Contributors

SUSAN SOLOMON YEM /

Local writer Susan Solomon Yem specializes in writing about education and family, so she found writing “Head of the Class” (page 40) for this issue to be particularly inspiring. “I love the idea of reimagining education, so I was especially intrigued by architect and designer Danish Kurani’s com-

ment about the role

of design in learning,” she says. “Envisioning schools as open and accessible may sound counterintuitive today, but constructing a building to be an inviting space and the heartbeat of a community could actually make it more secure.”

MARSHA KIRSCHBAUM /

“I’m in love with Point Reyes National Seashore and Tomales Bay near Inverness Park,” says local photographer Marsha Kirschbaum, who regularly shoots the night sky in West Marin and contributed her stunning imagery to our “Star Struck” feature (page 48), “For the darkest skies in this area, I wait until the coast is free from fog and point my camera west, as there are no lights until Hawaii to interfere with the stars. If I’m lucky enough to have fog over San Francisco to tamp down its light pollution, then I like to photograph the Milky Way at Drakes. The same goes for Nicasio Reservoir. Weather permitting, for quick runs I will go out to North Beach and McClures Beach

also at Point Reyes. I hope that by making people aware of our starry skies and what a precious resource they are, we can do our part to mitigate the light pollution that threatens to outshine those stars.” MARK ANTHONY WILSON /

Having written multiple books about West Coast architects, Berkeley-based writer Mark Anthony Wilson has been a longtime fan of Julia Morgan’s work, the subject of “Natural Beauty” (page 34). “I love Julia’s architecture because of her exquisite sense of proportion and balance and her subtle use of historic

detailing, things often missing from modern buildings,” he says. “I’ve seen hundreds of her buildings, and every one of them is aesthetically pleasing. Her ground-breaking career has been an inspiration to women professionals for over a century, simply because she was a quiet revolutionary who wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

BERNARD BOO /

The Mill Valley Film Festival (MVFF), running Oct. 6–16 this year, is always a must-attend annual event for Bay Area native writer Bernard Boo, an arts and entertainment critic and proud member of the San Francisco Bay Area Film Critics Circle who wrote “Back in

Action” in this issue (page 26). “It’s always exciting to watch world-class films at MVFF, but meeting fellow cinephiles and filmmakers after the screenings is what I look forward to most,” he says.

MICKEY NELSON /

While speaking with Karla Gallardo, the founder and CEO of San Francisco-

based fashion brand Cuyana, for “Quiet Luxury” (page 32), Marin-based writer Mickey Nelson discovered a surprising coincidence. “A fun fact I discovered

during my interview with Karla is that the home she moved into in Kentfield is

the same one where I was born!” Nelson

says. “I love the small-world feeling our area provides in those sorts of instances.”