Scenes from another successful Old North House & Community Tour and Homegrown Festival

Thanks to all who made this year’s Old North House & Community Tour and Homegrown Festival such a great success, especially tour committee chair, Maria Falconer (who somehow managed to evade all photographers, and, therefore, is not seen in any of our photos of the big day).  If you’d like to thank Maria, though, one option for consideration is to just stop in and buy something at Maria’s Rambles Gift Gallery & Boutique at 2611 N. 14th Street or from her online shop, Rambles.com.

The Homegrown Festival, the street party portion of the event, brought all sorts of fun to Crown Square, including live music, dance performances, refreshing beverages and snacks, arts and crafts booths, information from a variety sponsors and community partners, and exhibits inside Old North St. Louis Restoration Group’s Gallery.

It wouldn’t be a “House” and Community Tour without houses to show, and Old North specializes in a variety home sizes and styles.

One of the Habitat for Humanity Houses under construction at Clinton & N. 13th was on the tour.

Since Old North is also known for its gardens, of the private and community variety, we put those on tour, as well.

Tom Bratkowski had a chance to show the picnic table and benches he constructed for the 13th Street Community Garden.

In addition to the music and dance in the streets, the day provided opportunities to demonstrate various other arts initiatives.

The Old North Gallery featured photography of Benjamin Evans, as well as ONSLRG's before and after photos of historic buildings brought back to life from the brink of demolition.

Neighbors and visitors had a chance to see inside Northside Workshop, the soon to open art center at 1306 St. Louis Avenue.

Nancy & Ken Kranzberg (center) were present to view the progress they made possible at Northside Workshop, with Juan William Chavez (left), the artist who will run NSWS, and Sean Thomas of ONSLRG.

Contemporary Art Museum helped out with the opening of Northside Workshop, with Old North Grocery Co-op visible just across N. 13th Street from the new art center.

La Mancha Coffeehouse provided free cups of coffee to visitors to the tour.

Always a favorite part of the day, free ice cream courtesy of Crown Candy Kitchen (with Norah Ryan handling the scooping duties).

Perpetua Iron, a recently opened neighborhood business owned and operated by Old North resident Janet Sanders, was also on the tour.

An example of the ornamental iron items produced in Old North by Perpetua Iron.

The best part of the tour, however, is the chance to share with the world the warmth, friendliness, and community spirit of the people who live and work in Old North.

For more photos of the big day, take a look at our album on ONSLRG’s Facebook page by clicking HERE.

In addition to Maria, the list of others to thank could go on and on, but we should acknowledge the following:

• ONSLRG’s staff, Matt Fernandez, Jane Smith, and Sean Thomas;
• practicum students Michelle Wiegand, Becky Bitzer, Sheila Galvez, and Jennifer Gray;
• other planning committee members Vela Hermann & Thom Fletcher;
• Nevels Nevels for huge investment of time in laying out the tour booklet;
• Aida Rodriguez for bringing in the Lindy Hop and other social dancers;
• Urban Chestnut Brewing Co. and Ryan from UCBC;
• Officer Moran & other officers from the 4th & 5th police districts;
• Crown Candy Kitchen, especially Andy Karandzieff, for providing ice cream for all tour-goers and lunch fixings for the volunteers;
• numerous volunteers from within Old North, or friends of Old North, including Keith Marquard, John Thro, Curtis Berry, Kate Feit, Norah Ryan, Tino Ochoa, Nico Leone and Dave Eisenbraun;
• volunteer crews from Bank of America, FUEL for the City, and Step Up St. Louis!
• the generous residents who opened their homes and business owners who opened their spaces for visitors to see all that Old North has to offer, including: Janet Sanders of Perpetua Iron, Vela Vm Hermann & Chris Goetsch, Ben & Heidi Sever, Ernie & Jeannie Stanley, Doug & Marg Corey, Barbara Davis, Habitat for Humanity, Matt Fernandez, Tom & Susan Tschetter, James & Luz Maria Cox, Claire Wolff, Camille Clingan, Juan William Chávez & Kiersten Torrez of NSWS, Old North Grocery Co-op, including Sarah Kate Buckles and Melissa Breed, and the 13th Street Community Garden;
• La Mancha Coffeehouse for providing a free cup of coffee to tour visitors;
• Event sponsors:
• including Bank of America, Commerce Bank, Regions Bank, USBank, Reliance Bank, First National Bank, Duffe-Nuernberger Real Estate, M & I Bank (or BMO Harris), and Missouri Dept. of Agriculture;
• And, finally, thanks go to St. Louis 3Wheel Taxi for stepping up at the last minute to provide shuttle service when our previous shuttle commitment fell through!

Thank you again to all who put in so much time and effort to make the day possible and all who attended.

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1 Week to Go: Old North House & Community Tour and Homegrown Street Festival on Sat., May 19

We’ve come a long way in the past 30 years.  In May of 1982 Old North St. Louis Restoration Group held its first house tour, featuring 3 occupied homes and 2 vacant city-owned buildings available for purchase.

This year, the Old North House & Community Tour will feature 8 historically rehabbed homes, 1 historically-sensitive relatively new home, 1 historic home in the midst of a complete rehab, 1 LEED-certified new Habitat for Humanity home, a neighborhood business that produces wrought iron fencing & other ornamental iron, a Crown Square commercial space, the neighborhood grocery co-op, a produce-growing community garden, and a soon-to-open neighborhood art center in a rehabbed 19th century building. Among the stops on the tour are 7 properties that previously have been recognized by Landmarks Association with “Most Enhanced” Awards.  And, back by popular demand, one of the stops on this year’s tour will be one of the three homes featured on the very first tour in 1982.  Come on out to find out which one.

Tickets are available for purchase online by clicking HERE or they can be purchased in person at Rambles Gift Gallery & Boutique (2611 N. 14th), Crown Candy Kitchen (1401 St. Louis Avenue), Old North Grocery Co-op (2718 N. 13th) or Old North St. Louis Restoration Group’s office (2700 N. 14th Street).

Because Old North is a community that embraces and celebrates diversity, we have two different flyers for this year’s tour.  Feel free to right-click and save the flyer below for forwarding as an invitation to all of your friends, family, and colleagues.

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Old North Bustling with Activity, including Bike To My Lou and Volunteers from SLU’s Showers of Service and Dept. of Corrections

VOLUNTEERS ASSIST WITH CLEANING UP, SPRUCING UP, AND BOARD-UP TASKS

Old North neighborhood volunteers received considerable help today from students from St. Louis University and another group of volunteers brought to the neighborhood by the Missouri Department of Corrections’ Office of Probation & Parole.  SLU’s annual Showers of Service program is a day of service sponsored and planned by the SLU chapter of Alpha Phi Omega.  For several years now, this program has sent dozens of students to Old North St. Louis Restoration Group to be deployed throughout the neighborhood for various volunteer projects where they can work side by side with neighborhood residents on community improvement projects.  As shown in the photos below, this year’s range of activities included alley clean-ups, boarding up vacant buildings, clearing empty lots, and a lot of work in the neighborhood’s numerous community gardens.

ONSLRG's Community Development Specialist, Matt Fernandez, a SLU grad with a bachelor's degree in Urban Affairs and a Master's in Urban Planning & Real Estate Development, inspired the students with evidence of life & employment after SLU.

The results of the volunteers’ work can be seen all over Old North…

The Johnnie Owens Garden at the Hebert Street Community Garden

Aida Rodriguez appreciated the help she received at Wingmann Park

The quasi-free-range residents of the 13th Street Community Garden are enjoying the cleaned up conditions around their home

Thank you to Alpha Phi Omega at SLU, to the Dept. of Corrections’ Office of Probation & Parole, and to neighborhood residents, including but not limited to James & Luz Maria Cox & family; Keith Marquard, Aida Rodriguez, Ernie Stanley, Chris Goetsch, Vela Hermann, Graham Lane, Ben Sever, Matt Fernandez, Ross Dorsey, Thom Fletcher, and many, many others.

BIKE TO MY LOU BIKE RIDE PASSES THROUGH OLD NORTH

A large contingent of cyclists passed through Old North this afternoon as part of the Bike to My Lou bike ride.  The free community ride and festival took riders through some of downtown’s adjacent neighborhoods - and we thank the organizers and sponsors for including Old North on the itinerary!

HABITAT HOMES UNDER CONSTRUCTION

Meanwhile, work continues on the 12 Habitat for Humanity homes under construction at N. 13th and Clinton.

A GOOD DAY FOR BUSINESS

Businesses in Old North enjoyed the flow of customers brought in by the various events going on in the neighborhood and the beautiful spring weather.

La Mancha Coffeehouse

Therapy Boutique

Crown Candy Kitchen

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Old North St. Louis Selected for National Award for Excellence in Smart Growth Achievement

This morning in Washington, D.C., the Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Sustainable Communities announced that the revitalization of Old North St. Louis is the winner of the 2011 National Award for Smart Growth Achievement.  The National Award for Smart Growth Achievement recognizes communities that have successfully used the principles of smart growth to preserve and enhance their quality of life while helping to protect public health and the environment.  Of the five projects or communities selected for awards this year, Old North was recognized with the Award for Overall Excellence in Smart Growth.  St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay and Old North St. Louis Restoration Group executive director Sean Thomas were on-hand to receive the award from John Frece, Director of EPA’s Office of Sustainable Communities.

The Award for Overall Excellence in Smart Growth is the highest award under this program and “recognizes an outstanding comprehensive approach to growth, including built projects, supportive plans and policies, and effective community participation,” according to the selection committee.  The committee further notes that “This award is for the best overall approach to implementing smart growth on a variety of fronts—not just for a single plan or project, but at the neighborhood, corridor, city, county, or regional level.”  Last year’s Overall Excellence award recognized collaborative efforts among New York City’s Departments of Transportation, Health, Design & Construction, and Planning toward improving that city’s livability.

Among the factors that contributed to Old North’s selection was the neighborhood’s 28% population increase over the past decade.  A winning project not only shows that a comprehensive approach is in place, but that it has significant impacts.  Because the overall achievement award is not for one specific project but for the collaborative and strategic efforts over several years, credit for this achievement goes out to a wide range of groups and individuals who worked together on multiple projects.  On behalf of the Board and staff of the Old North St. Louis Restoration Group, we especially thank the residents of Old North who, over many years, have scraped together limited resources and put in countless hours of service to the community.

Specific initiatives that have contributed to the neighborhood-wide revitalization include the $35 million, 27-building Crown Square redevelopment of the former 14th Street Pedestrian Mal, and with it, 80 new households in an area that had largely abandoned and a growing number of new locally-owned businesses; the new homes at North Market Place and the historically-rehabbed North Market Apartments, which salvaged 9 previously crumbling, abandoned buildings; the cultivation and maintenance of community gardens throughout the neighborhood; the North City Farmers’ Market; and last year’s opening of the community-owned Old North Grocery Co-op.

Partners who have worked with ONSLRG to help make these great things happen include multiple agencies of City of St. Louis (such as the Community Development Administration, St. Louis Development Corporation, Land Reutilization Authority, Planning & Urban Design Agency, Cultural Resources Office), Regional Housing & Community Development Alliance, University of Missouri-St. Louis and MU-Extension; Missouri Foundation for Health, Ken & Nancy Kranzberg, Gateway Greening, Operation Brightside… and so many more than can be listed here.

Although this award recognizes past achievements, the real benefit is that it will help shed more light on an area that has even greater potential for more growth.  In fact, the work to continue the revitalization is already in progress.

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Scenes from Old North Home Grown Festival & House Tour -Part 2

The wet and chilly weather may have kept some people away, but the Old North Home Grown Festival & House Tour still was a great success in many other ways that can’t be measured by attendance figures alone.

Some of the community’s strong supporters who haven’t been back to the neighborhood in a while enjoyed the opportunity to see all of the changes, including some that have taken place just within the past couple weeks, including a bright, new look for the Old North Grocery Co-op.

Although we don't normally recommend painting on brick, the building that houses the Old North Grocery Co-op was classified as "non-contributing" at the time the neighborhood was approved as a National Register Historic District, in part because of the newer, non-historic brick on the exterior of the later addition as well as the historic portions of the former horseradish factory.

The event was successful in serving as a platform for establishing new connections, including with one individual who was so impressed that he made plans to hold a wedding reception at Crown Square, and in demonstrating the vibrancy of the community.  A few prospective commercial tenants came out to get a feel for the area and to look at look at commercial spaces that are available for lease.

The Home Grown Festival represented an opportunity to shine the spotlight on artistic talent within and nearby Old North.

Juan William Chavez had an exhibit that shared the story of Team Cookbook, inspired by the Old North Cookbook.

The space at 2607 N. 14th was the site of an installation created by Chinyere E. Oteh, Dail Chambers, and Simiya Sudduth representing the Ye Yo Arts Collective.

Visitors got a chance to try out new neighborhood businesses, such as La Mancha Coffeehouse.

The gallery at the Old North St. Louis Restoration Group’s office hosted a range of spoken word performances and the re-dedication of Wingmann Park (more about that in a later post), while the Parks Building was the site for a variety of craft vendors.

As always, the house tour showed off the beauty and unique character of homes in Old North…

… on the inside:

…and outside:

Although redevelopment of this cottage house on Palm isn't visible yet, the property still drew a lot of interest. The owners posted a display of architectural plans for the rehab, along with interesting bits about the building's history and its former occupants.

As the photo of the cottage on Palm demonstrates, Old North’s house tour is unlike many other house tours in other neighborhoods.  We don’t limit our tour to the homes that are in pristine condition or likely to show up on the cover of glossy home magazines.  Old North’s tour shows off the diversity of the community, including the range of housing styles and conditions.  There are many homes that have been beautifully restored to reflect their original, Victorian design.  There also are many homes that are at early stages of rehab work, and many that put more contemporary interiors into the shells of their historic homes.

The rain forced many of the street festival activities indoors, including the performances that had been scheduled for the main stage at Crown Square.

Students from Grand Center Arts Academy's Front & Center Show Choir were among the performers.

Young performers from Club CHIPS shared songs with positive messages about healthy living.

David Foote invited audience members to participate in a Zumba dance demonstration.

Meanwhile, out on the street, many of our sponsors and other neighborhood service providers braved the weather to staff information tables.

Kohner Properties staff shared information about apartments available in the neighborhood, including at Crown Square Apartments.

Grace Hill representatives distributed information about the upcoming Mary Meachum Freedom Crossing event scheduled for next weekend.

Trailnet representatives and friends gathered at the corner plaza while waiting for start of the environmental justice bike ride.

The Missouri Department of Agriculture, one of our sponsors, was on hand to recruit more gardens for their 10,000 Garden Challenge.

The Old North St. Louis Restoration Group thanks all sponsors, volunteers, homeowners, and visitors for making the day such a wonderful experience!

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Old North Home Grown Festival & House Tour Just 1 Week Away!

We’re down to 7 days now.  Since next weekend will be here before you know it, be sure to firm up your plans to attend the Old North Home Grown Festival & House Tour on Saturday, May 14.  This weekend also marks the last weekend to spread the word while you’re out and around taking care of other errands and / or visiting your favorite restaurants, coffee shops, entertainment venues, or church.  So, be sure to invite your friends to join us next Saturday.

And now, a few more previews of what can be seen and enjoyed at the Old North Home Grown Festival & House Tour on Saturday, May 14:

As part of the Home Grown Festival, some of the storefronts along this stretch of N. 14th Street at Crown Square will be filled with art exhibits featuring local artists, such as Juan William Chavez, Dail Chambers, and young artists from Ames Visual & Performing Arts Magnet School and Holy Trinity School. La Mancha Coffeehouse will have continue its showing of photos by St. Louis ArtWorks participants.

The registration tent for ticket sales, tour booklets, and other information will be at this plaza area at N. 14th and St. Louis Avenue. The Parks building, in the background, will house a variety of local crafters.

The Old North Grocery Co-op will be one of the new neighborhood businesses on the tour. Many of last year's visitors who saw the building had good reason to be skeptical that the space would be ready for opening by mid-summer. But the store DID open last July, and return visitors will be pleased to see the co-op in business.

Another new business that will be on the tour is La Mancha Coffeehouse at 2815 N. 14th Street.

The Hebert Street Community Garden has been on the tour in the past, but this will be the first time since it was dedicated to Johnnie Owens..

A stroll down the 1300 block of North Market will provide glimpses of the mix of old and new, as well as the variety of housing options from apartment buildings to owner-occupied houses. The North Market Apts. community space, in the background, will be open and will feature a display of plans for another round of Habitat for Humanity houses in Old North.

Since Old North continues to be a work in progress, the tour also features homes that are still in the midst of rehab, such as this home on the 1200 block of North Market.

This house on Monroe, in its final stages of rehab, provides evidence that not everything in Old North has red brick facade.

This house on Sullivan has great interior space as well as a wonderful patio and garden in back.

Although the tour can only feature a limited number of buildings, the architectural and historic character of the streetscape can still be appreciated on the way to and from the different stops on the tour.

As noted in previous posts, more information and a link to purchase tickets online can be found at the ONSL.org page for the house tour: Click HERE to visit the House Tour page of the ONSL website.  Volunteers still have time to sign up to help with this year’s tour.  Just call the Old North St. Louis Restoration Group office at 314-241-5031 or send an email to info@onsl.org and let us know when you’re available and how to reach you.

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Old North House Tour & Home Grown Festival: 12 Days Away!

This beautifully restored home on N. 19th Street once was a crumbling, abandoned shell. Come see how it has been brought back to life on Sat., May 14.

We’re just 12 days away from the Old North Home Grown Street Festival & House Tour on Saturday, May 14. Now would be a good time to call, email, or send Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn notices to all of your contacts to give them a heads-up and to invite them to join you on Saturday, May 14.  We have postcards in the Old North St. Louis Restoration Group office that you can come in and address to those you want to mail them to, and then we’ll put a stamp on them and mail them for you.

One of the homes on this block of Sullivan will be on the tour.

In addition to many houses dating from the mid-to-late 1800s that have benefited from historic rehabilitation, Old North also is home to 21st Century houses built within the past year.  As part of the dynamic mix of old and new housing found in Old North, the tour will feature a couple of LEED-certified homes built by Habitat for Humanity that were designed to fit the lot sizes and setbacks of the blocks where they were built.

A one-story and a two-story flounder house built by Habitat will be on this year's tour.

Among the many neighborhood amenities that will be celebrated are several community gardens.

This triangular greenspace bounded by Wright, Dodier, and Branch Streets has received a lot of attention lately, including significant support from Operation Brightside. Wingmann Park will be re-dedicated at noon on the day of the tour.

More information and a link to purchase tickets online can be found at the ONSL.org page for the house tour:  Click HERE to visit the House Tour page of the ONSL website.

If you have a Facebook account, type “Old North Saint Louis House Tour” in the search box and you’ll find our event page.  Once there, be sure to click on “Attending” and then click on the option to share this with all of your friends.

The 2011 Old North Home Grown Festival & House Tour is made possible due to the generous sponsorship support from PNC Bank (lead sponsor), Missouri Dept. of Agriculture, Bank of America, Commerce Bank, Duffe Nuernberger Realty, E. M. Harris Construction Co., Kohner Properties, Mackey Mitchell Architects, and USBank.

For other information or if you want to volunteer on the day of the tour, please give us a call at 314-241-5031.

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Old North HomeGrown Street Fest and House Tour Just 1 Month Away

This year’s Old North St. Louis House & Community Tour is expanding beyond the traditional format to incorporate a street festival that will celebrate and put the spotlight on locally produced foods, goods, and services.  The first ever HomeGrown Street Festival and our usual Old North House & Community Tour will take place on Saturday, May 14th from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m.

Tour tickets are available in advance for $10 and will be available on the day of the tour for $12 per person. To purchase tickets online or for more information, visit the ONSL.org page about the tour & street fest by clicking HERE.

The tour will feature the great diversity of housing styles that make Old North a community where almost everyone can find a place that suits their budget and lifestyle.  Stops on the tour will include historically rehabbed houses that once were abandoned shells, a LEED-certified home built by Habitat for Humanity last year, community gardens (including the 13th Street Garden, which grows food for the North City Farmers’ Market and is home to the Old North Chicken Coop), the Old North Grocery Co-op, and new businesses at Crown Square.  The HomeGrown Street Festival will show off the cool, public space at Crown Square, along the redeveloped former 14th Street Mall, and will feature a variety of locally produced arts, crafts, and other goods.   If you know of a good, local product that is worthy of inclusion at the street fest, contact the ONSLRG office.

We also could use some help in spreading the word about this great celebration of neighborhood revitalization, historic preservation, and the best of urban living.  It’s not too early to start inviting your friends, neighbors, relatives, and other supporters of sustainable, community-driven neighborhood development to join you on Saturday, May 14.   If you’d like to request postcards for the event that you could mail to anyone who might be interested in attending, call the ONSLRG office at 314-241-5031 or send an email to info@onsl.org.

This year’s tour is made possible by generous support from PNC, the Missouri Dept. of Agriculture, Commerce Bank, Duffe-Nuernberger Realty, Kohner Properties, Mackey Mitchell Architects, and USBank.

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Old North Flickr Set Features Highlights from 2010

The collection of Old North photos on Flickr now includes a set dedicated to highlights from the activities and events of 2010.  Check it out by clicking here.

Some of these photos will be included in the slideshow of 2010 highlights that will happen at the Old North St. Louis Restoration Group’s Annual Meeting & Pot-Luck Supper, which will start at 6 p.m. on Monday evening.

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Huge Year for Old North in 2010 - Part 1

With a couple hours left to celebrate the accomplishments of 2010… and to make a tax-deductible contribution to support our work into 2011 (as noted in the previous post, with a link to our online contributions page), this is as good a time as any to review some of the events and activities of this unbelievably busy year.

NEW RESIDENTS

One of the keys to becoming a sustainable and thriving community is attracting and retaining residents.  It’ll be a while before we get neighborhood-level details from the 2010 Census, but we do know that Old North welcomed at least 80 new households to the neighborhood this past year, including new tenants at recently completed Crown Square Apartments; homebuyers who moved into the 17 Habitat for Humanity-built homes on Dodier, Sullivan, and Hebert; and other homebuyers who purchased houses throughout the neighborhood, from North Market to St. Louis Avenue to Hebert.

CROWN SQUARE COMPLETION & RE-OPENING OF 14th STREET

While some of the residential apartments at Crown Square were finished and occupied by the end of 2009, the rest of the apartments, the sidewalks, trees, bike racks, street lights, and the new street were completed at various points throughout 2010, giving us reason to celebrate something new almost every other month.

Although the street didn’t officially open until the end of October - after the street lights were installed, we held our ribbon-cutting and grand opening street festival on July 29.  The film crew from Marvo Entertainment recorded the event for a future production that eventually will air on PBS stations across the country.  Until then, a short clip from the occasion can be viewed online at Marvo Entertainment Group’s website.

Landmarks Association of St. Louis and the National Trust for Historic Preservation gave us even more reasons to celebrate Crown Square when they presented awards to ONSLRG and our development partners at the Regional Housing & Community Development Alliance for our work on Crown Square.  Landmarks presented us with one of their “Most Enhanced Awards” in May (along with one to Old North residents Nico & Nicole Leone, shown in the middle photo below, for the historic rehab of their home on Wright Street) and the National Trust/HUD Secretary’s Award for Excellence in Historic Preservation was presented to staff from ONSLRG and RHCDA at the National Preservation Conference in October.

OLD NORTH GROCERY CO-OP OPENED FOR BUSINESS

Old North’s growing population brings with it a greater demand for neighborhood goods and services and other amenities, as well as an increased supply of customers for neighborhood businesses.  To accommodate this demand, and in response to the expressed desires of long-time community residents, ONSLRG initiated efforts to establish a grocery store for Old North and surrounding neighborhoods.  After many months of planning and community meetings, and investment of thousands of hours of volunteer effort to get the building at 2718 N. 13th Street in shape to serve as a grocery store - and support from more people and groups than can be listed here (although UM-Extension, Missouri Foundation for Health, Ken Kranzberg, Kaemmerlen Electric, and IBEW electricians deserve special acknowledgment), the Old North Grocery Co-op opened for business on July 17.

Volunteers from groups such as Students Today-Leaders Forever (mostly from John Carroll University who spent part of their spring break with us), St. Louis area Yale University alumni and current students (who came out for this year’s Yale Day of Service), and students from St. Louis University and Washington University worked side by side with dozens of neighborhood residents and friends of Old North who carried out interior demo, new wall construction, painting, shelf assembly, and countless other tasks for much of the first half of 2010.

In addition to bringing healthy and affordable foods to Old North, the grocery co-op also brought a lot of outside attention to good things going on in the community.  Among those reporting on the developments in Old North, National Public Radio aired a story about the co-op on NPR stations all over the country.  Click HERE for a link to the NPR page where you can read the transcript or listen to the report by Veronique LaCapra of St. Louis Public Radio.

RE-DEDICATION OF HEBERT STREET GARDEN AS JOHNNIE OWENS GARDEN

We were greatly saddened by the passing of our great friend and longtime ONSLRG board member Johnnie Owens in September, but a few weeks earlier we were able to let Johnnie know how much she meant to all of us when we re-dedicated the Hebert Street Community Garden as a lasting tribute to Johnnie’s many contributions to the community.

Check back tomorrow for Part 2, with images and details about…

-ARTS EVENTS AND OTHER PROGRAMS AT OLD NORTH GALLERY

-NORTH CITY FARMERS’ MARKET AMONG TOP 20 OF AMERICA’S FAVORITE FARMERS MARKETS

-SUPPORT FOR COMMUNITY GARDENS & DESIGNATION OF 13th STREET GARDEN AS GATEWAY GREENING ”HUB GARDEN”

-NEW BUSINESSES ON 14th STREET

-TOURS AND VISITS FROM FAR & WIDE

-NEW BOOK HIGHLIGHTS REVITALIZATION IN OLD NORTH

In the meantime, have a safe and happy New Year’s Eve!

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• 13th Street Community Garden, 14th Street Mall, Art in Old North, Awards and honors, Community Gardens, Crown Square, Crown Square Businesses, Habitat for Humanity, Historic rehabs, Houses for Sale, Johnnie Owens, Life in ONSL, North City Farmers' Market, ONSL amenities, ONSL in the news, ONSL people, Old North Gallery (formerly known as Crown Village Gallery), Old North Grocery Co-op, Old North St. Louis Restoration Group, Parks and green spaces, Uncategorized, Videos, Volunteer Opportunities, sustainability
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