Author: Andrew Caldwell

Downtown’s French Fort neighborhood has preserved its quiet, charming character for years, but changes on the horizon could make it Memphis’ next cultural hotspot.

Both the Tennessee Department of Transportation’s plans to begin work on a roundabout at the intersection of I-55 and Crump Blvd. and the proposed Harahan Bridge greenline project are expected to bring a new level of attention to the blufftop neighborhood. The Memphis Regional Design Center (MRDC) has stepped in to ensure French Fort thrives from the upcoming opportunities. MRDC, the residents of French Fort, and a number of developers took the first step in planning for the future last Saturday in a design meeting held in the neighboring National Ornamental Metal Museum.

“Both the roundabout and the Harahan Bridge Project are going to have a huge impact on French Fort,” said Chooch Pickard, executive director of the MRDC. “The design we come up with is going to need to take into account being able to supply the commercial needs of those visiting the bridge [and those using the roundabout].”

At the meeting, residents were asked to imagine a design for their neighborhood that might mirror that of Mud Island’s Harbor Town.

Ideas included art and gallery spaces, bicycle rentals, senior living facilities, a library, a new hotel, upscale condos and houses, and plenty of dining. The MRDC will begin working the best ideas into a master plan to be presented to residents at a later date.

Residents and developers paid special attention to the preservation of the area’s historic significance. Ideas of building a visitor’s center and museum, along with additional signage highlighting historic monuments, like ancient Native American burial mounds in DeSoto Park, were all discussed as ways to boost heritage tourism within the neighborhood.

The Harahan Bridge project, which will reopen the old rail bridge as a bike and pedestrian crossing over the Mississippi River and connect it with a planned extension of downtown’s Riverwalk, is projected to dramatically increase visitors to the French Fort area.

“I think one of the important parts of the Harahan Bridge Project is the connector trail directly underneath the bridges to get to French Fort and the Metal Museum,” said Greg Maxted, executive director of the bridge project. “We’re going to have big numbers of people coming to walk across that bridge.”

Pickard compared the Harahan Bridge project’s impact on the neighborhood to that of the Highpoint Terrace area near the Shelby Farms Greenline. Business has been booming in that commercial center, home to Cheffie’s Café, a hybrid bike shop, and a small grocery store, since the greenline opened last year.

Lauren Crews, developer and current owner of the Marine Hospital next to the Metal Museum, shared Pickard’s sentiments.

“This is not scientific. It’s just my gut,” said Crews to French Fort residents. “Whatever impact you think this will have on the local community and our neighborhood, I think you’ve got to double it. People are going to visit and move into [the French Fort area] just so they can be close to the greenline.”

February’s closing of Zinnie’s East did more than upset fans of the popular Midtown restaurant’s all-you-can-eat crab-leg Sundays. It also left organizers of the annual Wiffestock tournament scrambling for a new location.

The annual Wiffle ball tournament has been held in the Zinnie’s East parking lot since its inaugural event in 1996. But this year’s tournament has moved to the much more spacious Tiger Lane, near the Liberty Bowl.

On Saturday and Sunday, August 20th and 21st, Wiffle veterans and virgins will compete in a double-elimination tournament benefiting the Ronald McDonald House of Memphis.

Wifflestock has grown from a simple day of Wiffle among friends 15 years ago to last year’s 32-team tournament with close to 500 in attendance, said Johnny Jackson, who’s been coordinating the event for the past three years.

“We’ve been playing for the Ronald McDonald House from the beginning,” Jackson said. “We’ve given more than $70,000 over the years, and more than $17,000 of that was raised last year alone.”

While Jackson said he’s sorry that Wifflestock has been forced to leave Zinnie’s East, he said the seven-acre Tiger Lane has more to offer.

“If it runs the way we’re planning, Wifflestock should be so much better and run so much smoother. We’ll have more games to play,” Jackson said.

“In the past, because we were limited on space, if you played Saturday morning and lost, you didn’t play again until Sunday. This year, we’ve got enough space to play round-robin games. We’re prepared to have up to eight games going all at the same time.”

For those less interested in the sport, Wifflestock has plenty in the way of additional festivities.

“If we pull it off, this will be the biggest one we’ve ever had. It’ll be on a completely different level. We’ve got a lot more bands, a bigger stage, and a much larger venue at Tiger Lane.”

Additional attractions include live music featuring John Pastor, Jeremy Stanfill, and Brian Sharp, a hot-dog eating contest, a dunk tank, and plenty of food and drink from local eateries. There’s also an off-site poker tournament on Friday evening at Café Olé.

Along with the benefits of the new venue come a few kinks to be sorted out before the first pitch is thrown Saturday morning.

“The heat is definitely our biggest concern. In the past, we’ve always had Zinnie’s right next door if people needed to step inside between games and get some air conditioning,” Jackson said. “We’ve tried to get a bunch of tents, coolers, tables, and chairs. Really, it’s about making people feel comfortable.”

Parking and admission to Wifflestock is free for spectators, There’s a $25 entry fee for those competing for their name on a trophy, bragging rights, and the satisfaction of supporting a noble cause.

“I really hope [Tiger Lane] will become the new home of Wifflestock,” Jackson said. “It’s a great space for a wiffleball tournament. Hopefully, we’ll stay there for the next 15 years.”

Two weeks ago, Wei Chen became the first Chinese citizen to circumnavigate the globe in a single-engine plane when he landed his Socata TBM turboprop in Memphis on July 30th.

Chen moved from China nearly 16 years ago to attend the University of Memphis, and he’s been living here ever since. Though he’s only been flying for four years, he and co-pilot Rob Williams began their expedition on May 23rd, making their way over 21 countries in 69 days.

Through his expedition, Chen was able to raise $250,000 for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital while promoting the need for loosened restrictions on private aviation in China’s government-controlled skies.

Flyer: How does it feel to be the first Chinese citizen to circumnavigate the globe?

Chen: To fly a small, single-engine plane around the world is a big deal. Less than 200 people have done it. Of the 1.3 billion Chinese citizens, I’m the first one to accomplish that. The Chinese have the dream of flying. We invented the kite 2,000 years ago. To them, with the limited ability to fly around the world, it’s such a huge deal.

Why did it take so long for a Chinese citizen to do this?

It’s not allowed. In China, the entire airspace belongs to the military. You need permission to take off and land in China, so flying becomes very difficult.

What preparations were involved?

When I started planning the trip, I had 350 hours [of flying ahead of me]. It was like learning to drive a car and then driving the Indy 500. You have to believe in yourself. I think that’s the message I was trying to spread around the world. We planned it for 18 months. There are so many things that can go wrong. When I was on the trip, I just had to stick with the plan.

What was the trip like?

I was in a different country every day, a different airport every day. I was meeting with people I had never met before, sometimes having dinner with 300 people. It’s what I wanted to spread my message, but it’s also very draining.

What sort of challenges did you face?

On the day I departed, I got a phone call saying a volcano [in Iceland] erupted. The airports across Iceland and Greenland were closed. It affected Europe for two weeks, so it added a lot of uncertainty. I still took off and continued with my plan.

Flying in the Middle East was a big challenge. We had to go around Iraq and Kuwait. Not being able to land in Egypt was disappointing. I really wanted to see the pyramids, but I couldn’t do that. It took two hours to fly around Egypt to land in Saudi Arabia. If something had happened, there’d be no support. I don’t speak the language.

How did you use the trip to promote cross-cultural relations?

Along with promoting St. Jude, I was promoting Memphis. I was able to tell people about how I came to Memphis and all of the opportunities here.

Because I’m the first Chinese citizen to fly around the world, I received a lot of media attention in China. People in China could see they’ve got a fellow Chinese person living in the U.S. who can do this.

Did the Chinese government help in any other way besides opening up their airspace?

The Chinese Ministry of Culture wanted to spread [the news of my trip] to unite Chinese around the world. Sometimes they would send in a performance group to greet me and celebrate the flight. When I arrived in Barcelona, they sent around 30 performers to perform for the local community.

Chinese scientists have discovered showing “panda porn” may increase sexual desire in the typically prudish captive giant panda. But once the porn has been shoved under the bed, how can zookeepers determine if female pandas are preggers?

Leave it to the Memphis Zoo to create a pregnancy test for giant pandas. Erin Willis of zoo’s Department of Conservation and Research recently developed a new method to detect and oversee safe and successful panda pregnancies.

The Memphis Zoo has been receiving considerable attention from the international scientific community for the development. With only 1,600 left in the wild and nearly 300 in zoos or breeding facilities, pandas are on the World Conservation Union’s Red List of Threatened Species.

Captive pandas, like the Memphis Zoo’s Ya Ya and Le Le, have a reputation as poor breeders. Several attempts at impregnanting Ya Ya have so far been unsuccessful.

“What’s really exciting about this particular discovery is that it will have direct application on giant pandas and how we manage them in captivity,” said Andy Kouba with the Department of Conservation and Research at the Memphis Zoo.

“Bears have what’s called pseudopregnancy,” Willis said. “They’ll look like they’re pregnant, whether they’re pregnant or not. So you can’t usually determine whether they’re pregnant by normal means, which a lot of times means using a hormone, progesterone.”

Willis’ test examines a protein called ceruloplasmin, which normally increases in response to inflammation and was found to increase in the urine of pandas at one week of pregnancy. Older, less accurate methods of testing pregnancy in giant pandas didn’t test for ceruloplasmin, which isn’t produced during a pseudopregnancy.

“It’s a very early test,” Willis said. “You can actually use ultrasound, but [pandas] have what’s called delayed implantation. The embryo doesn’t implant for a long time, so you can’t use ultrasound early in the pregnancy. “

The early notice provided by the new test is especially valuable for giant pandas in captivity because it affords zoos plenty of time to prepare for and predict the female’s due date.

“In every term pregnancy I’ve analyzed, there’s been a drop [of ceruloplasmin] 24 days prior to birth,” Willis said. “That will give keepers and managers an idea of when a birth will occur.”

While the Memphis Zoo funded Willis’ research, Kouba says he expects the results of her work to bring in outside grants for additional research.

“People have been looking for a way to [detect] pregnancy for nearly 40 years in bear species like this and other species that undergo pseudopregnancies,” Kouba said. “We’re excited about … offering these resources to other zoos. We’re getting a lot of requests for [Willis’] assistance from researchers, and we’re trying to figure out how to meet that need.”

The Memphis Zoo is considering working with a private company to make the test available to other zoos and researchers.

“This initial study did show that there are quite a lot of lost pregnancies, and I need to do future studies to determine what the rate of lost pregnancies is in captivity,” Willis said. “Knowing there are a lot of lost pregnancies and doing investigations to see why that’s the case is definitely going to help the conservation of giant pandas.”

Over a thousand miles from her hometown, Memphis native Louise Gore inadvertently brought a bit of Bluff City charm into her new home in the Big Apple.

Gore, who has been living in New York since high school, teamed up with New York-based interior designer Hillary Unger to redesign Gore’s new Upper West Side apartment in Manhattan. The result is an accidental gallery of Memphis art.

Unger’s redesign, which included considerable reconstruction to the apartment’s living room, dining room, and bathroom, was centered around Gore’s art collection, most of which happens to be made up of work from Memphis artists, including Greely Myatt, Tim Crowder, Burton Callicott, and Louise’s younger sister, Kat Gore. Gore acquired the majority of her collection from the David Lusk Gallery in Memphis over the years.

Both Gore and Unger pointed out that exclusively displaying artwork from Memphis was a happy accident.

“We didn’t realize the Memphis connection until the project was nearly completed,” Unger said.

“It’s kind of ironic,” Gore added. “There’s plenty of art here in New York, but it worked out that almost every time I went home, I would bring back another piece of art.”

While the selection of art on display in Gore’s apartment was far from deliberate, Unger seemed convinced of Gore’s inherent attraction to Memphis art. So the designer let the tones set by Gore’s love of folk art shape the redesign.

“[The artwork] really made the apartment her own,” Unger said. “Louise was bringing home back with her.”

University of Memphis art professor Greely Myatt’s Fancy Assortment, which adorns Gore’s dining room wall with its arrangement of colorful vintage tins in the shape of a cartoon thought bubble, serves as the aesthetic highlight of the apartment.

Other notable pieces include Tim Crowder’s amusing Tell the Bees, which welcomes visitors as the focal point of the apartment’s foyer. Eric Rhein’s wire bird drawings from his 1997 “Humming Bird Series” are suspended in the living room.

Unger’s design portfolio has received nods from The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and Apartment Therapy.

Midtown’s iconic Sears Crosstown building is about to get funkified.

In the next few months, the 1.4 million-square-foot abandoned building will be adorned with colored solar lights and a disco ball made from used bike wheels.

The public art installations came out of Crosstown Arts’ MemFEAST 2.0 dinner, which was held last month on the roof of the Sears garage. Artists presented seven public art proposals, and at the end of the meal, attendees voted for their favorite. Crosstown Arts is dedicated to revitalizing the Sears Building and the surrounding neighborhood.

Robin Salant’s Lights, Timers, Solar!, in which she proposed using solar lights to illuminate the Sears building’s water tower and exterior, won the popular vote. Salant was awarded $5,000 to fund the project.

“[This project] literally shines a positive light on the building, enlivens it,” Salant said. “Hopefully, it will help people change their minds about its potential and presence in the neighborhood.”

Although Salant won the official vote, an anonymous donor came forward with $3,000 at the end of the evening to support one of the other projects: Colin Kidder and Eli Gold’s Diamond in the Rough. The two proposed installing a colossal disco ball made of donated bike wheels on the side of the Sears building.

After the event, Crosstown Arts launched “MemFEAST/Continues,” a fund-raising campaign aimed at raising money for Kidder and Gold’s proposal, as well as Sean Murphy’s “Crosstown Re-Sound,” in which Murphy plans to create a soundtrack for the building using handmade and exotic instruments played inside its vast, empty warehouse floors.

That fund-raising campaign ended last week, and though neither Murphy’s or Kidder and Gold’s project met its $5,000 goal, the artists have plans to move forward with their projects. At press time, Kidder and Gold have raised approximately 60 percent of the $5,000.

“We chose to design a sculpture to go on the Sears building because we believe that a concrete change to the building itself is visible evidence to Memphians that something is being done with this building,” Kidder said.

They’re asking Memphians to donate old bicycle wheels to the project, which they are set to begin work on in July.

“Community involvement is important to us,” Kidder said. “Collecting the wheels from diverse citizens of this city will symbolize a community effort, the same kind of effort it’s going to take to make the Sears building renovation happen.”

Murphy has raised 15 percent of his $5,000 goal, which, he said, is enough to cover the audio side of his project. Originally, he’d also planned to have the recording session videotaped for a documentary. He hopes to begin audio recording inside the building in August.

“The real costs concerns are related to filming the project and the production of a product,” Murphy said. “With $5,000, I can afford to bring a filmmaker on board to document the process through video, which will be made available for free through a service like YouTube.”

Salant was also included in the “MemFEAST: Continues” campaign, and she managed to raise a little more money for her lighting project.

“The bulk of the expense will likely be the bulbs, so the continuous donations mean more bulbs to work with, which is wonderful,” Salant said.

Since the banquet, Salant said she’s been consulting with lighting professionals about recommended bulbs and equipment and pursuing project support from local solar-lighting plant Sharp Electronics Corporation and Philips Lighting Company. With the help of volunteers, she plans to begin installing lights on the building in August.

Although the official fund-raiser ended last week, donations are still needed for each project. Donations can be made through Crosstown Arts until July 31st. The artists’ proposals are posted on the MemFEAST website (memfeast.tumblr.com/).

Nearly three years have passed since then-Shelby County mayor A C Wharton issued 151 “Sustainable Shelby” recommendations to make the county a greener place.

These include reinvesting in walkable neighborhoods, emphasizing adaptive reuse of buildings, and enhancing bike and pedestrian facilities. While the city and county have made good on some of these plans, it lacked an office to head up implementation.

That is, until last Tuesday, when Wharton (now the Memphis mayor) and Shelby County mayor Mark Luttrell launched their joint Office of Sustainability dedicated to making Wharton’s list a reality.

The man selected to lead the effort is 32-year-old native Memphian Paul Young. He’s held positions with the Local Initiatives Support Corporation in New York City and the local Community Capital, where he was involved in the Dixie Homes and Lamar Terrace projects as a financial analyst. He’s also held a number of positions in Shelby County government. — Andrew Caldwell

Flyer: How do you plan to realize all 151 recommendations?

Young: Ultimately, we want to keep the community engaged. Many of the things on our list require cooperation with various city and county divisions, nonprofit organizations, and the private sector. We want to coordinate to see that these strategies are done.

I’m located in the Office of Planning and Development, which is a joint city-county agency, and that was a strategic move so that I would be able to work for both governments.

are you starting with the short-term goals?

When I say short-term, I’m thinking within the next year and a half. Some are actually already done. One of the recommendations is to encourage MLGW to show customers their carbon footprint, and they’re already doing that on their website.

Some will involve decisions that the government will have to make. This is important to us, and we’re not just going to suggest that you do these things. We’re going to do the same. We’re going to practice what we preach.

What excites you most from Wharton’s list?

I’m really excited about the green-building task force. It’s going to be charged with examining our existing code regulations to figure out what we can do to ensure the developments we’re involved with are more energy efficient.

There’s a huge burden for many families who have $500 bills each month, and there are things we can do in developing the houses that can reduce those costs over the long-term.

The other thing that I’m excited about is trying to make our purchasing decisions based on the total life of a product as opposed to just the cost. If we can make those changes, I think we’ll be a lot better off.

How do you plan on involving the private sector?

We’re going to dispel some of the myths surrounding green buildings and how much it’s going to cost based on some of those incentives.

One of the sections in the plan is to green our economy, so we’re looking at trying to recruit green businesses and bring [green] conferences to Memphis. We want our workforce to take advantage of what we think will be the 21st-century jobs movement. We think that green jobs are the future, and we want to make sure our community is equipped to take advantage of that.

Although most businesses in the Broad Avenue Arts District are undergoing something of a renaissance, Odessa, a gallery known for its support of young artists, is in danger of closing.

Odessa, located at 2613 Broad, is struggling to pay the bills, and they’re asking for donations to help sustain the gallery through the end of the summer.

Donations can be made online to the “Help Save Odessa” campaign at indiegogo.com/Odessa. The fund-raising campaign will last until mid-June. At press time, Odessa has raised just over half of its $3,000 goal.

“Broad marks the newest arts district in the city,” said David Brown, president of the Historic Broad Business Association and owner of Splash Creative Ink on Sam Cooper.

Brown said Odessa is one of the few creative outlets where Memphis’ emerging artists can display their work in a gallery setting, and it plays a vital role in the Broad Avenue community.

“We knew firsthand the need for such an open and non-discriminative space in Memphis,” said Ashle Bailey, a recent Memphis College of Art graduate and co-owner of Odessa. “We wanted to move away from the mainstream establishments [in Memphis] that had become so institutionalized.”

Since opening its doors in 2008, and after undergoing a management change last year, Odessa has moved toward “securing a venue where ambitious art can thrive,” said Bailey, who helped shift the space from a party and concert venue to more of a dedicated gallery space.

“We recognize the unmet need in Memphis to broadly support the creative endeavors of a nascent, but potentially powerful, emerging artist community,” Bailey said. “[Odessa] guarantees a home for experimental and ambitious creative expression in Memphis that quite literally has nowhere else to go in our city. … We exist to support artists in Memphis.”

With that goal in mind, Bailey and co-owner Adam Gilreath, have been careful to keep the cost of renting gallery space affordable. The gallery has averaged roughly three shows a month since opening, which, with the rental fee at $100, has left Odessa in need of additional revenue.

The Historic Broad Business Association has been able to help mitigate Odessa’s financial troubles in the past by helping them to get grants for non-profit arts groups.

More recently, the association has helped spread the word about the current “Help Save Odessa” campaign. But the gallery is still falling short.

With the right amount of local support, Bailey said, “Odessa has the vision and ability to play a significant role in shaping the future of Memphis’ arts community.”

Some plans include increasing the number of artists shown and extending their exhibition time. Odessa would also like to decrease, or even eliminate, artists’ rental fees. Additionally, Bailey hopes to partner with public schools and nonprofit organizations to provide free gallery exhibition opportunities to an even younger generation of emerging Memphis artists.