Austin360 blogs > Out & About > Archives > 2010 > December
December 2010
Austin Toros at Cedar Park Center
The first thing this newcomer to the Cedar Park Center noticed, more than a year after its opening, is the roof. It’s comparatively low. Inside, the suburban arena northwest of Austin feels half as tall as the Erwin Center at the University of Texas. Imagine, if you will, the UT arena without the upper sections.
The smaller volume creates a more intimate sports experience, and I imagine even more so for concerts and special events. At the same time, the lower seating capacity also decreases the potential intensity of fans screaming in unison (capacity at Cedar Park is 6,800 for sports games and 8,500 for concerts and special events, according to its ticketing website).
A guest of Toros management — I attended games when the team played at the Austin Convention Center — I was escorted to court-side seats. My shoes rested on the boards. This altered my perspective enormously. The players seemed taller. The ball flew faster. The awesome talent — and flaws — of the team were magnified far greater than I had ever experienced at the Erwin Center, where I never sat remotely that close!
I noticed almost right away the relaxed body language of the spectators around the court. This could be attributed to the lower emotional investment for a minor-league team in a city brimming with sports franchises. Yet fans paid fairly close attention throughout this game, even when the Toros fell behind Tulsa 66ers by more than 20 points. This almost never happens at Dell Diamond, where it seems a full third of the attendees watch not an inning of the Express games.
The family sitting to my right were from Pflugerville. This was their first Toros game in Cedar Park as well. They were guests of the management, too, because the dad worked for a bank that leases a suite at the center. These shallow upper boxes — not glassed in — stood mostly empty for this particular game.
The Pflugerville family neatly matched the demographics of the big crowd (I’d guess 5,000). Virtually no spectator fit into the 18 to 30 age bracket, which naturally fills a third of the seats at the Erwin Center. Instead, it was parents and kids, in far more ethnic variety than at UT, which, for whatever reasons, continues to attract a overwhelmingly white following.
Online TV host D-Train emceed the novelty games during the breaks. The Capital City Dancers kicked up spangly jazz moves. The sale and consumption of beer takes up a lot of energy at Cedar Park, but it didn’t fuel the kind of bad behavior one sometimes encounters at major-league arenas.
At half-time, I talked to more fans, as well as to employees of the Toros and the center. They reported that attendance is up 50 percent after the move from the Convention Center, which is unsurprising, given the oddly diffuse experience of watching basketball in a big, raw box, as was the case in downtown Austin. Cedar Park is far superior for the Toros.
You may have noticed that I give no names. That’s because no names were given. Or my conversation mates, whose names I gleaned, asked not to be identified. I can understand corporate employees following protocol that leads a reporter to an official spokesman, but it never ceases to amaze me that, when I visit the suburbs, ordinary people clam up. No names. No pictures.
I’m sympathetic. They live away from Austin’s social swirl in part to secure privacy. I always respect their wishes, unless there’s a compelling news rationale, and, of course, there was not on Thursday night.
Leaving the horizontally spacious center — the lobbies form, not a doughnut, as at the Erwin Center, but a kind of wide horseshoe to allow for a large entryway from the support areas to the arena floor — I had time to consider the parking. There seems to be plenty of it, although I can imagine traffic might be tricky entering and leaving the grounds on one of those concert nights. (From the south, the center is reached via a U-turn from the 183A toll road extension.)
As I discussed with Pflugerville Father, the center is really not that far from downtown Austin. If one leaves town after rush hour, the trip is less than 30 minutes, door to door. I can’t imagine, though, trying MoPac and 183 north before 7 p.m. on a weeknight.
I flinched a bit at the $10 parking fee. I know that’s paltry compared to what one might pay at Jerry World, but still, it stings because there’s virtually no alternative. Nobody is walking here. Would have been cool to take Metro Rail there, but I don’t think there’s a Cedar Park stop. There are no nearby hotels, offices, restaurants or shopping districts — yet — as one often finds around sports arenas. But they may come with time.
The main thing: The Toros have a fine, new home, which they share with the amazing Texas Stars hockey team (it went to the finals its first season). Sometimes, the teams play on the same days, which must give the center staff a workout.
I expect to return to the center for a Stars game this season.
Jesse Drohen photo on Flickr
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Susan Bright, 1945-2010
Longtime Austin activist, publisher and feminist poet Susan Bright — author of almost 20 collections of poetry — died early Wednesday after a short battle with cancer.
A good deal of her energy was devoted to the battle to protect Barton Springs, where she swam.
“Susan was the oracle of Barton Springs,” said environmental activist Bill Bunch. “She knew the springs like no one else. Her poetry will guide community efforts to save the springs for decades to come.”
Since the 1970s, Bright participated in activist causes for women, peace and the environment. She helped organize festivals, workshops and conferences, including the Women’s Way Festival.
In 1990, Bright received the Woman of the Year Award in 1990 from the Austin Women’s Political Caucus. She was a member of the Women in Black movement, a group that gathered weekly at the south gate of the Capitol after 9/11, calling for peace.
“Ours is not an organization,” Bright told an American-Statesman reporter. “It does not have a doctrine. Women in Black is merely an idea. We just want wars to stop.”
She later helped the Coalition For Visible Ballots and the National Voter Integrity Project, groups that advocated honest voting and discouraged electronic voting.
As part of the Barton Springs struggle, Bright sometimes recited her work Austin City Council meetings. During the recent tug of war over which trees to save at the park, Bright dubbed one near the Philosopher’s Rock at the spring’s entrance “Poet’s Tree.”
“It’s a tragedy,” said Shudde Fath, who served on the Save Barton Creek Association board with Bright. “I didn’t know she was ill until the night before last. She was a wonderful, intellectual, smart woman.
Bright is survived by a husband, John Andrews, with whom she shared an annual booth at the Armadillo Christmas Bazaar, and a grown son, Daryl Bright.
Friends plan to honor Bright during the traditional Polar Bear Splash at Barton Springs on New Year’s Day.
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Three dots: Drew Barrymore, Scarlett Johansson, Justin Long, Billy Gibbons, Jim Franklin and more out on the town
The return of the 3-dot format for some select social items:
Sometime Austinite Drew Barrymore and frequent visitor Scarlett Johansson were spotted at Manuel’s and on South Congress Avenue this week. They are also expected at the New Year’s Eve celebration at the Seaholm Power Plant, scene of last year’s smash NYE party. The frequent sightings only feed the raging rumor that Barrymore and boyfriend Justin Long have purchased houses here. …
Red hot spot: Hopdoddy hamburger and beer joint on South Congress Ave., where co-owner Larry Perdido (Moonshine) was working the full room last week. Despite the wait at the rear counter, folks were noisily digging into the large burgers and bowl-sized goblets of local draft beer. Right concept, right spot. …
Also hot: Bouldin Creek Coffeehouse on South First Street — bigger, brighter, new location, but still packed midday last week. Table service replaces most counter orders at this extremely laid-back spot. The service is shared, so either everybody is waiting on you, or nobody. Unsettling. Met former music manager Ihor Gowda there for snacks and nonprofit chat. Next table: Poet Carrie Fountain and playwright hubbie Kirk Lynn. They were splitting up household chores like a party game. …
Getting hot: Taking some of the overflow from the W Austin Hotel & Residences, whose lounges fill quickly on party nights, is spanking new Hangar. It’s located directly across Colorado Street from Lance Armstrong’s Six, matching the other lounge’s mass and three-level allure. Dick Clark’s firm designed it with a retro airport theme; high-tech security guru and highly eligible bachelor Joe Ross is one of the investors. Prediction: The must-be-seen tribe will flock here this mild winter.
Allison F. photo from Yelp
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Farewell, Robert “Bobby” McCurdy
Today we say farewell to Robert McCurdy.
Dec. 19, the co-founder of the Austin Film Critics Association — and one of half of “Cole and Bobby at the Movies” — died while training to become a U.S. Navy pilot in Corpus Christi. His death is being investigated.
The buddies had grown to love movies while attending Bowie High School — inspired by their singular teacher James Ellerbrock — and they later housed together at Tejas, the University of Texas leadership fraternity.
McCurdy and Dabney started blogging about film while in their teens and quickly made a name for themselves in critical circles and, eventually, on the national scene. One year, they tried to see every single movie released in Austin.
Visiting dignitaries, they dazzled my entertainment journalism class at St. Edward’s University with their rapid-fire, entrepreneurial approach to reporting and criticism — surely the future of the field.
From what I witnessed, McCurdy, 23, was all you’d want in a best friend — steady and scampy, funny and wise, loyal and forgiving. There was never any question that he’d succeed in his one true goal: Flying for the U.S. Navy.
At an affecting memorial earlier today, I learned much more about him: As historian, student leader, ace pilot, friend and family member. Dabney, Ellerbrock and Bobby’s father spoke, along with his Navy commander, a chaplain and a childhood friend. The ceremony at the overflowing funeral home on North Lamar Boulevard ended with full military funeral honors.
His loss must be devastating for his Austin family. I know it is for Cole.
Head high, my friend, head high. Bobby would want that.
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Injustice foe JoAnn McKenzie
By the first grade, JoAnn McKenzie had denied St. Nick.
“There is no Santa Claus,” McKenzie, an Austin financial planner, told her aunt while living briefly in Lock Haven, Penn. “The kids who live in a house with a dirt floor got nothing for Christmas!”
McKenzie experienced social disjuncture at a very early age. Her mother died four days after her birth in San Antonio. McKenzie was raised by an aunt, Lorena McKenzie, nicknamed “Bootie” for the cowboy boots she wore in youth. A single parent, the elder McKenzie had served in the Women’s Army Corps and worked for Speaker of the House and Vice President John Nance Garner before joining her brother’s pipeline construction company and, ultimately, the Lower Colorado River Authority.
“I grew up different from everybody around me,” McKenzie says. “There were no single-parent households where I lived.”
That place was the LCRA company town of Buchanan Dam, named after the concrete embankment of the uppermost Highland Lake. Her father’s sister and her husband, Virginia and Carl McDonald, ran a gas station and general store there. (It’s now operated by their daughter, Jeannette McDonald Babin, as Hesitation Station, selling Texana.)
The McDonalds raised horses and hogs on Lake Buchanan, so McKenzie — who now wears crisp, subdued outfits — grew up playing with the dogs or goats, riding horses or shooting rats in the barn. Summer friends, many from rice-growing country downstream, took her skiing on their boats when they were not swimming. She was allowed to attend Camp Longhorn, founded by Julian “Tex” Robertson near Inks Lake, because her uncle provided the horses.
“I spent dawn to dusk outdoors,” she says of life in the rural tourist magnet.
On cool nights, she’d sit on a curb listening to George Jones, Bob Wills, Willie Nelson or Ernest Tubb playing at the Lakeview Inn.
Observing life in tiny Buchanan Dam, especially what transpired in her relatives’ store, further exposed her to economic inequality. “It was the water I swam in,” she says. “I knew who had extra, who needed something. There was not a lot of money in the area, but a lot of community and civic engagement. It was always about helping everybody, meeting everyone’s needs as a community.”
She witnessed racial divisions in Burnet, where she attended school, but also saw how those divisions could be bridged.
“I don’t recall any community upset when the black high school was closed and the other integrated,” she says.
More scarring was the drama of a woman run out of town because people suspected she was lesbian.
“But people didn’t talk openly about sexuality back then,” she says.
Like others her age, McKenzie has discovered that today’s youngest generation is unaware how recently racial and sexual inequality were all-encompassing facts of life. Not long ago, a grandson needed to talk to someone who had suffered a social injustice for a school project. She contacted Cloteal Haynes, a pioneer among black female students in the University of Texas music program.
Haynes shared stories of growing up in an all-black neighborhood, attending all-black schools, knowing where she couldn’t go and what she couldn’t do safely because of being black.
“He was so appalled and totally dismayed when he heard stories of prejudice,” McKenzie says. “He was aware of the history of prejudice because he was studying it, but his shock and horror were obvious when Cloteal shared her personal stories.”
Married to Jerry Prichard, McKenzie, who lives in Northwest Hills, has three children from a previous marriage: a son, 44, married with three boys; another son, 32, married two years; and a daughter, 33. Discussions about inequality continue in the extended family.
When she learned of the Human Rights Campaign award, McKenzie was upset that another recipient would be the Anti-Defamation League, which, nationally, had honored Rupert Murdoch.
“My thinking is that Fox News is the biggest hatemonger on the planet,” she says.
Yet local ADL leaders explained that Murdoch has, personally and persuasively, taken a stand against the anti-Semitism now raging in Europe.
McKenzie’s Equality Award recognizes her work with the Atticus Circle, a ground-breaking Austin group founded by Anne S. Wynn, which lobbies the Legislature and educates straight communities about how the legal system works against their gay neighbors. (Its awards luncheon is Jan. 27 at the Renaissance Austin Hotel.)
“For fair-minded straights, many of us don’t know about the insidious inequality and the horrible impact it has on the families of LGBT partners,” she says. “When we find out, it is, as Anne would say, a ‘duh’ moment.”
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The amazing Mary Ann Rankin
In case you missed the front-page profile of Mary Ann Rankin, dean of the University of Texas College of Natural Sciences, in Sunday’s newspaper, here’s a tease. Link here for full story.
Almost outside the peripheral vision of the speakers, the dean strides to the window. She nimbly flips open the wooden slats of the blinds. At a meeting about sustainability programs, Mary Ann Rankin, dean of the University of Texas’ second-largest college, lets in the light. With the same gesture, she also silently, subtly signals that it is time to change the subject.
The circular arguments and buzz words that sometimes make university meetings feel like jogging with a nail in one’s shoe are, to some extent, unavoidable.
“Rankin has the ability to deal comfortably with all the players important to a great research university,” said Larry Gilbert, director of UT’s once-endangered Brackenridge Field Laboratory , which Rankin championed before top administrators and the UT System Board of Regents. “She is a kind person, but when the going gets tough on key issues, she can be hardheaded and is willing to go all in and risk her job.”
Times are tough now, given mandatory cuts for state-supported universities. Yet Rankin, 65, has helped raise more than $700 million in charitable donations during her 16-year tenure as dean and manages an annual budget of $250 million.
She’s overseen the construction or renovation of more than a dozen buildings on campus, including the handsome Norman Hackerman Building , set to open in early 2011, and the 140,000-square-foot, interconnected Bill and Melinda Gates Computer Science Complex and Dell Computer Science Hall , for which UT just broke ground.
By any standards, that makes her one of the city’s top fundraisers. Add to that the college’s recent history of scoring research dollars.
“Under her leadership, the College of Natural Sciences has been instrumental in UT attracting more external research funding than any other American university without a medical school, with the exception of MIT,” UT President William Powers Jr. said. “While Mary Ann is a leader nationally in higher education, she (also) finds time to serve the Austin community.”
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Early 2011 Date Saving
As the year ends, it’s time to look ahead to early 2011 dates already reserved by smart party planners.
Jan. 13, Hill Country Ride for AIDS kicks off with a party at the Austin Music Hall.
The Atticus Circle Luncheon with country artist Chely Wright follows Jan. 27 at the Renaissance Austin Hotel.
Going head to head on Jan. 29 are the Gala Lumière at the Blanton Museum of Art and the Dell Children’s Medical Center Foundation of Central Texas gala at the Austin Convention Center.
Also that night, consider the Austin Lyric Opera pre-opening dinner for “The Italian Girl in Algiers,” as well as the always lively Merry Martini Mixer for Equality Texas at Sheraton Austin.
An Austin institution — Carnaval Brasileiro — sambas across the Palmer Event Center floors Feb. 5. The same night, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? spreads out to many private homes, benefiting Project Transitions.
The Philanthropy Day Breakfast, which recognizes charity heroes, is Feb. 10 at the Hyatt Regency.
Feb. 11, the Boots, Bells & Hearts Gala for Mental Health America of Texas kicks in at the Four Seasons Hotel.
On Feb. 12, the Human Rights Campaign recognizes crusaders for equality at the Four Seasons Hotel, while the sprawling Rodeo Austin Gala returns to the Palmer Events Center.
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Holiday tidings
Since many readers will stay close to intimates this week, your obedient social columnist offers a few tips for surviving the family holidays.
No drama: One way to avoid stress is to forbid drama. The holidays are not a good time to bring off a shortbread intervention on your diabetic cousin. Yes, certain relatives live for operatic moments. You are not required to participate.
Modulate: Eating, drinking, spending and cavorting are all pleasant in moderation. Indeed, something deep in our mammalian brains pushes us to actually feast on “feast days.” (Fear of future scarcity, I suppose.) Regret almost always follows.
If by car, stay: The roads and highways can be treacherous. Once you have arrived at your destination, hunker down. Luckily, most Central Texas byways are not slicked with ice or snow this time of year. Doesn’t matter. Avoid the drivers.
If on foot, go: Unlike car travel, pedestrian life is invigorated by the holidays. If you are fortunate enough to spend long winter nights in a walkable place, say downtown Austin, head out for entertainment or other means of celebration. Still, avoid the drivers.
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Stork Club Holiday Party at an Old Green Park home
Over. The. Top.
Kory Wilson acts as a doorman with hostess Carla McDonald
Carla and Jack McDonald, already solid-gold hosts, threw a holiday party that people will be talking about for years. They decked out their Old Green Park house like the swank Stork Club, the nightclub that ruled New York City society with class and style from 1929 to 1965.
That’s Austin’s Nancy Scanlan, second from the left, at the Stork Club in the late 1950s!
One room gathered table-clothed cabaret tables around a perky jazz band. Other rooms were laid out with savory or sweet snacks. An army of helpers held the door, made designer hot chocolate, passed out candy cigarettes or served special Stork Club cocktails.
Nancy Scanlan (now) and Nina Seely (in all-vintage wear)
This was the second night in a row that I relished the rejuvenated wonders of Leslie Moore’s Word of Mouth Catering. Once Austin’s buzziest caterers, they are back on game in a big way.
Dapper Eric and Maria Groten
Men arrived in tuxes or dark suits. Women, free to improvise, wore vintage gowns almost exclusively. Some were adorned with vintage furs, which I suppose are less likely to arouse the ire of animal activists. They looked dreamy.
Turk Pipkin and good-sport Shawna Fletcher
None dreamier than our hostess, Carla. Some readers are probably tired of the hosannas sung about this wife, mother, businesswoman, activist, writer and humanitarian. They are out of luck: I don’t know how she does it — and still looks like a million bucks night after night.
Piet (pronounced Pete) and Cindy Vanhoutte, who told me about their Flemish-language wedding in Bruges, Belgium several years ago
I also spent time with Lindsey Love, who shares the society beat at the Houston Chronicle with Douglas Britt. She was skipping three Houston parties for the McDonalds’ Stork Club soiree. Good bet.
Kevin Lalande, Christie Horne-Lalande and Joe Liemandt
Personally, I felt a bit tired from the holiday social grind. Carla took me aside to ask if I was OK — in so many words. (Kind, too.) I chugged hot chocolates to keep awake, but still left well before the party’s final goodbyes, timed well past midnight (according to my spies).
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Harlem Nights for Austin Chapter of Links
Talk about historical glamour! The Harlem Nights party for the Austin Chapter of Links lit up the Renaissance Austin Hotel on Saturday with style and panache. (Nice touch that the Harlem Renaissance was remembered in the Renaissance Austin.)
Angela and Dexter Henderson
Links, Inc., the African American answer to the Junior League back when that organization was segregated, counts two local chapters, the other named for Town Lake. The older Austin iteration celebrated its 50th anniversary at the Harlem-themed event.
Gisselle Little and Sandra Little
As soon as I entered the atrium lobby, I encountered familiar socializers such as state Rep. Dawnna Dukes and Sherry Ransom, executive director of Leadership Enrichment Arts Program. They and others were dressed to the nines, some in vintage garb that recalled Harlem in the 1920s and ’30s.
Shirley Gordon and Sandra Talbot
For whatever reason, this event always falls on a night stacked with multiple competing social events. So it is with chagrin that to each query: “Are you staying for the dancing?” — I replied “sadly, no.” Some day. Soon.
Dominique and Corey Smith
A joyous New Year’s resolution? How about dancing at every event where dancing is allowed?
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Holiday Party at a Tarrytown Home
Civic activist and arts backer Anne Elizabeth Wynn and filmmaker Joaquin Avellán kindly invited us to their holiday open house in Tarrytown. It was an open-hearted family affair, with kids making smores over a fire and adults bouncing between the pizza slices and sweet treats.
Sarah Bird and George Jones
Many of the same socializers who attended the holiday party earlier that Friday evening at the Law Office of Becky Beaver also dropped by Wynn’s airy, art-bedecked house. I met two fascinating young people, recently arrived from Venezuela: Lope Gutierrez Ruiz and Michu Benaim Steiner, who have produced a novel art magazine.
Michu Benaim Steiner and Lope Gutiérrez-Ruiz
Perhaps we should pause here to remark on the increased number of Latin Americans who have moved to Austin recently. This is in addition to the migratory patterns of mostly Central Americans and Mexicans who have made up the bulk of immigrants during the past decades, and have been the focus of most public discussions on the issue. These newer arrivals come from educated, entrepreneurial sectors across Latin American society, including Mexico, especially Monterrey, contributing yet another layer to our creative class.
Rosa Rivera, Juan Miró and Nancy Scanlan
On other topics, I was interested to discover that Ihor Gowda has left behind music management and aims to dive into the nonprofit sector. Also that Wynn and family have invented a collapsible Christmas trees with clear rings to support ornaments and gifts as if on circular shelves. Neat.
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Holiday Party at Law Office of Becky Beaver
Many Austin offices host holiday parties. Few of them are adorned with so many recognizable guests. Dignitaries from the lands of law, arts, business, charity, fashion, media, food and education showed up at the Law Office of Becky Beaver on Friday. Some 700 of them.
Stephen Moser and Becky Beaver
This made threading one’s way through the chatty crowd an Olympic sport. How could one not stop and trade stories with all these fascinating folks along the way? Or avoid the tempting snacks and drinks, located at handy stations?
Terrence Ortiz and MD Trotter
And what to say about Becky Beaver, the person? Quite aside from her reputation as a fearless family lawyer — I’m sure other adjectives are used by her opponents — Beaver is among the Top 10 most active socializers in Austin, especially on the charity circuit. She’s also an inveterate collector of local art.
Joyce Christian and Ruth Gardner Lowe
She looked dazzling in gold (pictured here with La Moser), receiving guests and bidding them farewell by the office Christmas tree. I may have talked to three dozen people and bid a “happy holiday” to scores of others, but I would have traded all that to hear Beaver’s asides as she greeted each newcomer.
Her wit turns pretty tart, you know, though hardly ever mean.
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The Impact of One Woman: Rebecca Powers
Her eyes red with grief, Rebecca Powers picked up a People magazine to distract herself during a flight between Sacramento, Calif. and Austin.
What could take her mind off a final visit to her beloved brother, Peter Hancock, who, in 2003, was dying from cancer?
An article in the celebrity magazine told of a Cincinnati woman who was raising serious money for charity by convincing others to donate $1,000 each a year.
“I never imagined that for $1,000, I could make a difference in my community,” Powers says seven years alter, as she plans to hand over day-to-day management of Impact Austin to an interim CEO.
So far, by combining the gifts of women with fairly modest means, the group has given away $2.6 million to 25 Central Texas nonprofits, collecting from members in 53 ZIP codes.
More than 500 women signed up last year - Impact Austin records an impressive 73 percent renewal rate - and Powers hopes to duplicate those membership numbers by the end of the year.
Powers, whose sun-streaked blonde hair and tanned features attest to hours swimming, boating and reading outdoors, could be mistaken for any other Northwest Austin housewife.
And, in fact, Powers, 56, raised two children, Brad, 23, now working on his masters in accounting at Texas Christian University, and Claire, 20, a junior majoring in civil engineering at George Washington University, with husband, retired Vignette marketer Phil Powers.
The Louisville, Ken. native — called “Becky” — grew up outside Peoria, Ill., where her family’s yard backed onto cornfields. Her father worked in marketing for Caterpillar Inc., the tractor maker; her mother stayed at home. She spent a lot of time outdoors as a girl, devising games with other bored neighborhood kids. She also excelled at school.
“I was a pleaser,” she says. “If I got good grades, I had more freedom to do the things I wanted to do. And I really did enjoy the learning.”
For college, she chose the University of Richmond, in part to escape a conventional life back home in the 1970s, but also to be near her grandmother in Norfolk, Virginia. Her mother requested only one thing of the assiduously polite Midwesterner who inherited residual Southern manners from her parents.
“She asked, ‘Would you change your name back to Rebecca? You want to be a doctor, and Dr. Becky doesn’t sound right.’” Powers remembers with a smile.
Not long after that declaration of geographical independence, her parents hauled a younger brother and sister all the way to Melbourne, Australia, where her father had been transferred.
“By default, I had to make decisions,” she says. “I had more independence sooner than I ever expected.”
Meanwhile, older brother Peter, who had been stationed in San Diego while serving in the U.S. Navy, was turning into a Californian.
“He became laid back, didn’t wear socks,” she says. “He was not a hippie, but very casual. Took life a day at time.”
Ironically, the sister who sought her cultural freedom in Richmond moved back to Peoria after graduation and took a job as a sales representative for IBM. That’s where she met husband Phil. Rebecca continued to work in sales until her second child was born.
The couple moved to Austin in 1994. Restless — and wanting to afford some domestic help - Powers became the self-proclaimed “queen of the Pampered Chef,” selling the company’s kitchen tools from her home.
“I loved being available to kids, but I needed more,” she says. Joining parent organizations and a Bible study group weren’t enough.
“It was only in my little neighborhood,” she says. “My sphere of influence was very small.”
Impact Austin blew open that world. After reading the People article, she convinced the wife of her son’s baseball coach while in the stands at a game.
“I was completely uninformed about nonprofits,” she says. “But it was the right thing to do at the right time. The women I met, we weren’t the usual suspects (in fundraising). But we did have business backgrounds. A lot of freedom to try this because we were an unknown quantity.”
At first, Impact Austin wasn’t taken too seriously.
“That was the biggest gift we got” she says. “We didn’t know what we couldn’t do. But we did it.”
Within six months, Powers had drafted 126 members. The group required written applications from nonprofits, initiated reviews, deferred the winnowing process to committees, then gave each member one vote about who got the money. Along the way, she discovered a mentor in Colleen Willoughby, who started Washington Women’s Foundation and serves as godmother to collective giving movement.
“I’m an evangelist,” she says. “I dare people not to do it.”
Why did it work, asks a reporter trying to keep up with Powers’ torrent of words? After an uncustomary pause, she says: “It worked because it feeds my passion. The women who became members could see of themselves: ‘I matter.’”
Brother Peter, whose memory returns to Powers when she hears certain songs, remains her distant inspiration.
“He sits on my shoulder a lot,” she says. “I kinda feel like he’s my partner. It’s almost as if we are closer in death.”
For years, Impact Austin gave out its checks on Peter’s birthday. To a favored member, she annually conferred a “For Pete’s Sake” award, a bowling pin “because he was such an incredible bowler.”
“Each time, we honor a different character trait in brother,” she says. “It has helped me appreciate my brother more now than when he was alive.”
After she steps down as Impact Austin CEO at the end of January, she’ll stay on as the founder to spread the collective giving word to other cities.
“Now I’m figuring out what the next thing,” she says “If I am open to it, it will happen.”
CORRECTION: In an earlier version of this post, Peter Hancock’s last name was wrong.
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A West Lake Hills Holiday Party
Another party, another skyline. Robert Nash and Paul Simmons give a holiday party each year at their trim, mid-century modern home in West Lake Hills. A prime draw: The vast view of Austin. And every time it appears Austin’s skyline has transmogrified.
Sherry Matthews and Stephen Rice
Nash and Simmons are social connectors. So the guests — along with copious refreshments — are always worth the climb along winding Stratford Drive, Red Bud Trail or West Lake Drive. (Nash and Simmons live very close to the former home of the late super-connector Liz Carpenter.)
Frank Rivera and Gabriel Lewis
The guest list is governed by males, but the age bracket ranges from infants to ancients. I chatted with an artist, a teacher, a writer, a law student, a marketer, a businessman or two, even a small-town mayor.
Elliott Beck, Kelsey Lyon and Jake Lewis
A sprightly jazz trio noodled out melodies, some seasonal. Folks migrated from the slightly chilly balcony to interior nooks, completing the circuit in the kitchen, where lively conversation and laughter reigned. Then they headed back to the view. Always, the majestic view.
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Brad Womack, Sandra Bullock, Jesse James, Dennis Quaid, Kimberly Buffington, Drew Barrymore, Justin Long
Austin celebrities continue to make headlines.
“I can promise you there is a very happy ending,” Womack told reporters. “I did find somebody, I did fall in love.” The reality show returns for a new season on Jan. 3.
Meanwhile, Austinite Sandra Bullock was chosen as Woman of the Year by People magazine, which is apt since virtually all confirmed personal news about the Oscar winner is funneled through that publication.
Online news outlets without Bullock’s endorsement are reporting that she wants to spend Christmas with her ex-husband, Jesse James, bringing together adopted and biological offspring.
Seen at Austin golf courses, clubs and restaurants a good deal lately: Dennis Quaid and his Austin-bred bride, Kimberly Buffington. Quaid is filming “Beneath the Darkness” in Smithville. Perhaps this also means the couple and their twins will finally move here, as Quaid has often predicted.
Another couple who can’t keep away from Austin: Drew Barrymore and boyfriend Justin Long. Can’t confirm that they have purchased real estate here, but at the very least, they should be considered part-time Austinites.
UPDATE: Information about the film Dennis Quaid is filming was added to the original post.
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Deborah Main Designs Soiree + Warehouse District + Armadillo Christmas Bazaar
Pillow designer Deborah Main is not the only businesswoman throwing a holiday party this season. But she may be the only one doing so deep in the Zilker neighborhood. Her smart affair Tuesday stationed pillows, hats, jewelry and art from various designers and artists around the house, making for a domestic version of the Armadillo Christmas Bazaar, even including a mellow musical act.
Griff and Cat & Steitz
The most alluring station for Deborah Main Designs was in Main’s tub, where she plumped up some discount headrests ($50). At that price, count me in! Ran into various fixtures on the fashion scene, but also Rebecca Powers, who, by coincidence, I was slated to interview for the column the following day. We had never formally met, so it was a pleasant shock to witness her testimony on Impact Austin, the giving circle she founded. I broke custom and bid on a silent auction item — a book about signature Texas homes.
Laura Del Villaggio and Deborah Main
Following the party on Tuesday, companion-for-the-evening Ian Carrico and I decided to hit the Warehouse District. We stopped for a drink at the W Austin Hotel & Residences, my third visit to this chic new social magnet. For the first time, it was pretty quiet and there was no problem securing a couch.
Rebecca Powers and Becky Griner
We then headed to Hangar, the new club at Fourth and Colorado streets designed by Dick Clark’s group. Shelved on three levels, it somewhat matches the club Six across the street. (And from what I hear, shares some investors in the Lance Armstrong circle.) The retro-cool airport theme led to some couches that too closely resemble those in waiting areas, but overall, it is impressively jet-setty. Our final visit was to Rain on West Fourth Street, the gay bar which recently added tall, black leather banquettes to its front lounge. Good addition.
Bruce Willenzik and Annie Harding
The following night, I had several social options, but was stuck responding to some technical glitches in the newsroom. So when the next column was put to bed, I strolled over to the Palmer Events Center for the Armadillo Christmas Bazaar. This is the right home for the decades-old art-and-crafts gift fair. There’s more room for musicians and their fans, as well as for exhibitors.
Almost immediately, I ran into Austin Film Festival wrangler Barbara Morgan and her daughter. Morgan endorsed the bazaar’s combination of veteran artists and newcomers. I agreed. I was far more tempted to make purchases than at any time in the past. Congratulated Bruce Willenzik and Annie Harding, who are stepping down from the leadership of the bazaar, then bought some seasonal cards from Pro-Jex’s Neil Coleman and his booth partner, Tim Taylor; together they run a thriving photo biz called Historical Image Reproduction.
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Zach Theatre’s Holiday Party
It doesn’t matter where Zach Theatre goes, a party follows. The company’s holiday affair took place Monday at Spring Condominiums. Guests whirled around the model units on the 25th floor, trying on six spatial arrangements for size.
Bill Jones and Anton Nel
We ran into many a Zach friend, but also two surprise guests: Dennis Karbach and Robert Brown. These two scamps, once so vital to Austin arts and business, had scurried away to homes in San Francisco and San Antonio. Missing Our Town, now they’ve taken a one-bedroom unit in Spring. Welcome back, boys!
Blair Hurry and Liz Litsinger
After much chit-chat, the guests assembled in the largest condo to hear speeches about the theater and plans to break ground on a new building early next year.
Elizabeth Giddens and Roderick Sanford
Artistic director Dave Steakley said he’d found an old gasoline advertisement featuring a kangaroo. “Put hop in your tank,” it read, says Steakley, before borrowing the expression to assess the theater’s momentum. “Zach’s got hop.”
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Ron King Salon Fashion Extravaganza
As if we needed any fresh evidence that Austin’s fashion scene is evolving rapidly, witness the weekend of celebrations wrapped around the opening of the Ron King Salon in the Four Seasons Residences.
Aleksandra Vidacic and Jasenka Stegic
In collaboration with his New York contacts, King pulled off event after event, culminating in a mobbed runway show that some reported was among Austin’s finest in years.
Carey Ayers, Cody Kinsfather and Kevin Haley
I attended the pre-show reception only. But I caught a glimpse of the 500 or so guests who waited breathlessly outside the Four Seasons Hotel’s main banquet room. (A few others cooled their heels in a confusing VIP lounge. Actually, not the only confused or confusing thing about the evening.)
Melia Millanti and Katrina Beaty
Many in the crowd were models — or would-be models — or members of the fashion press. A few looked like they could afford haut couture.
Ted and Heilla Lain
Yet Austin’s fashion scene isn’t really about money. Yet. It’s more about creativity and openness to new experiences.
Lance Avery Morgan, Rhonda Lee and Rob Giardinelli
And that’s why it’s the hottest slice of Austin’s social scene right now.
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Rusty Spurs closes its doors
Rusty Spurs, once the hope of a fresh gay district on East Seventh Street, has closed its doors indefinitely.
“The new investors for the club could not come to an agreement with the original owners, so they just shut the whole thing down,” said Rob Faubion, fundraiser and blogger who had planned the “Jingle Bell Jubilee” event there for Friday to benefit the Wright House Wellness Center.
The news comes as other gay and lesbian bars outside the crowded Warehouse District have closed or face extinction.
The city’s only lesbian-centric bar, located at 113 San Jacinto Blvd., locked its doors after a short run earlier this year. Yet another, Lipstick 24, recently opened up at 606 East Seventh St.
The building that houses the decades-old Charlie’s Austin — on Lavaca Street near the Capitol — was for sale for months. The business itself, however, was not for sale.
The Chain Drive sits on land slated for Waller Creek redevelopment, although there are no immediate plans to build the 21C Museum Residences and Hotel at that site (a project not give much hope by downtown watchers).
A Facebook page for the Iron Bear, slated to replace Amsterdam on West Eighth Street, reads that it is “Coming Soon!”
What else is out there? Rain, Oilcan Harry’s and Kiss & Fly in the Warehouse District and the ‘Bout Time neighborhood bar in far north Austin. Other bars feature gay nights.
UPDATES: Information on the Lipstick 24 and the Iron Bear were added to the previous post.
CLARIFICATION: A previous post said Charlie’s Austin was for sale. The building was for sale, not the business.
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Shhh! Ross Smith may have been spying on you, politicians
Like so many Austinites, Ross Smith has sported many hats: musician, historian, researcher, nuclear strategist, fish monger, political spy.
Wait, spy, did you say?
Before he was outed by the Dallas Morning News in 1994, Smith says he produced opposition research for presidential candidate Walter Mondale, the Democratic National Committee, Ann Richards and state Attorney General Dan Morales.
“The vast majority of the time, people in public life are who they say they are,” Smith says. “They paid their taxes on time (or if not it was an honest mistake), have no shady sources of income, never had any trouble with the law, served in the military when they claimed to, are decent to their wife and kids and dog, etc. When something fishy does turn up, most often it’s found in the course of checking all the usual sources in a standard background check.”
Dressed in Jack Abramoff-style fedora and scarf — without the convicted former lobbyist’s stern, G-man stare — Smith talks with delicate care about his past.
He was born on the Texas side of the state line in Texarkana (“My Mom made sure of that”). His father was a rising music professor, his mother a librarian and social worker; both passed away in 2004.
During his youth, Smith, whose boyish features glint beneath red hair going white, moved to Indiana, Tennessee, Wisconsin and Minnesota. He attended choral mecca St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minn., with notions of following his father into music.
Although he still sings with the St. David’s Episcopal Church choir and arranges choral music, he veered into American and European historical studies, specializing in international relations and foreign policy. He earned his master’s degree from American University in Washington.
His thesis, “The Strategic Implications of a Space-Based Missile Defense System,” made him an instant expert on President Ronald Reagan’s proposed, laser-based, so-called “Star Wars” program. Ross determined it was “technologically unworkable.”
“Scientists proved that the basic geometry of proposed lasers was faulty,” he says. “The numbers were incredible.”
From an early age, he also nursed an interest in politics, interning for Speaker of the U.S. House Jim Wright.
“Dad was a Teddy Roosevelt Republican. Mom was a Franklin Roosevelt Democrat,” he says. He leaned to his mother’s inclinations. “She was quite clear about how power works and who needed the most help.”
According to Smith, some of his most sensational research involved former state Sen. J.E. ‘Buster’ Brown, then a Republican candidate for state attorney general. Brown’s complicated case included debts to a prominent Houston lawyer, a topless bar called Caligula XXI, and conflicts with campaign disclosure laws, all duly reported in the Houston Chronicle and elsewhere.
“It requires a very strict attention to detail and accuracy,” Smith says of political spying. “If you aren’t 110 percent sure about your facts and sources, it can’t be used.”
Smith’s rather nondescript features actually helped him on the job.
“Nobody notices gray little men — John le Carré’s phrase — or the college student in jeans and a T-shirt who seems pretty clueless about the term paper he’s researching,” he says.
“Or the guy in slacks and a golf shirt who looks just like a dozen other real estate agents who drove through the neighborhood in the past few weeks (even when you are actually there checking to see if your opponent is a slumlord). For me, being successful at my job depended on staying completely anonymous and blending in wherever I went.”
Opposition research has changed since Smith quit the field, as social media and confessional theater have changed the way the pubic processes the information.
“Things that I would have turned up as dark secrets are now showing up on Jerry Springer and Oprah every day,” Smith jokes.
Does he have any regrets for his years in the political shadows?
“It gave me a healthy reticence,” he says. “I’m never going to run for office because I know how dirty it can be.”
He is proud of his years of above-ground work for Morales, researching environmental policy, gangs, victim compensation, colonias, administrative law and more.
“I was expected to become an instant expert in everything,” he says.
Managing his parents’ estate and acting as unofficial godfather to his younger relatives, the single Smith also struck out into the business world with San Miguel Seafood, a collaboration with Roberto San Miguel that specializes in providing super-fresh fish to chefs and home cooks.
Long conversations with Smith wear down his sometimes wound-up rhythms of speech.
“A friend once said that my sense of humor was three degrees off from the rest of the world,” he says. “Having a different view of the world helps when you are trying to show people a new way of seeing or when you are trying to find things others are trying to hide.”
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Grand Opening Soiree for McGarrah Jessee
It operates as an office for an advertising agency. Yet it doubles as a vividly chic social space. And the sleek, high International Style main room was “Mad Men” before the fictional ad men in “Mad Men” came along.
The digs for McGarrah Jessee — launched with a party on Friday — are in the old Starr Building. You know, the mid-century gem that served as broken-down offices for the Texas Comptroller’s office, then sat empty for years at 121 W. Sixth St.
Kristin Freeman and Jeremy Adam
Oh yes, Heather McKinney’s firm did a superb job opening up the space a bit, reviving the escalator, marble and exquisite abstract Seymour Fogel mural, also creating unique pieces from recycled building materials. (Only the mahogany panels seemed unfinished.) This is the way to treat Austin’s modern past. Original architect and National Medal of the Arts winner Florence Knoll would be proud.
Melinda Perez, John Price and Jessica Price
Back to the party … creative types swarmed the central space, with substantial bites provided personally by chef Lou Lambert. There was much discussion of the grand offices that takes up two floors that formerly served as a bank.
Meg Moody and Derek Bishop
Once retail goes into the ground floor, the McGarrah Jessee spot will provide a crucial social link between East and West Sixth Street.
So much happening at once downtown: Austonian, Four Seasons Residences, W Austin Hotel & Residences, Hangar club. Who said these were bad times?
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Denise Prince Party at W Austin Hotel & Residences
I came for the art. I stayed for the party. Denise Prince invited me to view framed photographs of Austinites that hang in the lobby of the newly opened W Austin Hotel & Residences. I never found her in the masses, but ran into about a million acquaintances anyway.
Veronica Koltuniak and Matt Hovis
As predicted, the W has instantly achieved cynosure for Austin’s cafe society. The three-part lounge and two-part restaurant — plus the lobby, which serves spillover traffic — were draped with guests swirling cocktails and scanning the winter-attired crowd for familiar faces.
Cheray Ashwill and Julia Smith
The project’s developer, Beau Armstrong, and its design architect, Arthur Andersson, surveyed their domain. Connoisseur Anne Elizabeth Wynn, snuggling in the red room with filmmaker Joaquin Avellan, pronounced the place perfect.
Social all-stars Mary and Rusty Tally dallied by one of the fireplaces. (Mary has more insight into Austin’s social scene than the next 100 power players.) On his smart phone, artist Berthold Haas showed me his sons’ recent, unbridled performance at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art.
Joaquin Avellan and Anne Elizabeth Wynn
Architect Sinclair Black dropped by to examine the results. Writer Julia Smith and social connector Veronica Koltuniak introduced me to some fascinating folks. (Smith also reported that the Bat Cave benefit that I missed at her and Evan Smith’s Tarrytown house had been packed. Good to hear.) Filmmaker Matt Hovis discussed the aura of the evening. And that’s just the start …
Two tiny notes: Prince’s prints of staged scenes are not sufficiently lighted. And the service on the second day was not yet up to snuff. Easy to forgive.
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Heritage Society Preservation Awards at the Driskill Hotel
I hold no nonprofit in higher esteem than the Heritage Society of Austin. While other cities have bulldozed their irreplaceable pasts, making room for manifestly temporary architecture — I wince when I think of what has happened to Houston, my childhood hometown — Austin tends to keep what’s best and improves the rest.
Ken Stein and Council Member Chris Riley
Not universally, mind you, but more often than not. And even the black eye the preservation community recently received for endorsing dubious historic status for high-end, tax-advantaged homes could not dim the luster of the 50th annual Preservation Awards ceremony at the stately Driskill Hotel on Friday.
The keynote speaker was Kennedy Lawson Smith of the Community Land Use and Economics Group. Smith’s amusing slide show about the death and rebirth of American downtowns didn’t present any groundbreaking news, but she urged some pretty tough strategies for fighting suburban sprawl and, especially, our overbuilt retail sector, including changing depreciation laws — which encourage junk buildings — and forging regional partnerships.
Kathy and Greg Phillips
(Can you imagine Austin and Round Rock cooperating like Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minn., which share sales taxes, obviating inevitable competition over retail incentives. Anyone stuck in traffic on Interstate 35, Research Boulevard or MoPac should curse the lack of regional planning in Central Texas.)
School teacher Sally Hunter won the society’s Merit Award for Public Service for developing a curriculum around the Governor’s Mansion. Council Member Laura Morrison took the other Public Service award, not only for championing Capitol View Corridors, local historic districts, etc., but also supporting the crucial Austin Historical Survey Web Tool. I don’t always agree with Morrison’s inflexibility on neighborhood issues, still I admire her commitment to Old Austin’s physical environment.
Barbara Bush and Mandy Dealy
Preservation god Wayne Bell introduced the other awards for projects such as the Joseph and Susanna Dickinson Hanning Museum, Verde Camp (bungalows in Travis Heights), Bailetti House (a 19th-century home on Waller Street), the repurposed Austin Community College Gymnasium and the singular Austin Motel and its owner, Dottye Dean.
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Howl and Moss Openings on South Lamar Boulevard
Attending retail launch parties allows the observer to predict the intended customer base. In that case, Howl, an interior design and home decor shop, and Moss, a fashion consignment boutique next door, will be mobbed by a youngish set with tendencies to start trends.
Robin and Mark Farmer
Howl serves as an expanded outlet for owner Barry Jelinski’s creative slant on “shabby chic.” The store, cheek-to-cheek with Moss on South Lamar Boulevard, bristles with funky objects that the casual shopper will not find elsewhere. After examining these rarities on Thursday, the warmly dressed bohemians who assembled for the launch turned to each other for conversational comfort, while sharing ironically consumed beers like Lone Star.
Ebony Griffin and Dominique Bedford
The madhouse in Moss was not mainly male. Which is not surprising, since the ingenious clothing on the racks was destined for the other main gender. (Although I suppose not exclusively.) I can report that the female guests, some bordering on model gorgeous, spoke fervently of this fashion. “Too much of a good thing,” said one dazzled guest.
Tracy Tenpenny and Barry Jelinski
South Lamar seems to add another cool retail or entertainment spot each week. Pedestrian links among those people magnets are still dicey, however, as partiers hiked up to Uchi or down to a fast-food place to relieve themselves, since the Howl/Moss plumbing was under repair that night.
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Ralph Lauren Reception for the Long Center
Business meets pleasure. Fashion grapples with charity. Frivolity connects with seriousness.
Wendi Kushner and Patty Huffines
One doesn’t expect so much social harmony in a designer shop at the Domain. Yet the irrepressible Nina Seely made it happen again on Friday.
She opened the Ralph Lauren boutique to backers of the Long Center. A portion of their purchases went to the performing arts center, which is showing signs of financial stability these days.
Susan Lubin and Wendy Satterfield
Already, Seely has raised tens of thousands of dollars for the center in this manner. She has also made it safe for those who are intimidated by designer prices to fantasize. (In fact, I have purchased several Ralph Lauren ties from Seely, but that’s about as far as my wallet will take me.)
Graydon Parrish, Wendi Kushner and Brian Kushner
Among the dazzlers there were Jo Anne Christian, Wendi Kushner, James Armstrong, Larry Connelly, Patti Huffines, Susan Lubin, Graydon Parrish, Amy Holloway and Kevin Smothers. I lingered as long as I dared.
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Austin Visual Arts Awards Ceremony at AT&T Center
You already know the winners of the Austin Visual Arts Awards.
These prizes fill a vacuum in the arts scene, since several other disciplines hold their own community awards. Visual arts leaders gave out honors, back in the 1990s, but this second-year initiative from Austin Visual Arts Association has the feel of credible and reliable commendations for local artists and backers.
When AVVA asked me to give out the patron award, I thought: Oh cool. Whoever it is, I’ll already know them. No need to write a speech.
Nope. They informed me earlier this week it would be Mike Chesser. Who, I asked. Well, this photographer and collector has served in leadership positions with Austin Museum of Art, Blanton Museum of Art, Arthouse, Art Lies, Art Pace and Fluent Collaborative. How could I not know him?
Turns out, I do. A helpful guest pointed Chesser out during the early reception. That’s right: I’d talked to this gentle, thoughtful, modest man dozens if not hundreds of times at social events. Did not know his history. Congrats to Mike and all the other winners.
Photo of Chesser courtesy of Till Richter.
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W Austin Hotel & Residences Sneak Peek
Those who insist on standing outside the W Austin Hotel & Residences — never to enter — will inevitably ask of the sleek, gray, articulated slab: Is it Austin?
Through and through, the W picked up on Austin’s obsessions with sustainability, casual comfort and cultural omnivorousness. The ingredients at Trace are purchased from local and/or organic suppliers. The portraits on the wall are of wide range of Austinites, not just celebrities. The art was chosen — although not always placed — by local trendsetter Anne Elizabeth Wynn.
During a sneak preview on Wednesday, members of the media also found out about the multi-lounge mix of DJs and live music and a room completely dedicated to a McIntosh stereo system.
There’s the indoor/outdoor restaurant — pretty intimate — for fresh-looking chef Paul Hargrove. (We tried some savory bites.) The emphasis in these ground-floor facilities is drink with food (rather than food with drink), because “W is a cocktail brand,” I heard again and again.
(The compulsive branding thing could get old, but I understand the impulse.)
The restaurant and lounges, done up in what I’d call “baroque mod,” opened earlier today, despite the presence of an army of hard-hatters finishing out the place last night. The first hotel guests will fill the stunningly chic and spacious rooms later this month, followed by the Away Spa and pool deck.
ACL Live at the Moody Theater, located on the south side’s Willie Nelson Boulevard, opens Feb. 24, around the time the first residents will fill the condos, which will be finished out from the lower floors to the higher.
Despite its polished finish, this W is Austin to the bone. It’s going to be transformative, especially for that quadrant of downtown, once parking and traffic are smoothed out. Imagine hundreds of hotel guests and hundreds of residents, plus thousands of visitors to the Moody Theatre swarming the neighborhood day and night, not to mention the additional retail slated for the western and northern facades.
I predict people will long to meet each other in the hotel’s lounge areas. (The tall boutique establishment is kinda like Hotel St. Cecilia on steroids.) Hey look, I understand the Old Austin/New Austin split. But I think both sides are going to warm to this hot, cool social space.
CORRECTION: Heather Plimmer’s name was misspelled in an earlier post.
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Austin Social Agenda, Dec. 13-19
Hosts are sharing that holiday cheer throughout Austin’s social scene next week.
Dec. 13, Dave Steakley and Elisbeth Challener’s crew stages Zach Theatre’s Holiday Party at Spring Condominium.
Dec. 15, the Young Women’s Alliance mingle during a VIP Happy Hour at Cameron Lockley and Eddie Bernal’s La Sombra resaturant on Burnet Road.
Also Dec. 15, guests will flock to the Grand Opening Party at Soleil on Lake Travis (6550 Comanche Trail) or the Austin Film Society presentation of “True Grit” at the Paramount Theatre, with an after-party at the Belmont.
Dec. 16, some will head to Robert Nash and Paul Simmons’ famed Christmas Party in West Lake Hills.
Dec. 17, find me at Becky Beaver’s Office Christmas Party at 816 Congress Ave.
Dec. 18, guests will be puttin’ on the ritz for the Holiday Soiree — with a Stork Club theme — at the home of Jack and Carla McDonald.
Also Dec. 19, join the Harlem Nights Stompin’ at the Savoy for the Links Austin Chapter at Renaissance Austin Hotel.
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Austin’s Theresa Wright preps the White House for the holidays
Travis County social services coordinator and part-time florist Theresa Wright earned the decorating gig of a lifetime, helping to spruce up the White House for the holiday season.
Her first team worked on the Diplomatic Room, arranging especially designed ornaments, a garland over the mantlepiece and two garland over doors.
“The color scheme was tangerine orange, apple green and goldenrod yellow,” Wright says.
One of almost 100 volunteers actually decorating, she moved on to trimming four trees in the East room before meeting first lady Michelle Obama at a thank-you reception.
She also was introduced to U.S. Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Bo, the first family’s Portuguese water dog.
She snapped pictures of the first lady, the first dog and the admiral, but didn’t snag a picture of herself with Michelle Obama.
Wright jokes: “I didn’t have the clearance level for that.”
Sunday at 7 p.m., HGTV airs its annual “White House Christmas” about the decorating efforts at the “people’s house.” Keep an eye out for Austin’s Wright.
CORRECTION: In an earlier posting, the date for the HGTV show was incorrect. Also, Wright’s job title was inaccurate.
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Big Weekend Calendars Launch at the Vortex
How to keep track of Austin’s unending festivals, tours, rallies, concerts, markets and competitions? One popular tool is the Big Weekend Calendar, which for the past five years has guided Austinites around their town’s treasures. It’s a straightforward wall calendar, combining crisp photography with an easy-to-read grid and text tabs for more than 250 events and activities.
Anne L. Tiedt, Mike Stefanik and Laura B. Williams
Editor/publisher Mike Stefanik sold more than 12,000 copies of the calendar last year and hopes to expand to Portland, Ore. soon. Used in combination with AustinSocialPlanner.com, I Live Here I Give Here’s online calendar, plus the usual alerts from austin360.com, Tribeza, Rare, Launch787 and Do512, etc., one can practically schedule a year’s activities in one sitting.
Bryan Flores and Malkia Smith
Tuesday, Stefanik’s crew threw a launch party for the 2011 calendar at the Vortex, complemented by dancers, musicians and refreshments. It was a predictably youthful group and one that clearly likes going out. (Former Statesman columnist Lee Kelly’s phrase “cafe society” comes to mind.) A few of them even knew that 10 percent of the company’s after-tax profits goes to local nonprofits, especially the Austin Parks Foundation.
David Staab and Crystal Cao
Caught up with the Vortex Repertory Company’s Bonnie Cullum, who is working on programs that help creative artists — who write their own work — carve out careers. Cullum’s a rare Austin gem whose performance company is more than 20 years old. Quite impressive for an East Austin warehouse theater that has specialized in innovative efforts.
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Headliners revealed for Austin City Limits’ studio gala
The top tickets for the seated dinner on the studio floor are already sold out. Still for sale are dinner-by-the-bite-plus-performance tickets at $500, and performance-only tickets in the balcony at $150. Following the performance, the entire theater will open up for a reception with snacks and a chance to tour every seat in the surprisingly intimate house. Get more information at KLRU.org.
The hotel itself opens to the public on Thursday.
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Dancing with the Stars Austin (and Bruno) at the Hilton Austin
I’ll admit, playing Bruno Tonioli for Dancing with the Stars Austin was a blast!
The deliriously popular local edition of “Dancing with the Stars” raises money for the Center for Child Protection, a public-private collaboration that focuses on reducing trauma to victims of child abuse during the investigation and prosecution of their cases. Gross take: $905,745. More than 900 guests packed Hilton Austin’s large ballroom. John Paul DeJoria pledged $50,000 during the “need auction,” and two people paid $11,000 each to dance next year.
I wish this delightful event didn’t linger quite so long on the gruesome details of those criminal investigations. For decades, the media has informed us about the horrors of child abuse. We don’t need the evidence repeated, especially during dinner, no matter how important it is to remind diners of the cause.
But that’s a minor flaw when one considers the distraction provided by the Austin celebrities behaving outrageously on the dance floor.
Other memorable dances from the celebrities and their pro partners: Joe Ross’ backwoods swing; Amy Rudy’s sexy, bespangled tango; chef David Garrido’s leathery swing; Kristie Dennis’ pro-quality cha-cha/salsa; Mayor Pro Tem Mike Martinez’s slap-happy salsa; Stacey Hammer’s flawless disco/salsa; and Wendy Topfer’s youthful cha-cha.
My far more practiced — and habitually funny — fellow judges were radio personality Ed Clements and all-around talent Turk Pipkin. I knew I’d have to resort to gimmicks, so I studied the over-the-top flummery that is “Dancing with the Stars” judge Tonioli. Most of the responses to this smarmy act were quite kind and positive, although one colleague joked that I might be hearing soon from the Italian American Defamation League!
[Gala photos by Robert Godwin.]
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CORRECTION: The Dancing with the Stars Austin took place at the Hilton Austin, not Hyatt Austin.
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Matched Pair: Sofia and Victoria Avila
Austin floral designers Sofia and Victoria Avila face the question fairly regularly: What color is that?
Sofia: “What would you call that?”
Victoria: “It’s not orange. It’s not peach.”
Sofia: “Apricot?”
Victoria: “Mandarin. Like a mandarin orange.”
In an instant, the extraordinarily close siblings — who start and finish each other’s sentences — had named their future flower company.
Victoria: “Mandarin Flower Co. was born.”
Sofia: “Everyone thinks its because we speak Mandarin (Chinese).”
Victoria: “Or because we have orange hair.”
Sofia: “It was the color.”
No matter what they called it, the Avilas were bound to make a statement with their business that, in just four years, now competes to decorate the top social events in town, often with avant-garde creations.
The sisters were both born in El Paso of Mexican parents, Rosa Maria Avila from Chihuaha, Mexico, a photographer who serves their mentor; and Guillermo Avila, a former stockbroker from from San Luis Potosí.
Yet their narratives part ways at several junctures.
Sofia, 27, wears her copper hair loosely around slightly angular features and green eyes. She attended school in Mexico and the U.S.; wanted to be a ballerina, but eventually graduated from University of Texas, doubling up in Plan II honors and Chinese language and culture.
Victoria, 23, sweeps her auburn hair around dainty bone structure and changeable blue-green eyes. She attended Westlake High School, picked up her grandmother’s love of painting, and now studies Chinese language and culture, like her sister, with a minor in business.
They admit Mandarin has challenged them more than English, Spanish, French or Italian, their other languages. “It’s the hardest thing,” Victoria says. “You have no frame of reference.”
With their matched porcelain features out of a Botticelli painting, the Avilas, whose ancestors immigrated to Mexico from Spain and England, could be mistaken for twins. And their Old World manners remain immaculate.
“It worked,” Victoria says. “We don’t fight really.”
They moved to Austin seven years ago so that Sofia could attend UT. At their father’s insistence, Sofia and Rosa Maria accompanied her.
“We come from an extremely conservative, traditional Mexican family.” Sofia says. “It’s our culture, I guess.”
The floral inclination is also deeply embedded in the family.
“We are the third generation in flowers,” Sofia says. “Our grandmother did flowers in Chihuahua. My grandfather had a ranch and he experimented with cross-breeding unusual flowers and fruits.”
An uncle, Tiburcio Herrera, who studies business and architecture at Texas Tech University, also influences their work, especially the physics of large decorations. Their company’s origin story goes back to a time when they wanted to send their mother some flowers for her birthday, and so went online.
Victoria: “Everything we saw online was A) hideous. B) really, really expensive.”
Sofia: “We could do so much better.”
Though they knew and admired the work of Austin florists David Kurio, Coby Neal and others, they dreamed of trying different approaches, adding avant garde twists.
They researched, took a start-up business course, and sold boutonnieres in the Westlake High School parking lot before prom.
Sofia: “We went from there.”
Victoria: “Everybody thought we were crazy.”
Sofia: “They still do.”
The Avilas big breakthrough came at the Texas Conference for Women at the Austin Convention Center. The keynote speaker was Martha Stewart and the host first lady Anita Perry. The always courteous Avilas met both women before the program.
Victoria: “We wanted magnolias for a Southern effect …”
Sofia: “But they were not in season, so we used corn husks for the flowers.
Victoria: “A little Mexican touch.”
Perry started off her public remarks with: “Have y’all seen the flowers this morning? They are so beautiful.” The sisters’ tablemates cheered and Stewart pointed them out to thousands of women. Perry later asked them to decorate two inauguration luncheons.
This year, the Avilas turned the Long Center stage into a wonderland for the Sabores Auténticos de México dinner, and they decorated the past three Ballet Austin Fêtes, always one of the social season’s top events. Most recently, they built ceiling-to-floor arrangements that represented 10 ballets from Stephen Mills’ 10 years of tenure there.
Despite their successes, party planners still respond to the slender, girlish artists with incredulous looks.
“We have had to prove ourselves at every single event,” Victoria says. “They look at us — so young. Are they really going to do that?”
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Bleet-Up and Alpha Rev
Bleet-Ups — parties where bloggers and tweeters meet — are meant for networking. As promised, major mixing transpired on the Whole Foods terrace Friday night. Holy cow! I met dozens of people previously known to me only by their digital personae.
Amanda Garcia and Rose Reyes
Among the many folks wandering around Austin Eavesdropper Tolly Moseley’s carnival + concert + awards show were web editor JJ McLaughlin, newly arrived arts journalist Claire Spera, “funtrepreneur” Amanda Winters, Downtown Austin blogger Jude Galligan, attorney Luke Stanfield (who introduced me to business cards with QR codes), distance runner Rob Wetzel, iPad app-er Discovery Gerdes, Realtor Amber Gugino, some fresh faces from Public School’s creative pod, SXSW Interactive’s new word-spreader, Kelly Krause, loads of Statesman folks, local music advocate Rose Reyes, the pop-pleasing band MoTel Aviv, and Kahona Coffee honcha Piper Jones (who saved me some delicious decaf).
Megan Kelly and Rob Wetzel
The man of the hour, however, was Chris Apollo Lynn, who announced the winners of the Austin Blogger Awards at the end of the ceremony. To make the City of Austin’s noise-ordinance cut-off hour, he raced through the honors.
Kelly Johnson and Meghan Erwin
Dear ones, I did not win. Nor did newsroom colleague Addie Broyles of Relish Austin. We were nominated in the category “Best Blog from a Traditional Media Outlet.” Coming out on top was KUT’s exquisitely composed Texas Music Matters.
Claire Spera and Discovery Gerdes
I dragged my loser boots to Antone’s for the Mental Health America of Texas benefit. I wasn’t really there as a reporter, but rather as a fierce fan of Alpha Rev. (I promised the Mental Health folks I’d check into their good work soon. The band’s Casey McPherson sits on the charity’s board of directors — all the musicians and the club owners donated their services.)
Jude Galligan, Amber Gugino and Luke Stanfield
The band played songs from “New Morning,” also numbers I didn’t recognize. They interrupted their own compositions with incredible forays into blues, country and other genres with guests Junior Brown, Charlie Sexton and members of the Soldier Thread and the Gourds. I’ve always liked Alpha Rev’s music. Now I respect their musicianship even more.
Indiana Adams, Sandhya Ganesha and Amelia Raley
Odd thing happened: I was minding my own business — not reporting or photographing, just swaying to the band — when two separate individuals approached me with story idea pitches. I hope I behaved politely, but I could barely hear a word they were saying. I encouraged them to contact me by e-mail, when I was not blissing out to Alpha Rev. Hope they do.
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Salvage Vangaurd Gala at Eponymous Garden
When Salvage Vanguard Theater throws a “gala,” don’t visualize women in glittery gowns, men dressed as penguins or stiff diners over stiff drinks. The longtime Austin warehouse theater group raises money in the same way it presents performances: Without a scintilla of affectation.
Gricelda Silva and Jacob Trussell
Musicians and dancers performed at the Eponymous Garden, the guest-residence-and-events cluster of bungalows, set around a renovated farm house on Garden Street in East Austin. Aromatic snacks were arrayed behind the kitchen; traditional sidecar cocktails were served out by the old “stables.”
But my reason for attending were the fascinating people, among them Garden co-owner and consummate cabaret artist Sterling Price-McKinney (also my former landlord at the Garden). So many other talented artists to catch up with: Cyndi Williams, Joey Hood, Gabriel Luna, Paul Soileau, Luke Savisky, Jenny Larson, Josh Meyer, Adrienne Mishler, Matt Hislope, Westen Borghesi, and so forth.
Luke Savisky, Margery Segal and Jason Phelps
Yet big surprise was the return of Jason Phelps and Margery Segal, two signal Austin artists from the 1990s. They now live in Travis Heights after a long sojourn in Vermont. We welcome them back with wide, open arms. In some ways, the circle was never broken.
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Tribeza Issue Launch at Mexic-Arte Museum
Allow me this once to quote my own Gowalla posting for the first party of Thursday night: “Oh, the great shipwreck of beauty that has washed ashore here … at Mexic-Arte Museum.”
Sean Lopano, Jennifer Yu and Michael Yates
From the museum itself came rows of moderately priced art ready for purchase, not unlike Women & Their Work’s Red Dot Sale or Arthouse’s 5x7 extravaganza. Artists and other guests discussed the relative merit of each canvas, some adorned with multiple materials. This is an excellent way to raise money and awareness of each place’s constituent artists.
Fred Meyers, Michelle Golden and Stefan Whitwell
From Tribeza — whose December issue was launched at the museum this evening — came the beauty of “The 10 of 2010,” which included cover boy Andy Roddick, arts backer Julie Thornton, movie producer Elizabeth Avellán, Texas Monthly reporter Pamela Colloff, producer and restauranteur Daniel Northcutt, sustainability expert Lucia Athens, LBJ Library & Museum head Mark Updegrove, HAAM’s Carolyn Schwartz and state Rep. Mark Strama, as well as author of the moment S.C. Gwynne (“Empire of the Summer Moon,” which several dear ones will receive as Christmas gifts.) Included among the “10 to Watch” was American-Statesman food writer Addie Broyles.
May Suite and Ajay Kinger
A third source of beauty were the guests. The fashion, interactive, law, arts, charity, food, media and business communities were suitably represented. Why complain?
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Holiday Party at a Tarrytown home
More than one guest called it “the kick-off party for every Austin holiday season.” Others said it was simply one of the biggest and best house parties of the year.
Nina Seely and Mary Yancy
At the last minute, social savior and Ralph Lauren proxy Nina Seely took me by the arm to witness Becky and Mark Powell’s renowned holiday affair on Wednesday. The Powells live a low, long Tarrytown house that looks like a European hunting lodge crossed with a remote monastery. It’s cool, unlike anything else I’ve seen in Austin, and formerly sat on many acres of land just off Exposition.
Becky Powell and Susan Auler
The Powells have made this manse thoroughly livable with an extensive patio, a pool and a basketball half-court, along with game rooms, dens, living rooms and a new wine cellar. Other houses now enclose the street and neighbors include project management expert Dealy Herndon.
Bill Jones, Dealy Herndon and Johnita Jones
Guests spilled from room to room as servers passed around treats like sugared bacon and specially made little puddings. Who were these folks? Many live in Tarrytown. Or they formerly lived in West Austin. They knew the tradition of dropping off an unwrapped toy — for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Service’s Rainbow Room — inside a sleigh in the front yard. It would be disingenuous to pretend that power performers, many tied to the statewide Republican ascendancy, others associated with the downtown business community, were not there.
They, and everyone else, dived straight into the holiday deep end. Conversations multiplied into the cold night.
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KIPP Reception at a Pemberton home
When I arrived at Melissa Jones’ discreet, sturdy Pemberton home for a reception, I jokingly informed my host that I knew quite enough about KIPP. I admired what the Houston-based charter schools had done here and across the country. No need for a refresher course on Wednesday.
David Wride and Melissa Jones
I was wrong. I entered Jones’ tall den to find major-league Austin players already setting aside wine glass and savory snacks to soak up data from KIPP Austin operations wiz Sheilah Kavaney . They also asked tough questions of the school staff, many of them about the relative role that parents play in student success. Among the players were Melanie Barnes, Nancy Scanlan, Ken Gladish, Karen Kahan and David Wride, as well as Margo and Grant Thomas.
Karen Kahan and Crystal Cotti
Turns out KIPP has opened 99 schools nationwide (they grow up so fast, don’t they?). The Austin branch wants to expand from four schools and 1,000 students to 10 schools serving 5,000 students. It has already raised more than $17 million from its goal of $30 million for the expansion. Extraordinary.
Melanie Barnes and Sheilah Kavaney
KIPP started with middle schools, the place where low income students usually stumble. It has proven beyond a doubt it can dramatically raise scores and aim students who had little chance at college to institutions of higher learning. I am humbled just to help spread the word.
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Austin Social Agenda, Dec. 6-12
Heading into that holiday swing next week …
Dec. 6, live for Liveable City’s Holiday Bash at Black Star Co-Op Pub & Brewery.
Also Dec. 6, sing for Conspirare’s Christmas at the Carillon Gala at the Long Center.
Dec. 8, the media will take another sneak peek at the W Hotel and Residences.
Also Dec. 8, AVAA gives out its Visual Arts Awards at AT&T Center and the Blanton Museum of Art’s Director’s Circle Holiday Party is just around the corner.
Dec. 9, a Ralph Lauren Showcase benefits the Long Center at the Domain.
Also Dec. 9, the Austin Marathon’s Holiday Party goes the distance at 710 Rio Grande St.; and FuturoFund throws a Christmas Party at the LatinWorks offices.
Dec. 10, the Heritage Society’s Preservation Awards dignify the Driskill Hotel over a luncheon.
Dec. 11, the 100 Club of Central Texas holds a Holiday Party at Headliners; the SIMS Benefit Bash shakes the Austin Music Hall; and American-Statesman style writer Marques Harper appears as Mother Ginger in “The Nutcracker.”
Dec. 12, Patty Griffin and Shawn Colvin sing for Marathon Kids at the Paramount Theatre.
CORRECTION: Zach Theatre’s “Red Hot Patriot” does not open this week.
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