Christopher Wink » Philadelphia Inquirer

Stories that never ran: the Philadelphia workplace in five years

Christopher Wink — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 13:30:38 +0000

More than a year ago, I handled a half dozen interviews and a couple rewrites on a story for the Inquirer that covered what Philadelphia workplaces will look like in the future. As is sometimes the case, it never found its home in print.

The story’s primary timeliness has been lost, but I think it still has merit. So, with permission from my editor, I share it below, in addition to a slew of extras from the heavy lifting of reporting.

It was meant to be a localized version of a Time magazine cover story that caught my attention.

Below, read the story, see portions of my interviews that didn’t make it into the piece and watch some related video news pieces

*Please note that the facts, figures, quotations and assertions are fact-checked and correct as of June 2009.

THE FUTURE OF THE PHILADELPHIA WORK PLACE

Not that long ago, there was something of a stable existence in retail.

Sheldon Abba

Sheldon Abba worked in a variety of clothing stores, from independent storefronts to big players like Urban Outfitters. He had a marketing and design background and, he thought, a fairly good sense of his future.

And then the bottom fell out.

With the economy on the slide, he was let go from Walnut Street-retailer Stussy in February, and his perception of that future changed.

“When I was in school, I thought I’d get a steady job with a brand and get a regular paycheck,” Abba, 23, said. “When that job evaporated, I started thinking differently. Maybe I could pay bills doing something like it on my own.”

So, with a handful of friends, he launched S. Industries, an ethereal design and retail company that is based wherever Abba and his cohorts are at the moment. He’s finding steady work through word of mouth but will soon take the venture on the Web through an e-commerce site. It’s a far ride from clocking in as a retail day manager.

The U.S. recession has changed lots of plans, like Abba’s. While entrepreneurs, freelancers and telecommuters have long been part of the U.S. workforce, today’s economic climate seems to have put more people in those roles than in recent memory. So much so that some say independent, remote ventures like Abba’s S. Industries are part of a trend for the future of the nation’s workplace.

That trend may fast become a norm in Philadelphia and across the country in the next five years or more, said Thomas Malone, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology management professor and author of the 2004 book, The Future of Work. Those who do stick to cubicle life may find their offices becoming smaller, closer to home, more mobile and, believe it or not, more fun in coming years, other experts say — all thanks to advances in communication technologies and increasingly casual work environments.

“The key message here is that I think we are in the early stages of an increase in human freedom in work, and it just might be as important a change for business as democracy was for government,” Malone said.

Some worry that the expected continued decline in traditional office employees could leave the new worker short on camaraderie and political social skills.

To curb his isolation, though, Abba has launched his venture with friends. They hold their meetings in bedrooms with a computer and a hard drive, listening to music and laughing.

“That’s a different work environment than any work place,” Abba says. “What I’m doing — finding work and making a schedule — is really valuable learning.”

For those who work from home for established companies, there’s another trend in keeping the best of the office: co-working.

For more than four years, Lori Hylan-Cho worked for software companies in California from 2,800 miles away in her Logan Square home near the Philadelphia Art Museum. The software developer and mom, whose hair is not unknown to be dyed purple on occasion, relished the flexibility but lamented the solitude.

“I was going a little nutty,” she said.

So, after making “a New Year’s resolution to get out of the house,” Hylan-Cho rented out space at Independents Hall, a shared office in Old City that rents workplaces to self-employed or other independent workers.

“In the coming years, the place becomes less important than the tools, and managers become more comfortable with distribution,” said Alex Hillman, a freelance Web developer who in 2006 opened Indy Hall with University of the Arts professor Geoff DiMassi. “Companies that want to stay ahead of the curve — if they’re open-minded — will need to explore these options in the traditional worker-employer relationship.”

Hylan-Cho, 40, has worked in software development for 11 years and has watched more and more of her co-workers flee the office.

“Working from home let me put in a load of laundry, be home for packages and sometimes meet the kids for lunch,” she said. She kept in touch with work by way of regular video conferences and instant messaging, connecting with co-workers from California to Texas back to Philadelphia.

That extra freedom kept her loyal, one of the more valuable assets of an employee in the future.

“Businesses are quickly finding that one of the most expensive costs of business is turnover,” said Deanna Geddes, an assistant professor of human resource management at Temple University’s Fox School of Business. So, the Center City office of the future may increasingly be a more inviting place.

Geddes says we might see the rise of the campus workplace for those who, unlike Abba and Hylan-Cho, do stay in the office.

“What successful businesses like Google learned before a lot of others is that people like to hang out, where they can develop friends, and when you have friendships in the workplace, people want to stay,” she said. “The casual campus environment that is more open, with fewer doors and walls, more communal space, games and less restrictive hours, lets people come and go as they please and keeps them invested in the workplace.”

For those who have already left traditional work environments, voluntarily or because of a tightened economy, the recession seems to point work places in a new direction.

“It takes a special kind of person, someone who can separate time and get work done,” Abba said. “That isn’t everyone, but clearly even the old-style offices of the past are going to change.”

-30-

Professor Thomas Malone, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

“We’ll see the economic benefits of very large business, as the same time as the human benefit of very small organizations, the freedom and creativity.”
“The reason, of course, is a completely new generation of technologies that are reducing the cost of communication to such a low level. A huge number of people can now make sensible decisions for themselves with access to enough information because of the Internet, instead of just following orders.
“We’ll see more human freedom, more people making more decisions for themselves. We may see more small organizations, where you’re your own boss.”
A lot of lessons about that future can be taken from the nation’s largest private employer and an online auction behemoth, Malone said. Increasingly, we won’t need or always be able to find a company to employ us.
“The clerk in Walmart and that seller for eBay represent the difference in what is now and what may come: in how they work, in responsibilities and where and when they have to do them,” Malone said. “Seven hundred thousand people say they make their primary or secondary living on eBay. They are essentially independent store owners with a huge amount of freedom in what they do, what to sell and what prices to set. That’s the future.”
“Even inside big companies, we’ll see more freedom inside the company, more command and control to coordinate and cultivate. In another meaning of freedom, there will be more choice of when or where they work, with telecommuting for example, we’ll see a decentralization of the workplace. Both of those results are enabled by cheap communication….
One reason cities grew the way they did was that for many occupations you had to live in a city, near the office to the company you worked for. One of the important trends changed by cheap communication technology is that more and more kinds of work can be done essentially anywhere in the world. What that means, I think, is that people will choose where they live often for reasons other than where their company is because it won’t matter. What that means is the dynamics of cities, i think will change. There are a lot of nice things about living in cities other than just going to work there. So, some people will continue to want to work in cities even though their jobs don’t require them to do so. It’s hard to know what the net impact on a city like Philadelphia will be, but I expect the population of cities may lessen but that the quality of living will go up.
“The key point is electronic communication is reducing the need to travel to work everyday. You can work at home or near home much of the time. Ten years ago, we used to think that more and more people would become telecommuters. I think that’s not nearly so black and white now. The vast majority of professionals will be telecommuters in the sense that they work some of the time from home or while traveling and surely the professionals who spend all the time working from the office are a minority, but we’ll see a hybrid of office and telecommuting time.
“If you need an example of a future employee, look at an eBay seller. If those 700,000 people were employees, it would make eBay the second-largest private employer in the country, second only behind Walmart. Of course, they are not employees… That’s all the freedom of any small store owner. It’s on a scale unlike ever before, in any regional or global marketplace. It’s as if an auction company built a retailer — not eBay the company, but eBay the community.
“In cities, there is a pretty strong division between business and residential neighborhoods. Maybe we’ll see more of a blurring of these distinctions,” Malone, the MIT professor, said. “I think when people don’t have to drive or commute all the way to a downtown of a city, that means they could stay at home. We’ll see more of something I call a neighborhood office building.”It would be a place, Malone said, where telecommuters and freelancers, whose numbers are expected to rise, can work together. It’s a trend called co-working that already has strong roots in Philadelphia.
; residential neighborhoods with one or two or more office floors

Professor, Deanna Geddes, human resource management at Temple’s Fox School of Business

This is a time to play to our strengths as a region. research and biotech, biomedic
Companies without the sophisticated IT for corporate to retain employees may suffer.
We might see more choice, allowing younger people to come in at 10 a.m. and work through 8 or stay on to 9.
Center City could become the place for more campus-orientated workplaces. It’s cheaper to build out of the existing city.
Taking a mantra from education in 1990s, clicks not bricks. We don’t need all the institutions.
Work flexibility will be key.
More and more employees are looking for flexibility. work-life issues and boredom go even further.
There’s nothing more valuable than a good idea.
More people want a job that first their lifestyle, not just someplace to punch a time card.”
“There will always be a place for corporate headquarters. They may change, get smaller and more casual, but they won’t go away entirely.”
“There will always be a place for the cubicle jungle,” Geddes, the Temple professor, said. “But we won’t go as much and might not have to travel as far.”

Web designer Alex Hillman, co-founder of Independents Hall

“What happens when a company is based outside the city, and the employee lives outside the city, but they come to the city to work in a physical space, like a coffee shop or sitting in a park using Wi Fi?” Place starts to breakdown.
“The risk is low, as it’s a fairly cheap big city. There are a lot of industries and for so long Philly has just been a good place to try new things. It’s in our city’s history.”
“With some trust for telecommuting or greater freedom and be valuable to the long-term relationship.
“People react to distractions differently, but ultimately being completely isolated can’t be healthy,” said Hillman. “A combination of factors affect the distribution of the workplace.”
In 2006, Alex Hillman, a freelance Web developer who caught cabin fever from too many lonely work sessions at home, and Geoff DiMassi, a University of the Arts professor, opened Indy Hall.
See Technically Philly coverage of Alex Hillman.

Software engineer Lori Hylan-Cho, telecommuter and Indy Hall member

“Ditching the commute is a big thing. It’s not just that you’re stuck in traffic or on a train, but you’re not with a family. could productive worrk time, but not family time.”
It was awesome. But it puts a strain on communication. You have to be a very active communicator. You have to make sure you’re around.”
“I’m used to working with a lot of men, certainly in technical positions,” she said.
The worst recession in a generation or more has brought on a slew of attention to the future of business and our friendly workplace confines. In the view of some experts, the Web-literate telecommuter is a sign of things to come.
It’s invaluable for life balance, as you have kids, your job can be more portable giving you a chance to be with your family.”
“It was a great way to have a job that I love and live where I want to live,” Hylan-Cho, 40, said.
So, if Hylan-Cho lands another gig that brings her to an office, she might meet with colleagues there for regular meetings, if not traditional full days. Still, she said it’ll be hard to give up the flexibility she’s had for the past few years.
But, she now no longer telecommutes for that California company. In fact, she says she might look for another chance at the collaboration of a traditional office.
“I don’t know if it’s the future,” Hylan-Cho said. “But it’s worked well for me.”

Helpful U.S. Census Bureau of Labor Statistics information for Philadelphia employment:

Number of Views:560

Inquirer: My first couch surfing experience

Christopher Wink — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 13:30:39 +0000

My travel mate Sean Blanda (left), Zurich, Switzerland couch surfing host Dule Misevic, and myself in November 2008.

A full-length travel story of mine focused on the five year anniversary of CouchSurfing.com at first destined for the Philadelphia Inquirer last January never found a home there. After a back and forth, I went another direction and it got a tad stale for the daily’s travel editor.

So, because I’ve shared other stories that didn’t run as planned, I’ll do so today. Additionally, as always, I also like to share some grafs that were reworked and items I cut from my original story, which also can be seen below.

ZüRICH, SWITZERLAND — I just can’t find chopped beef for cheesesteaks anywhere. But cheese? Well I have my choice of cheeses in the largest city of this European country known for its favorite holey dairy product.

I snag a jalapeno-laced Swiss cheese and settle for a pound of ground beef I plan to mince. After picking up fresh rolls, peppers and onions, I am back climbing hilly Kornhausstrase, a busy road northwest of the city center that rides over the Linth River to Zurich’s residential neighborhoods. As a jet-setting tourist, this is a part of Zürich you would never see. Unless, of course, you are couch surfing, which is why I am here.

CouchSurfing.com, the online hospitality-exchange giant, is celebrating six years this month and has nearly 1.6 million members, but it hasn’t lost its mission. For five weeks in fall 2008, I made something new of the tired European backpacking trip by hopping from one stranger’s couch to another, not for money, but in the name of cultural exchange. I never had a better experience than my first, sleeping on a tan couch in the leafy northern extreme of Zürich, Switzerland.

The sky is gray, cloudy and intimidating, and cars and bicycles whiz past me as I march determinedly, groceries in tow, hoping to get to my host Dule’s big, modern, first-floor apartment before he gets home from work. It’s my second day and nearly my third night in Zürich, but it didn’t take more than 15 minutes for me to decide that Dule deserved a particular thank you.

Surf the couch

Here are some numbers [from January 2009] on membership, which is free:

Better than half of the more than 800,000 members are based in Europe.
Today nearly 600,000 couches are available in 230 different countries and regions around the world.
Recently, more than 7,000 new couches are added to the database a week.
More than 50,000 cities are represented in the Couch Surfing community.
While Philly is one of the 50 most surfed places in the world, its less than 2,200 registered couches are topped by smaller cities like Austin, Texas; Portland, Oregon and Amsterdam, Netherlands.

The expectations and your experiences vary as widely as the members involved.

More than 1,200 languages are represented on CouchSurfing.com, but if desired, users can find hosts who speak English almost anywhere.
While the average member age is 27, more than 150 people in their 80s are signed up with CouchSurfing.com.
The site boasts a ratings and review system where better than 99 percent of nearly two million member experiences have been “positive” to date.

He isn’t an itinerant wanderer, nor an existentialist looking for meaning or a creep looking for a victim, so perhaps he isn’t who you think is willing to let a stranger crash on his couch. Dule is a Serbian-born, 30-something academic with a Ph.D. from Michigan State and a research job in Zürich. As couch surfing matures, so too, do many of its members.

There isn’t even an implicit agreement to do something in thanks for your couch-surfing host, nor is a host required to offer anything more than a place to sleep – the floor, an extra bed, a bathtub, maybe even a couch. But a funny thing happens when you put your trust in a stranger; you tend to bond awfully quickly. You want to find a way to say thanks.

So was the case with Dule and me. The day before, he found me and my two traveling buddies at our arranged meeting spot, under the blue angel that hangs from the city’s central train station. I told him to look for my Phillies hat, deciding not to describe the haggard appeal that my friends and I had acquired after nearly a month slumming around Europe.

Dule arrived wearing glasses, a smart khaki suit jacket and blue jeans. He offered a warm, if hesitant smile, and snagged one of our bags before leading us to his home. So began my first couch surfing experience and the best, most complete three days anyone could ever have in Zürich.

A founding principle of couch surfing is cultural sharing. So when my friends and I decided we wanted to thank Dule with something more tangible than words, we knew it should be something from the rich culture of Philadelphia – a city we compared and contrasted and raved about to whomever would listen during our trip. During our time in Zürich, Dule was a frequent victim of my Phila-babble, so what better gift than the king of Philly cliché, a founding father of our city’s tasty treats?

I got plenty in return for those cheesesteaks I made. After introducing my friends and me to Zurich’s tram system – when you have to buy a ticket and when you don’t – Dule gave us a breezy outline of the city’s sights. All the tourists go to Landesmuseum, the Swiss National Museum, he said, but it’s dusty, boring and overpriced. Swiss culture is influenced a lot by Germany, but no visitors seem to make it to Zurich’s best bratwurst stand on Theaterstrasse near Schoeckstrasse – where all the locals go and the brown mustard is even spicier than in Philadelphia.

Dule has has hosted more than 100 people since he joined CouchSurfing.com in 2006, so he knows where to point wanderers like myself.

On my first night in Zurich, Dule shared some of his favorite haunts. I screamed with dozens of locals in support of a penalty kick that won a match for the Swiss national soccer team, while sucking down a beer brewed in the city. He talked about walking into traffic at crosswalks – unlike in the States, cars would stop here, he said. I got pushed around in a game of pool I wasn’t prepared to be in, and Dule got me out of paying the money I hadn’t realized I was gambling.

A BBC couch surfing report from fall 2008

Casual knowledge to this local was priceless insight to me, so I quickly fell in love with what couch surfing can mean for your tried and true backpacking trip.

“I can’t help but think,” I told Dule on my first night in Zurich, “that couch surfing is going to be good for me.”

“I know,” Dule said with a giggle. “A hotel won’t seem the same ever again.”

Even the cheapest hostels in Zurich run more than $30 per night, which means Dule saved the three of us close to $300. That total, of course, doesn’t include the tour he didn’t have to give, the thoughts on Swiss culture he didn’t have to share, and the proper fondue party to which he didn’t have to invite us. Of course, in this expensive city, a chunk of those savings went to our big cheeseteak meal, but that’s something important to understand. Couch surfing shouldn’t be thought singularly as a way to save cash, but rather a way to make better use of your money. I’d rather spend my funds on making and sharing a Philadelphia delicacy than on bed linens. Hotels, even hostels, are an offer of a place to sleep, but couch surfing also offers a friend to make.

I now had a warm guide in a foreign land and a friend in Switzerland. Dule now had the same for Philadelphia.

Throughout my jet setting, couch surfing allowed me to learn more about a place than I ever could otherwise in the short few days I allotted for enormous cultural metropolises. As I said goodbye to Dule, he told me that I just might see him in Philadelphia for another cheesesteak.

My couch will be ready.

EXTRAS FROM THE STORY

My Couchsurfing profile can be seen here
My original breakout box lede:

The concept of bringing into the digital age the timeless idea of staying with and learning from locals was first conceived in 1999, when Casey Fenton wanted more than a tour book-experience of Iceland.

The New Hampshire native found an online directory of students of the University of Iceland and e-mailed some 1,500 of them asking if he could stay at their homes and get a local perspective on the Arctic country.

It worked, and Fenton resigned himself to couch surfing the rest of his traveling days. Four years later – after a hand in the dot com bubble – Fenton launched CouchSurfing.com and the site has thrived since, letting people of all kinds experience travel in a new way.

I didn’t know what he looked like beyond a small, grainy photo from his Couch Surfing profile. So, I made at least three false starts, smiles and extended hands to the wrong stranger. He recognized my Phillies hat and my accompaniment – a college buddy and his brother, both looking as haggard as I was after a long day of travel from Lyon, France, via Strausbourg.
We shook hands as if agreeing on a business deal. Then we were off to his neat apartment a short walk from the city’s center. And just like that, my couch surfing career and the best three-day tour anyone could ever have of Zurich, Switzerland began.
On my last night in Zurich, like I would in Budapest, my host and I exchanged the most important element of culture: food. I bought the ingredients and made Swiss-modified cheesesteaks: local cheese and stripped beef on fresh rolls. Dule hosted a proper Swiss fondue party: bread in a garlic cheese and then fresh fruit dipped in melted Swiss chocolate.
And that’s how cheesesteaks became appetizers for my first authentic fondue party.

Number of Views:617

Inquirer: Dogs call for a neighborhood in change

Christopher Wink — Wed, 20 May 2009 15:05:11 +0000

At Orianna Hill Park in Northern Liberties, Basil is petted by owners Lisa Lee, center, and Scott Nealy as Marie Barnes watches. As the neighborhood has become trendier, the pets have proliferated. (RON TARVER / Inquirer Photographer)

Why an influx of dogs are often a sign of a neighborhood in change is the focus of my story for the Style & Soul section of today’s Inquirer.

Dogs may not have caused Northern Liberties to change from blighted to trendy, but they sure were a sign that change was coming.

Twenty years ago, when Frances Robb first moved to the neighborhood north of Old City, dogs were about as rare as a parked BMW. But as Northern Liberties went from edgy to trendy, the canine pack grew. Read the rest here.

Read the full story, comment and then come back for what didn’t make it in.

Robin Broughton-Smith, owner Wag N Style in East Falls

Broughton-Smith moved from Old City with her husband and bought their house in East Falls at the end of last April. They are still learning the feel of the house and neighborhood.
There are people here who follow trend and who love their dogs.
There are young couples with small children and dogs who want things for their dogs and their children, at the same level.
Broughton-Smith’s dog is a Habanese named Roxy. She got her for Christmas five years ago in December 2003.
Robin Broughton-Smith is one of those people who take her dog-care very seriously.
“To get my dog groomed, I literally would drive miles, hours to get her groomed, like she is a child going to see a specialist. I have babysitters for my dog. I definitely treat my dog like a person.”
She is opening an eco-friendly, pet boutique with lots of healthy foods and treats.
Wag N Style is on Midvale Street, just off Ridge Avenue and across from Johnny Manana’s, part of an East Falls restaurant scene that might likely use a shopping district.
“The pet industry has changed and broadened so much. People are seeing these things are offered, especially for the dogs, and they want to join in.”
She is an accountant and her husband works for the state department.
They will use family members to help run the story, which they hope to open May 16.
“There’s so much offered for pets now, especially dogs. There are people who go to PetSmart and think that’s all that’s there, but we can broaden those horizons,” Broughton-Smith said.

Frances Robb, co-owner of Canine Couture in Northern Liberties

“When I first got to Northern Liberties it was like ‘Good Morning Vietnam.’ It wasn’t exactly the most desirable place to be, but it had this fabulous old Ukrainian element still.”
She and her friend launched Canine Couture in 1996.”There are two groups who always seem to be dog owners, younger people who might be newly married — they have the kid and the dog — and then the empty-nesters,” said Robb. “Those young people are also some of the first people to live in a changing neighborhood just because it’s affordable. They all seem to have dogs now… so shops follow them. The empty-nesters come later and bring stability.”
It’s really nice in many ways that it has become gentrified, but on the other hand you kind of miss that other element. That whole more eclectic group. I came into one neighborhood 20 years ago and now I’ve ended up with BMWs parked on the street.”
“There’s a certain loss, when it becomes yuppier.” There is a different feeling. Some of it is very positive, some of the dog population has been growing with it. A few years ago I was stunned to see five or six in a block, but in the last five years, fairly recently, it seems overnight there are a gazillion.”
In December 2005, Doggie World Day Care at Third and Poplar streets had a pit bull left outside its doors. Robb alerted the doggie daycare center and a new resident was happy to take the pup in — even after they found he was blind. The new owner named him Stevie Wonder, and now, Robb says, they are an inseparable part of a new Northern Liberties.
“Years before that, if you think there was anyone living in Northern Liberties was willing to just take in a dog, particularly a pit bull, then you’re crazy. This is a dog neighborhood now.”
I am astounded at the number of dogs walking in Oriena Park.
“The empty-nesters who come in have more disposable income, and they’re replacing their children with dogs, so some of these people are way over the top. These people are moving back to the city in the neighborhoods that the young people have already made feel safe again. They want to be in a neighborhood again with restaurants and places to walk. Northern Liberties has those things now. And lots of dogs.”
Robb says though she saw more and more dogs during the years, there has been a real explosion in the last five years. She pointed to another crush of new homeowners and the “bazillion apartments” that noted NoLibs developer Bart Blatstein has brought along the 2nd Street district. But Chic Petique was the first,the real anchor of Liberties Walk.”
“Ten or twelve years ago, you could have bought a house for $50 or $60,000. That’s not so anymore.”
“The faces get younger and they often have a leash with something attached to it.”
“We see dogwalkers in Northern Liberties now.”
“You get younger people who are first time home buyers who want to live in a certain type of neighborhood. That spot a few years ago was Old City after Society Hill got too expensive. Then, Old City was out of reach, so Northern Liberties became that place,” Frances Robb said. “A house was built across the street from me — it was for $800,000 — so it’s happening elsewhere now.”
Robb said: “They all make it seem safer and then those empty-nesters can come in, with a dog who is replacing their kid.”

Kristoffer Reiter, District Manager of Doggie style

“We are looking at a lot of upcoming areas.”
“A Doggie Style store should be a neighborhood store, just like a grocery store. At a doggie boutique, you’re buying things like you would at a grocery story. Our customers come every week.
When an area grows up and becomes stable, that’s where we want to be. People taking care of their houses, the streets are clean.
“Our two landmark locations are largely used by tourists.”
“We don’t believe in big box like Pet Co or PetSmart.”
“We’re dealing with the problem of any young [franchise], wondering how close can you be without hurting the business of an existing store.”
The people who come to a pet boutique come for their passion for their pets
While Northern Liberties is too close to their Old City location, Fishtown might not be.
“Right now Fishtown is still a high risk. When we have condo owners in their 20s and 30s with no kids — they have pets with double incomes — that’s interesting to us.”

David Elesh, Temple University sociology professor

“Fewer people are marrying or are delaying marriage, when they do, they’re having fewer children, but people are still desirous of companionship,” said David Elesh, a Temple University sociology professor who studies urban neighborhood trends. “Pets offer the ability to have companionship but be less demanding than a children or even a spouse.”
“Our society is have fewer and fewer children, the only population subgroup above net return rate is Hispanics. Seventy percent of women are now working, that’s less time to devote to families, so, yes, there are fewer and fewer traditional families in the United States, that’s particularly so in cities.”
“Traditional methods of companionship through marriage and children is diminishing, and a dog or another pet is not unlike the commitment of a child.”
“Higher end pet shops show people have a desire to endow those pets with a great deal of time and money for appearances.”
“New breeds of dogs are being introduced that require less care, bred with poodles who won’t shed. “That’s tailoring the dogs to the lifestyle.
“The interest in exotic pets show a conspicuous display, showing I can get and care for this exotic pet.”
Young professionals and empty nesters – often early adopters to growing city communities – give their new homes a try with furry companions.

Cut text

There are any number of indicators of a neighborhood in change, but none seem to define a success better than the first high-end boutique. In recent years, the United States has seen a pet craze. Now, often the first boutique that can survive in a changing neighborhood is a pet boutique, brought there by a crush of new residents, dogs in tow.
The change is that the young people who are often the first new residents in a changing neighborhood are also delaying marriage, children and other serious relationships and getting a dog instead, Elesh said. You can spot the young people poised to flip a neighborhood by the leashes in their hands. Then, once the first retailer moves in to serve this most present and newest neighborhood demographic, the inevitable onrush of retail and nightlife seems almost destined.
Northern Liberties flew from blight to working class to hipster heaven to full-blown, trendy nightlife destination.

Number of Views:482

Inquirer: The secret life of a ballerina

Christopher Wink — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 13:38:12 +0000

Brooke Moore finds her offstage challenge outdoors, hiking national parks across the country. Photo by SHARON GEKOSKI-KIMMEL / Staff Photographer

I cover the secret passions of a handful of Pennsylvania Ballet dancers in a story for the Philadelphia Inquirer yesterday.

It was last summer when Brooke Moore figured she and her father had probably scared away a mountain lion.

The deer they discovered was freshly killed, its leg just torn off; there were no bugs and the blood trail was visible. The two didn’t pay it much mind, though, and continued their weeklong, 85-mile backpacking trek through the Pennsylvania Laurel Highlands.

Just another day in the life of a ballerina. Read the rest here.

See the story, comment and return to see the Pennsylvania Ballet in action and to read what didn’t make it in my story.

Martha Chamberlain, principal dancer
Center City, 37

She gets help from the ballet’s wardrobe department.
For the past three years, she has been the predominant designer for BalletX, a troupe that preforms at the Wilma Theatre.
Her sister, who went to the Rhode Island School of Design, is still in the fashion industry
She started designing for the Pennsylvania Ballet by working on smaller shows in 1992. Her first large piece was for a performance at the Academy of Music in1993.
She took classes at the University of the Arts in the early 1990s, learning jewelry crafting.
Her jewelry appeared in stores through Philadelphia.
“I would go through phases. Things were selling and it became more than a hobby, so I’d take a break and return whenever I found inspiration.”
She returned to sewing in 1995 after her jewelry hiatus.
“I was sick of the leotards I was wearing. So I decided to make my own.”
“I see a lot of dancers, younger dancers, going to school, even if online. A lot of dancers prepping themselves for ‘what if I can’t do this anymore?” said Chamberlain, who didn’t attend a college.
“I think this economy is making the younger ones realize they need something for when they’re done dancing.”
She’s busy, too. After recently completing one design job, she had four more waiting.

Julie Diana, principal dancer
Cheltenham, 33, wife of principal Zachary Hench

While pregnant with her daughter last year, Diana was approached by Dance Spirit magazine to blog.
She has also been published by the University of Pennsylvania’s literary journal.
Hench proposed to Diana in 2005 on stage at the Academy of Music after serving the respective lead roles of a performance of Romeo and Juliet.
Principal dancer Julie Diana agrees that an outside hobby “enriches” her dancing.
“I’ve always loved to write. It’s always been a passion.”
For years I was chipping away at a college degree. I can finally be proud of that,” said the new Penn alumnae.
She has been dancing professionally since she joined the San Francisco Ballet at 16.
“As long as my body holds up and my love for it is still there, I will be a dancer.”
“The body is probably the huge issue. The instrument gets trashed along the way.”
“I would enjoy writing for a magazine.”
“I have a degree in English. I’m hoping that opens a lot of doors,” she said with a laugh.
Her daughter was born on June 23, 2008, and then she started dancing again in September,
She had two pieces in Dance Spirit in February and another in September.
“I’m still trying to figure it all out. Being anew mother, working and writing. It’s pretty crazy.”
“Having outside interests definitely enriches my dancing.”
“Going to school helped my ballet, it never detracted from it.”
She has hopes of going back to get her master’s. “I have to pace myself.”

Brooke Moore, soloist
Art Museum district, 27

“I’m the outdoorsy type.”
Dancers operate on two-week contracts, she said. They get off July, August and most of September.
In-season, we get weekends. It’s like a 9-6 day job, but you’re really physically tired.
“I take yoga. I used to ride my bicycle, but my bike was stolen.”
When performing, I’m not in until 11 but it goes into the night. When performing, I’m not doing any additional activity.
“I’m only living in the city for my job.”
“When I’m not physical, I want to keep going. I want to keep challenged. It’s also mental.”
“My most recent accomplishment I’m proud of was probably backpacking last summer with my father. We hiked 70, more like 85 miles in a week in The laurel highlands trail in Central Pennsylvania.
When I lived in San Francisco, it was climbing in Yosemite and other things like that in California.
“The majority of dancers have hobbies but they are less strenuous.”
“I think with any hobby, it can make you a better dancer.”
“Also my hobbies keep me in shape in the off-season. It’s cross training, but not with wear and tear.”
“It might remain just a hobby, but making it another career has crossed my mind.”
“We spend so much time together and in such intimate settings. It is like a tight knit family. We know each other so well.”
“Doing things outdoors make me happy, and my well being affects me as an artist,” Moore said.
“Everyone’s other outlet, well, it’s a whole other life,” Moore said.

Jonathan Stiles, chorus
Center City, 32 (husband of Martha Chamberlain)

“I’d say cooking and cycling are both my avid hobbies.”
“I’ve done catering for garden parties a few times with a good friend Kathryn Frazier.”
It’s developed over the past three or four years.
“It could be a future. It’s what I’m interested in. Caterring is every bit as time consuming and exhausting as dancing is.”
“As a dancer or any performer, you are the people who work weekends and holidays, when other people are being entertained. It’s much the same in the catering industry. I want might try to a schedule.”
“There are traits in people that help them become a succesful dancer. If you’re looking at people dancing for their careers, the highest caliber kind of dancer in this country, well then there are traits that are required to get to a place like the Pennsylvania Ballet. Almost everyone had to decide at a very early age that they would be dedicated to this thing. They’d spend a lot of hours. I went to an arts school for high school and college. With my work study jobs, that meant 14 hours a day.”
“Dancers from the time that they are 10 or 11, they are being driven to dance classes every single night. Maybe we’re not very comfortable having much down time.
Dancers are very passionate about the other things they do.”
There are kind of two through lines with a lof these hobbies. They are things that relate to being a dancer. Design work comes out of being around dance so much. Julia Diana, her writing comes from dance. And the hiking or in my case, cycling, helps to keep in shape.”
It also has to do with self-determination. Dancers, more than other people, don’t get a lot of being able to decide their own schedule, like what parts they do.

Number of Views:601

Inquirer: Devon Theater reopens in Mayfair

Christopher Wink — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 13:30:23 +0000

Devon artistic director Michael Pickering oversees a rehearsal of "Nunsense," the inaugural show for the new theater. AMANDA CEGIELSKI / Staff Photographer

The Devon Theater‘s proud reopening on Frankford Avenue in Mayfair was detailed in yesterday’s Sunday Inquirer by theatre critic Howie Shapiro and me.

About 400 people, dressed for a gala, will take their seats Friday evening in what once was a dilapidated Frankford Avenue movie house. Three women in nun’s habits will pop up, administering parochial-school demands: Get rid of the gum! Flip off those cell phones!

The lights will dim, the loopy musical Nunsense will begin – and Northeast Philadelphia will have its first professional live-performance theater, in an area where many people (those in the Northeast included) may not expect to find one. Read the rest here.

Check out the genuinely interesting story, comment and then come back and see some extras below.

The Devon looks cleaned and modern inside, far from the decrepit and abandoned 65-year-old eyesore it was just five years ago. Getting an inside tour before most and doing so with Shapiro, an established critic for a big urban daily, was another good reporting experience.

In theory, he was there for the theatre angle, and I was meant to cover the neighborhood side of things. Our double bylined story reflects that, as, while we reviewed and agreed on the final product together he wrote primarily the art side, and I covered the Mayfair reporting first. Then we came together.

I also covered the opening for uwishunu.com, a Philly arts and entertainment blog, and for NEastPhilly.com, a community site that covers Northeast Philadelphia. That means I wasn’t left with much excess.

I did have a colorful conversation with a retiree who lives near the Devon, bought tickets and then decided to volunteer to help it succeed. Her enthusiasm was more than I could encapsulate in even three stories. Here’s one story she told that had no sensible place anywhere but right here:

“I asked [the general manager] ‘how old do you think I am?’ He said 63 or 64, and I said, ‘I ought to buy 10 more tickets from you. No, I turned 76 in February,’” said Kathleen Murray, who lives within walking distance of the Devon. “He asked me what’s my secret, and I told him because everyone’s always asking what’s my secret. I told him my secret is scotch and skiing. I skiied for 35 years but had to stop because I have an artificial knee, but I still drink my share of scotch. So that’s my secret, plenty of skiing and scotch.”

Some other extras:

“I don’t think there’s a lot of performing options in residential areas.” said Karen DiLossi, the director of programs and services for the Theatre Alliance of Philadelphia.

See the Devon Theater reopening story here.

Number of Views:401

Live, from the Northeast – it’s theater (Philadelphia Inquirer: 3/22/09)

Christopher Wink — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 00:52:11 +0000

Devon artistic director Michael Pickering oversees a rehearsal of “Nunsense,” the inaugural show for the new theater. AMANDA CEGIELSKI / Staff Photographer

By Howie Shapiro and Christopher Wink | Philadelphia Inquirer | March 22, 2009

About 400 people, dressed for a gala, will take their seats Friday evening in what once was a dilapidated Frankford Avenue movie house. Three women in nun’s habits will pop up, administering parochial-school demands: Get rid of the gum! Flip off those cell phones!

The lights will dim, the loopy musical Nunsense will begin – and Northeast Philadelphia will have its first professional live-performance theater, in an area where many people (those in the Northeast included) may not expect to find one.

The opening of the sparkling Devon Theater is an example both of neighborhood tenacity and of a professional Philadelphia theater community whose growth – against the economic odds – seems unstoppable.

“I welcome them to the theater community,” says Margie Salvante, executive director of the Theatre Alliance of Greater Philadelphia. “The theater industry, on a national level, is really focused on Philadelphia as a hot spot right now.”

Excitement has been building in the Mayfair neighborhood where the Devon, on Frankford between Barnett and Stirling Streets, heralds a new level of local entertainment and the gradual revitalization that has taken hold. A call for volunteers to help usher, greet, and take on other duties drew more than 200 responses.

“I’ve seen the Devon at its worst. I want to see the theater now that it’s alive again,” says one of those volunteers, 76-year-old Kathleen Murray, who sometimes goes to the Arden Theatre in Old City or Glenside’s Keswick but relishes the idea of being able to see a show closer to home.

Her orientation was last weekend. “Will I be selling popcorn? Anything!” she says.

Whatever Murray does, she’ll be doing it in a state-of-the-art theater with a new 40-foot stage, and cupholders at each seat – just like at the movies. Its sound design boasts under-the-stage speakers to balance music for the front rows, and necklace transmitters that beam sound directly to the hearing aids of ticketholders who need them.

It even has a skybox of sorts, a roomy 20-seat balcony level for VIPs or rentals, with its own restrooms and catering space.

A local company, Fuse Management, which produces theatrical and special events nationwide (including on the Parkway and at Penn’s Landing), has been in charge of renovation and will mount the productions. Fuse opens the Devon with an agreement with Actors’ Equity, the professional union of theater artists – not generally the case with nascent theater companies. (The nearest theater – Kensington’s Walking Fish, five miles south on Frankford Avenue – pays its actors but is not aligned with Equity.)

“We could actually do it without any unions,” says Stephen McEntee, a Fuse employee instrumental in the Devon’s rescue from termite-riddled, roof-rotting destruction. “But we believe in it because of the talent, and we believe that people should be able to make a living at their profession, the arts or otherwise.”

The Devon, felicitously located near two Mayfair eat-and-drink landmarks – Tony’s Place across the street and Chickie’s & Pete’s to one side – is now owned by Mayfair’s Community Development Corp. (CDC), the neighborhood revitalization group that has a $6 million investment in the theater and the still-to-come surrounding streetscape.

State, federal, city, and private money is funding two-thirds of the project; the rest comes from a loan to the CDC from Beneficial, says Brian Patrick King, its executive director and a Mayfair native.

The theater, he says, will be a production house presenting its own shows, a booking house bringing in others, and a rental on off nights for groups that can use its spaces. The CDC hopes six new retail storefronts on the block, also part of the project, will help pay the Devon’s costs.

The theater even plans to use its own shows to help charities raise money: The charity guarantees the house, then sets fund-raising ticket prices, and the Devon provides all the services, cut-rate.

Like other projects now coming to fruition in a tough economy, the new Devon has roots in a more optimistic time earlier in the decade, when a study showed Mayfair lacked arts and culture in general.

At that time, on the Frankford Avenue corridor that mixed long-standing businesses with newer ones opened by young owners, the Devon was the last old-time movie venue standing, if barely. So five years ago the CDC, looking to create an arts scene – and the nighttime buzz, dining, and shopping that often come with it – bought the Devon for $800,000.

The theater, built in 1946, was among the city’s last single-screen cinemas, eclipsed by the era of multiplexes. In the beginning, its big, twinkly marquee – a landmark re-created and working again – advertised first-run films in what remains a solid, largely Irish Catholic neighborhood (where Nunsense should sell out). But as the business changed, it became a second-run house and then, in the ’70s, declined into porn; neighbors called it “the dirty Devon,” and worse.

One day in 1978, they woke to see a proclamation on the marquee: “No More Sex.” The Devon went back to being a second-run cinema, at 99 cents a ticket until 1985, when (amid some head-shaking) the price went up to $1.

Mike Lally, 29, a Mayfair native and manager of the new Devon, says that when he was a grade schooler, “the last thing I saw here was The Terminator – the original Terminator.”

The theater struggled and shut down, reopened for a few years with classic films in the late ’90s, then closed for good.

“When I walked in, it was like something out of a horror movie,” says Amy Pickering, the new theater’s education director, who will run its summer camp, workshops, and adult programs. That was in early 2008; the building was a dilapidated shell.

She and her husband, Michael – now the Devon’s artistic director – live in Sicklerville, Camden County, and had been traveling the country with a music-comedy dueling-piano show. They came at the behest of Fuse Management, drove around Mayfair, and were intrigued.

Their initial look at the Devon “terrified us a little bit,” Michael says, but they liked the neighborhood. “You could tell there wasn’t a lot of arts access around here, though,” he says, “and we decided it would be great to be part of providing that.”

The Pickerings understand that their shows will draw theatergoers as well as those who have never attended a live performance. To that end, the Devon’s Web site not only lists the usual particulars (ticket prices from $25 to $35, and the like), but also offers guidance on when to applaud.

“People may be a little intimidated,” Michael Pickering says, “and we want this theater to be as accessible as possible to everyone.”

That goes for what’s on offer, too, which returns the Devon to family-theater roots. You want cutting edge? The Devon is not your stage. (The Odd Couple is the just-announced second show.)

Its Web site poses the question: “Is this show appropriate for my kids?” The answer: “At the Devon Theater, we do not produce shows that are ‘for adults only.’ ”

Says Michael Pickering: “It’s a family area. We never want to put a show up with a parental advisory.”

See it here.

Number of Views:181

Live, from the Northeast – it's theater (Philadelphia Inquirer: 3/22/09)