meat is covered by at least 1/4-inch of liquid, adding a little water if necessary.) Tightly cover the pan and transfer ribs to the oven to braise for 4 hours. Let cool slightly then refrigerate overnight to cool. Remove meat from pan and strain braising liquid to be used in glaze recipe that follows.
GLAZE
1 recipe reduced braising jus 1/4 cup apple cider vinegar 1/4 cup soy sauce 1 teaspoon sea salt PREPARATION: In a saucepot, combine all ingredients and reduce over mediumhigh heat until thick and shiny. Baste the meat with the glaze and serve extras as a thickened sauce.
PREPARATION: Combine sugar, water, red onions and herbs in a pot and reduce over medium-high heat until caramelized. Once caramelized, stir in the butter until melted, and then stir in the warm cream and season with salt. Strain the sauce, adjusting the consistency with more cream if needed.
CELERIAC PURÉE
Above: Chef Kilgore arranges freshly-seared
scallops on a blank canvas.
MALTED YOGURT GRITS
1 cup artisanal white grits 4 1/2 cups whole milk 1 1/2 cups heavy cream 1/2 cup chèvre goat cheese 4 tablespoons butter, at room temperature Salt to taste 1/2 cup plain Greek yogurt PREPARATION: Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Spread the grits on a baking sheet and toast them for 25–30 minutes until deep golden brown. Bring milk and cream to a boil in a medium pot. Sprinkle toasted grits into milk mixture while whisking, and then cook for 15 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove the pot from heat and swirl in goat cheese, softened butter, salt to taste and yogurt. Serve immediately or reserve in a covered pot.
WILD GARLIC OIL
cup chives, snipped 3 ounces wild garlic bulbs (found in Asian markets) 2 cups vegetable oil, chilled
1/2
PREPARATION: Blanch the chives and wild garlic in salted water. Squeeze out all extra water and transfer to a blender. Add chilled vegetable oil and blend until smooth. Do not strain.
2 1/2 cups celery root, diced 3/4 cup sliced shallots 4 cups whole milk 1/2 cup plain Greek yogurt 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice 2 teaspoons sea salt PREPARATION: In a pot, cover celery root and shallots with the milk and a lid, then simmer gently until tender. Strain off liquid and blend solids with the yogurt and lemon juice until smooth. Season with the salt. Cool in refrigerator.
PEANUT CRUMBS
1/2 cup butter 2 cups panko breadcrumbs 1 sprig fresh rosemary, leaves minced 3 sprigs fresh thyme, leaves minced 1 1/2 cups peanuts, toasted and chopped 1 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon sugar
PREPARATION: Melt butter in a nonstick pan. Once butter is frothy, add breadcrumbs and toast, stirring continuously, until golden brown. Stir in the herbs. Mix the toasted breadcrumbs with peanuts, salt and sugar in a bowl. Reserve for sprinkling over the top of the glazed short ribs. PLATING: First place the grits, wild garlic oil, short ribs, glaze and peanut crumbs, then drizzle with the red onion caramel and celeriac purée and garnish with sliced raw trumpet mushrooms.
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ON THE FLY: GROVE STAND SEASON’S EATINGS
( chef profile continued from page 98 )
Kilgore, the culinary wunderkind behind money and move to Miami,” he says. They Alter’s thoughtful and inventive menu. chose the latter—and never looked back, “It’s all about the irony.” especially during the winter months. Like this signature starter, Alter and Kilgore soon landed a job at Mandarin Kilgore reveal themselves in layers. Oriental’s Azul before moving on to J&G Occupying a former warehouse in Grill at the St. Regis Bal Harbour Miami’s oh-so-hip Wynwood Arts Resort, where his dishes captivated District, the restaurant’s rustic the palate of the Miami Herald’s ALTER wooden tables, open kitchen and food critic, who awarded the — LOCATION — 223 NW 23RD STREET exposed ductwork impart the restaurant the paper’s highest rating. MIAMI no-frills feel of a casual bistro. In Javier Ramirez, one of J&G — HOURS — a neighborhood best known for Grill’s most frequent diners, was TUES-SAT 12 P.M.-2:30 P.M.; AND 7 P.M.-11 P.M. its Technicolor murals, Alter’s equally impressed. After repeatedly CLOSED MON. AND SUN. walls remain unapologetically sampling Kilgore’s innovative altermiami.com bare. “We wanted the art to be tasting menus, sometimes on the plate,” says Kilgore, 30, two nights in a row, the local explaining that the restaurant was designed businessman and food blogger invited the to be the surprising “alter ego” of traditional chef for coffee to propose opening their own fine dining. restaurant together. A Kansas native whose first restaurant job “I knew all I needed was an opportunity was washing dishes at age 11, Kilgore has an and a kitchen, and I would really be able to easygoing, Midwestern sensibility and serves find out what I was made of,” Kilgore said. compliments as readily as his imaginative Alter opened in May 2015; two months fare: “That looks great—beautiful work,” he later it also earned a four-star review from calls to a staff member plating a complicated the Miami Herald, making Kilgore the only dish. During a Saturday lunch rush, Kilgore chef ever to receive the honor twice. The works the room like a proud father, stopping accolades continued this year, as he was to chat with the eclectic clientele, who named one of Food & Wine’s Best New excitedly dissect each bite in a buzz of Chefs and was also a semifinalist English, Spanish, French and Portuguese. for the James Beard Rising Star But this friendly, boy-next-door demeanor Award. belies a fierce ambition, not to mention an Despite his fast track enviable résumé. After studying culinary arts to national recognition, at Denver’s Johnson & Wales University, Kilgore refuses to Kilgore honed his craft in some of Chicago’s indulge in selfmost celebrated kitchens before a 2011 congratulation. vacation to Miami made him reconsider his “I’ve set a lot Windy City career trajectory. of goals and I’m “It was a really good time to visit; the food reaching them, scene here was just beginning to sprout,” he but I don’t get says. Kilgore and his wife, Soraya, a pastry cocky because chef who now works by his side at Alter, wondered just what a future in Florida could Right: Find this chocolate look like for them. mousse with mint “We thought: We can either renew our gelato recipeat flamingomag.com. lease in Chicago and stay, or spend that
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I know there is much more to do,” he says. “It gives me confidence to keep creating because people seem to enjoy my food.” Each of Kilgore’s carefully considered creations benefits from his artistic point of view. Perhaps none is as visually inspiring as a vegetarian dish that mimics a fallen tree and is served atop a custom glass terrarium that he conceived with Mark Alan Diaz, the designer behind some of Miami’s chicest restaurants, nightclubs and shops. “I tell people my job is to make the food taste good, but my fun is to make it look beautiful,” Kilgore says. The chef would like to invent more special plates like this while continuing to find new ways to delight his most loyal customers. In addition to hosting world-renowned guest chefs for one-night collaborations, Alter also offers nightly seating for four at the chef’s counter. “It’s like having a ticket to a show,” Kilgore says.
“You get to see the heavy-metal ballet that is going on in the kitchen while interacting with me and learning about the details of each dish.” Diners now travel from around the world to sample a menu Kilgore describes as progressive American that utilizes international flavors and techniques, with a focus on Florida ingredients. An entrée of local grouper cheeks, for example, elevates a part of the fish that is often tossed out to the role of a delicacy, combining modern, French and Japanese cooking styles in an artful presentation that takes its cues from mother nature. In addition to local seafood, Kilgore’s dishes incorporate cheese from Cypress Point Creamery near Gainesville as well as produce from Alter’s backyard garden and from Local Roots, a farm outside Orlando. Soon he will begin choosing seeds for Local Roots to plant and grow, allowing him to plan his menus literally from the ground up. “I want my food to taste different, but if we’re all getting our ingredients from the same source, how different can it really be?” he asks. While the year-round abundance of fresh ingredients is a nice bonus, the low-key quality of life is what keeps Kilgore rooted in the Sunshine State. “It’s a beautiful place,” he says. “Who doesn’t want to live somewhere that people dream about and save all year to visit for a few days? On top of that, Miami’s a relatively young city that is blossoming and becoming such an international hub. It’s an awesome thing to experience.”
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BROWNIE
Brownie is a 7-8 year old chocolate lab who has the most luxurious fur coat and happy eyes. He enjoys going for walks, making new friends, and chilling with his older foster sister, who happens to be a lab too. Brownie has a wonderful attitude and great outlook on life - typical lab personality.
Labrador Retriever Rescue of Florida (LRRoF) is a non-proďŹ t organization dedicated to placing Labrador Retrievers in loving, permanent homes. LRRoF has saved over 8,500 dogs since the year 2000. The Rescue is comprised of hardworking volunteers & a network of foster homes that are committed to this mission.
FOSTER
ADOPT
DONATE
Follow us on Facebook.com/LRRoF w w w.L R RoF. org Photo credit: Paola Paladini Pet Photography
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ON THE FLY:THE ROOST RE AL ESTATE DOLLARS & SENSE B y R o b i n H a rt i l l
Distinctly Designed Architectural archetypes emblematic of our state
Santa Rosa Beach
PHOTOGR APHY BY TROY WARD, PIX360
SIESTA KEY
siesta key
The modern main home was built in 2007. Its 4,755 square feet of living space includes three bedrooms and three-and-a-half baths. The adjacent 935-square-foot guest home is the restored 1948 Revere Quality House, built in the Sarasota School of Architecture style. The guest house has two bedrooms and one bathroom, and was originally commissioned as a prototype of minimalist construction that could withstand Florida elements while maintaining a modular and streamlined aesthetic. The main home has floor-to-ceiling windows throughout and a second level consisting entirely of a master retreat, complete with a terrace. The 0.68-acre property sits on a bayou and features a courtyard with a swimming pool and a private dock. 100 Ogden St., Siesta Key List price: $3,100,000
SANTA ROSA BEACH
Built in 2011, as a nod to Old Florida, this 4,985-square-foot abode has five bedrooms, five bathrooms, plus two bunk rooms that share a Jack-andJill bathroom. The design of this spacious retreat echoes classic traits of Florida cracker architecture. This style of woodframe home was widely built in the 19th century in Florida and is exemplified here by a metal roof and gracious dual-floor porch area. Outside there’s a swimming pool, al fresco kitchen and fireplace. Also on the 0.12-acre property, a separate carriage house with one bedroom and one bathroom. 41 Mistflower Lane, Santa Rosa Beach List price: $2,999,000
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ON THE FLY:THE ROOST RE AL ESTATE DOLLARS & SENSE
DAYTONA BEACH
Built in 1922, this 4,984-squarefoot Spanish Colonial Revival home has four bedrooms and five-and-a-half baths, and sits on 0.85 acres. The creation of this architectural type—popular from 1915 to 1940—was a side effect of U.S. excitement after the much-anticipated Panama Canal was opened. Signature elements of this eclectic style (a mash-up of Spanish Baroque, Moorish and Gothic ornamentation), such as curves, arches, a light stucco exterior, terracotta roof tiles, decorative ironwork and a courtyard, all take the stage here. The patio by the pool offers a view of the Halifax River. A dock and boat lift provide direct access to the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway. 2 Tropical Lane, Daytona Beach List price: $1,750,000
Daytona Beach
Cultivating Conservation For decades, Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens has given our community a place to love animals. Today, our mission is to offer visitors a cultural journey designed to inspire a deeper appreciation of both plants and animals, while setting a new standard for zoos in the process.
jacksonvillezoo.org
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PHOTOGR APHY BY DAVID FREEMAN
Experience wildlife alongside unique sculptural installations and beautifully integrated gardens of colorful blooms and contrasting textures – right here at the Zoo.
ON THE FLY:THE ROOST RE AL ESTATE DOLLARS & SENSE
ALYS BEACH
Alys Beach
Hardly cookie cutter, this 2,584-square-foot home on 0.08 acre, with four bedrooms and four-and-a-half baths and a private en suite guest pad, has a rooftop terrace and a courtyard waterfall that flows into a heated pool. Many architectural traits of this 2008 residence are replicated throughout its New Urbanist neighborhood, such as the white roof and pristine Bermudan-style exterior. The 158-acre masterplanned community is based on principles that encourage uniformity, sustainability, green living and walkability. Other Gulf Coast neighborhoods, such as WaterColor and Rosemary Beach also reflect New Urbanism, but have their own look. 38 N. Charles St., Alys Beach List price: $2,449,000
KEy west KEY WEST
This palm tree–adorned conch-style retreat, located on 0.1 acre, has a main residence of about 1,600 square feet (with three bedrooms and two-and-a-half baths) and a 500-square-foot guest home (with one bedroom and one bathroom). Built in 2002, the home’s design keeps it cool, shady and airy. It has a two-story porch, plantation shutters and cathedral ceilings reflective of the breezy Key West conch style of the late 1800s and early 1900s. The heated swimming pool can be enjoyed year-round. Walk or bike to the beach, Duval Street, Mallory Square and Ernest Hemingway’s house. 1716 Von Phister St., Key West List price: $1,550,000
Selling the best of Jacksonville...
RIVERFRONT TO OCEANFRONT
PHOTOGR APHY BY NICK DOLL PHOTOGR APHY, 30A HOMES
LUXURIOUS WATERFRONT HIDEAWAY 6120 SAN JOSE BLVD. WEST
MLS# 781198
PRIVATE YACHT CLUB COMMUNITY 6670 EPPING FOREST WAY NORTH
MLS# 806722
6 BR/8 AND 2 HALF BATHS 240 FT OF RIVERFRONT APPROX 4 ACRES $3,995,000
MEDITERRANEAN MASTERPIECE 2217 MILLER OAKS DRIVE NORTH
MLS#808982
4 BR/5.5 BATHS BREATHTAKING SUNSETS $2,100,000
6 BR/5.5 BATHS PRIVATELY GATED ESTATE $2,450,000
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ON THE FLY:THE TIDE ROADTR IP-WORTHY EVENTS (NORTH) DESTIN
September 30–October 2
Above: It’s literally a bunch of bull at the Bulls on the Beach showcase in Perdido Key.
BULLS ON THE BEACH PERDIDO KEY
September 9–10 This adrenaline-filled rock-androll rodeo features professional bull riders from across the Southeast, roping and wrangling live cattle on the shore of the Gulf of Mexico. Should the pros’ athleticism inspire you (or FloraBama’s signature beverage, the Bushwhacker, provide some liquid bravado), show off your own riding skills on the mechanical bull. A favorite watering hole of Jimmy Buffett and country crooners Kenny Chesney and Blake Shelton, Flora-Bama knows how to throw a memorable party. florabama.com
JUANA GOOD TIME REGATTA N AVA R R E B E A C H
September 9–11 Since its inception in 1990, this regatta has more than quadrupled in size and earned a reputation as a friendly competition where sailing enthusiasts can connect. Held in the Santa Rosa Sound, the event features several long-distance races for multihull sailboats, from beach cats to trimarans and cruisers. There are also triangle
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races (in which sailors navigate a three-pronged course) and timed Hobie WAVE races. Winners receive stoneware pottery trophies. Also included in the weekend festivities: a beach barbecue with live music, free beer and door prizes. Sounds like smooth sailing ahead! juanaspagodas.com
If you need a reason to amble over to the Emerald Coast, now you have it. The food fest, in its 38th year, lures nearly 70,000 seafood lovers to the Destin Harbor Boardwalk to delight in an abundance of fresh-caught local fare. Family activities include kids’ pony rides, inflatable games and human hamster balls. Several stages jam with live bands playing styles from rock and reggae to country and tropical. A string of nearby shops and independent businesses provide plenty of temptation for the discerning shopper. Festival favorites include a zip line that spans the crowd and the Mingo Toss, a chance for competitors up to age 12 to fish-fling snappers as far as they can. destinseafoodfestival.org
SALT COOKING SCHOOL: HOLIDAY CLASSICS A M E L I A I S LA N D
October 3
Fancy yourself a gourmand? Get behind the knife with the talented team from Salt, the Ritz-Carlton’s two-time AAA Five Diamond award-winning restaurant. Chef de Cuisine Rick Laughlin, a graduate of Le Cordon Bleu, takes participants into the kitchen to demonstrate food prep, cooking and plating techniques. Learn to master decadent holiday courses, such as seafood chowder with king crab beignets, duck confit with an autumn cassoulet, lamb roulade with couscous and apple cobbler with salted caramel ice cream. This interactive class culminates in a four-course lunch (with wine pairings!) for attendees to savor the fruits of their labor. ritzcarlton.com
GIRLS’ DAY OUT JACKSONVILLE
September 17
Celebrity chef and cookbook author Mai Pham, whose Vietnamese cooking propelled her to Food Network fame, and Amy Robach, ABC Good Morning America news anchor and cancer survivor, team up for a little food and a lot of fight. Feed your body and mind with a culinary exhibition by Pham and a touching talk by Robach, who will share her story of battling breast cancer, which she discovered during a mammogram segment live on the air. In between gourmet treats and tear-inducing testimonies, attendees can bare all, with free health screenings by Baptist Healthcare professionals on hand at the Hyatt Regency Jacksonville Riverfront. wjct.org
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Above: Blowing in the wind at the Juana Good Time Regatta in Santa Rosa Sound.
PHOTOGR APHY BY FLOR A-BAMA (TOP LEFT); DESTIN SEAFOOD FESTIVAL
DESTIN SEAFOOD FESTIVAL
ON THE FLY:THE TIDE ROADTR IP-WORTHY EVENTS (C E N T RA L ) THE FLORIDA-GEORGIA CLASSIC JACKSONVILLE
PHOTOGR APHY BY JOHN COLLINS
October 28–29 Since 1933, the River City has hosted one of the most heated games between rival teams in college football—the Florida Gators vs. the Georgia Bulldogs. More than 80,000 fans in orange and blue or black and red descend on parking lots surrounding EverBank Field for competitive tailgating, rabble-rousing and just plain old people watching. Former Times-Union sports editor Bill Kastelz coined the nickname “The World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party” in the 1950s, which has stuck despite protest from both schools’ presidents. Official Florida-Georgia events include a hall of fame luncheon, Touchdown Showdown (an interactive attraction with games), jumbo screens,
refreshments and merchandise sales; and—wait for it—the big game, which kicks off at 3:30 on the 28th. jaxhappenings.com
FLORIDA SEAFOOD FESTIVAL A PA LA C H I C O LA
November 4–5 Apalachicola, a town with fewer than 3,000 residents, swells with more than 30,000 visitors during this festival celebrating the bounty of the sea. Now in its 53rd year, it’s dubbed Florida’s oldest maritime event. Under the shady oaks of Battery Park, attendees devour delicious plates of mollusks, crustaceans and fish while bands offer live entertainment and artisans sell their wares. There’s also a blessing of the fleet, a carnival, a parade, blue crab races, an oyster-shucking contest, several competitiveeating events and a chance to try tonging for oysters, just as locals have done since the 1800s. floridaseafoodfestival.com
(C E N T RA L ) SHINE ST. PETERSBURG MURAL FESTIVAL ST. PETERSBURG
September 1–10 Shine transforms St. Petersburg’s downtown and arts district into an open-air contemporary art museum. Internationally renowned artists from Spain to Hong Kong work alongside local talent to erect large-scale murals, which festivalgoers can watch take form. This year’s fest will see live music added to the mix. Local artists created Shine to illuminate the power of art in public spaces to revitalize areas and inspire dialogue. “Neighborhoods take pride in the murals as they add
Above: Take a bite out of St. Petersburg’s multi-hued mural extravaganza!
to their community’s spirit,” says executive director John Collins. “Not a weekend goes by that we don’t see people out taking photos of the murals. We also have businesses call our office requesting information to employ our local artists.” shineonstpete.com
I LIKE IT HOT! FESTIVAL
hottest lollypop (provided by Tampa-based Intensity Academy Gourmet & Hot Sauce Company) the longest. Perhaps this heat test is how we should elect our next president? ilikeithotfestival.com
MOUNT DORA BICYCLE FESTIVAL MOUNT DORA
LA R G O
October 7–9
Can you handle the heat? For 16 years strong, this celebration of the pepper bills itself as Florida’s largest gourmet spicy food fest. Food vendors from around the state set up booths for guests to sample and purchase hot sauce, barbecue sauce, beef jerky, pepper jelly, spice rub and more. There’s also an amateur hot sauce and salsa competition and—for the truly intrepid (or those who enjoy watching masochists in action)—a jalapeño-eating contest and the Spicy Lolly Lick-A-Thon, in which candidates strive to keep their tongue on the world’s
With its picturesque setting (think: canopies of oak trees and shimmering lakes), Mount Dora captivates cycling enthusiasts from around the world. Exalting the joy of riding, the festival offers 14 routes for bicyclists of all levels, ranging from a friendly ghost ride to crushing hill climbs. The most ambitious of the bunch can take on the Back 2 Back Century Challenge, two consecutive days of 100-mile rides—a feat that earns them a heavy medal. This inclusive weekend accommodates cyclists traveling at all manners of speed and types of vehicles. Expect tandems, hand cycles, road
September 10–11
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ON THE FLY:THE TIDE ROADTR IP-WORTHY EVENTS (SOUTH)
THE MORSE MUSEUM 75TH ANNIVERSARY
objects in this commemorative exhibit are from artist Louis Comfort Tiffany, who made a variety of art glass creations for patrons from wildly different demographics, including iridescent carnival glass that was pressed and sold for pennies. morsemuseum.org
FLORIDA SURF FILM FESTIVAL NEW SMYRNA BEACH
W I N T E R PA R K
November 18–19
A special exhibit of the museum founders’ expansive collection, titled Pathways of American Art, will present diverse styles and types of art from the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Expect to see paintings, prints, pottery and sculpture. Some
It wasn’t long after he discovered surf movies in the eighth grade that Kevin Miller of Maitland started shredding waves himself. To share his passion for the salty sport, he and his buddy, John Brooks of Daytona Beach Shores (a former professional surfer turned firefighter/EMT),
Starting October 18
founded the Florida Surf Film Festival four years ago. Surfers from as far away as Australia and Spain have trekked to New Smyrna for this mix of shorts, features and documentaries that explore the interplay between surfing, culture and music. Some of the most-anticipated films include Given, Sorria, Journey to the Center, Shot in Gabon and, for skateboarders, Cinecitta On Wheels. floridasurffilmfestival.com
(SOUTH) INTERNATIONAL BALLET FEST OF MIAMI MIAMI
August 27–September 11 The 21-year-old International Ballet Fest of Miami assembles more than 100 principal dancers from some of the world’s most famous ballet companies for performances of the highest caliber. It also offers two gala ballet evenings, a dance film series, a dance art exhibit, book presentations, dance workshops and master classes. Special events include Young Medalist performances, a presentation of up-and-coming young dancers who have won international ballet competitions, and a contemporary performance with guest companies from around the country as well as Korea, Colombia, Chile and Venezuela. internationalballetfestival.org
ISLAND HOPPER SONGWRITER FEST
C A P T I VA I S LA N D A N D F O R T MYERS BEACH
September 23–October 2 Above: Get swept away by the graceful moves of the Cuban Classical Ballet of Miami, as well as other principal dancers from all over the globe, at the International Ballet Fest of Miami.
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Learn the story behind the song at this celebration of lyricists. The free festival kicks off on Captiva Island
and wraps up on Fort Myers Beach. More than 60 of the best Americana songwriters gather in Southwest Florida to perform their ditties and share their origins. Some of the star-studded performances include Bob DiPiero, who wrote “Southern Voice,” recorded by Tim McGraw; Even Stevens’s “I Love a Rainy Night,” recorded by Eddie Rabbit; and Frank Myers’ “I Swear,” recorded by John Michael Montgomery. Rising country star Maren Morris, who spent the summer opening for Keith Urban on his U.S. tour, will be one of this year’s headliners, performing her hit single, “My Church,” and other tracks from her debut album, Hero. fortmyers-sanibel.com
HUMPHREY BOGART FILM FESTIVAL K E Y LA R G O
October 12–16 For four years, Stephen Bogart, son of Bogie and Bacall, has co-hosted this showcase for his father’s films and the golden age of cinema. The year’s festival coincides with the 75th anniversary of The Maltese Falcon and the 70th anniversary of The Big Sleep. The films run as they were meant to be seen: on the big screen. The movies play both in traditional movie theaters and outside on a giant screen under the stars. Watch the Bogart classic Key Largo alongside the same waters Bogie navigated in the movie. The festival also puts on a dinner dance and cocktail parties serving Bogart’s Gin, displays collections of family memorabilia, and presents film intros from experts. Superfans may want to cruise on the original African Queen, which docks in Key Largo. bogartfilmfestival.com
PHOTOGR APHY BY CUBAN CL ASSICAL BALLET OF MIAMI
bikes, mountain bikes, hybrids, cruisers and recumbent bikes. This year’s festival also welcomes a cycling celebrity: 17-time Tour de France racer George Hincapie, who will participate in Saturday rides and mingle with guests over a celebratory beer (or two) at Mount Dora Brewing. mountdorabicyclefestival.com
Above: Check out this replica of famed architect Paul Rudolph’s Walker Guest House—before it travels to other museums as an educational midcentury design exhibit.
SARASOTA CHALK FESTIVAL VENICE
November 11–14 Founded in 2007, this public display of chalk murals (some giving the illusion of being three-dimensional) grew so popular that it recently moved from the artsy Burns Court neighborhood to the Venice Municipal Airport, which provides more space for pavement artists to create their masterpieces. The festival is a museum-inmotion, as artists of all ages and skill levels take to their hands and knees to recreate old masterpieces alongside original works of art. As an integral part of the performance, the public interacts with the artists as they work. chalkfestival.org
MIAMI BOOK FAIR MIAMI
PHOTOGR APHY BY ANTON GR ASSL, ESTO
November 13–20 Now in its 33rd year, the Miami Book Fair is regarded as one of the country’s finest literary events. Eight nights of panels offer intimate access to some of the world’s most distinguished authors, including Jeffrey Toobin, Alan Cumming, Joyce Carol Oates, Sebastian Junger and Terry McMillan. The Porch is an expanded area dedicated to “all things Florida,” with live music, cultural performances, author chats and food. (Don’t miss the Flamingo magazine–sponsored session!) Daytime is for the street fair, where makers from the Miami Pop-Up Flea sell their wares and more than 200 publishers and booksellers, including antiquarians, indulge bibliophiles. Perfect for families,
the Children’s Alley has six tents filled with kids’ books and activities. On the weekend, the Festival of Authors has nearly 500 authors, including several from Latin America, reading and discussing their works. miamibookfair.com
REPLICA OF PAUL RUDOLPH’S WALKER GUEST HOUSE S A R A S O TA
Through April 6, 2017 Paul Rudolph was an esteemed international architect with a major impact on Sarasota, where he lived from 1947 to 1958. During his residency, he conceived minimalist beach houses that landed in magazines and brought the city acclaim. To honor him, in 2015 the Sarasota Architectural Foundation created a replica of one of his favorite works: the Walker Guest House, built in 1952 on Sanibel Island. The 576-squarefoot house has a combination of screens and glass walls shaded by large panels that can be moved using ropes, pulleys and counterweights. Visitors tour the house to learn about the Sarasota School of Architecture, an innovative movement headed by Rudolph and others between 1940 and the late ’60s. “This is a very unusual ‘preservation’ project because we are building fresh from scratch, from the original drawings,” said Joe King, construction manager of the replica. Ultimately, the house will travel to other museum venues as an educational midcentury design exhibit. sarasotaarchitecturalfoundation.org
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FLORIDIANA ALL THINGS VINTAGE B y R o b i n H a rt i l l
AIR SUPPLY
This breezy design feature has been upping Florida’s cool factor for decades.
W
hen acclaimed Sarasota architect Tim Seibert remodeled a thenunremarkable house on Siesta Key in 1971, he dressed up the home with a lacelike curtain of mid-century modern breeze blocks along its western wall. The breeze blocks— concrete structures crafted in geometrically appealing shapes and patterns that facilitate the flow of air and outside views from inside the home—made the house cool, style-wise. The grillage, which Seibert says added “texture and the look of a modern building” to the Ness House (named for its original owner), became an icon of the Sarasota School of Architecture’s forward-thinking style. More than decorative, breeze blocks
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serve a functional purpose, which embodies the school’s principle that inside and outside should interact: They filter sunlight and bring breezes into the interior of an abode while affording a view of the yard from indoors. These concrete snowflakes peaked in popularity during the 1950s and 1960s, before central air-conditioning was the norm, particularly in the hottest parts of the U.S., like Florida. The concept of a permeable wall dates back centuries earlier to warm parts of southern Europe like Spain and Portugal, as well as the Middle East. “When Europeans came to the New World, they brought that idea with them,” Seibert says. Breeze blocks remain a common sight in Florida, where they are found on both
vintage buildings and new construction. Today, three Florida companies manufacture the fashionable fixtures: A-1 Block Corporation in Orlando, Carroll’s Building Materials in St. Petersburg and White Cement Specialties in Venice. “They’re fun-loving, not totally serious, and just give buildings a whole lot of texture and look,” says Janet Minker, board chair of the Sarasota Architectural Foundation. “Mid-century modern is very en vogue.” Everyone who’s owned the sleek Ness House agrees that the stacked aerated cement has a lasting, classic coolness. Forty-five years and at least two additional remodels after the original renovation, the blocks still stand.
PHOTOGR APHY BY JANET MINKER
Breeze blocks along the western wall of the historic Ness House in Sarasota
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