Ellen Richardson, a graphic designer and Pleasant Plains resident, recently took her Craigslist hunting skills to the next level with the launch of her blog, Listed District. Listed District offers daily DC Craigslist findings of everything from Mid-Century and Industrial furniture, to bikes and the utterly strange. Growing up in north Alabama, Ellen got plenty of flea market and antique mall scouring practice – she’s drawn to the interesting histories of the unique (and strange) so, don’t expect her to post too many IKEA leftovers. Every week Ellen is going to share a roundup of some Phenomenal Finds with PoPville.

Listed District Roundup – Bakelite

This week, Craigslsit has a plethora of interesting vintage items made of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bakelite. Bakelite, in case you’ve not heard of it, was developed in 1907 by Belgian chemist Leo Baekeland. It was one of the first synthetic plastics and, once it caught on, was used to make tons of industrial, household, and recreational items – everything from cameras, jewelry, and telephones, to coffins and even machine guns. Bakelite was groundbreaking from an industrial application standpoint, and is actually still used today in several specialized industries. But the best stuff, the stuff collectors drool over, are the everyday Bakelite items that are today made from materials that are less labor intensive to produce.

And like any good success story, Bakelite has plenty of scandal and intrigue associated with it. Leo Baekeland eventually descended into epic eccentricity and his heirs didn’t fair too much better. The movie Savage Grace, starring Julianne Moore (based upon the book of the same name by Natalie Robins and Steven M.L. Aronson), dramatizes the dysfunctional life and brutal murder of socialite and Bakelite heiress Barbara Daly Baekeland by her son Antony. Antony was institutionalized and went on to also attempt to murder his Grandmother before dying mysteriously at Rikers Island…yep.

All of these items are super cool on their own – the Bakelite factor is just the icing on the cake. **Some of the radios I found are fetching huge prices on eBay!

All the listings after the jump. (more…)

Streets of Washington is the brilliant blog covering some of DC’s most interesting buildings and history written by John DeFerrari. John is also the author of the equally brilliant Lost Washington DC. ‘Streets of Washington Presents…’ will feature some fascinating buildings and history from around PoPville.

The art of making a really good pipe seems to have died out, and many would say that’s a good thing. But if we set aside the health and social issues for a moment, we discover a business that once relied on skilled artisans to make its very finest products. In Washington, D.C., the very best pipes were made by Bertram’s on 14th Street, opposite Franklin Park, and it seems like almost every famous world leader from the early 20th century who smoked had his pipe made there.

Benjamin Bertram Goldmann was born in Leipzig, Germany, some time in the late 1870s, the son of a master pipe maker who passed the exacting craft on to his son. Bertram emigrated to the United States and had a pipe shop first in Baltimore but then moved to D.C., where he settled on 14th Street early in the 1900s. A Washington Post reporter visited the old man in his shop in 1933 and found him muttering about all the bad things that pipe owners and other pipe makers do to their pipes. Beyond not scrupulously caring for a good pipe, anyone who would paint or varnish the outside of a pipe was essentially committing a crime against humanity, according to Bertram. His pipes were handcrafted from carefully selected pieces of briar root imported from Algeria. Only the pieces with the grain just-so were acceptable. Beyond the briar pipe bowls, Bertram used amber, Bakelite, and bands of silver and gold. The pipe bowls were a light, blond color when new and would darken to a rich shade of mahogany as time went by. These pipes were veritable works of art.

Bertram passed the business on to his son, Sydney Bertram Goldman (c. 1904-1960), who ran the store during its peak years. The shop sold President Franklin Delano Roosevelt his famous goose-quill cigarette holders. It also sold only the best pipe tobacco and cigars. When Winston Churchill was in town he bought his fine Romeo y Julieta cigars, made in Havana, from Bertram’s. They sold for a dollar apiece at the time. According to the Post, Bertram’s also supplied Joseph Stalin with its best Capitol Blend pipe tobacco via the Soviet Embassy. General Douglas MacArthur’s iconic corncob pipes came from Bertram’s. Entertainers such as Edward G. Robinson and Red Skelton were also customers.

The location of the former Bertram’s store (Photo by the author).

The store moved a few doors up to 920 14th Street NW in 1947. The new building was festooned with a rather eccentric carved glass frieze of a hunting scene on its facade. When the new place opened, Sydney Goldman, who had served in the Marines during the war, made a point of hiring 49 disabled veterans to work in the pipe-making shop.

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Giselle

The following was written by PoP contributor Eric Nuzum.

French Bulldogs rarely show up in shelters and rescues. They are expensive dogs and difficult to breed. Anyone who goes through what it takes to get one usually isn’t very quick to let it go. Those that do come up for adoption are usually seriously ill or disabled.

That’s why we were so surprised to see Giselle listed for adoption. A four-year-old Frenchie, rescued from a high kill shelter in South Carolina. Besides testing positive for heart worm, she was described as good with kids and dogs, didn’t have behavior issues, and seemed otherwise perfectly fine.

More than a hundred people applied to adopt her, but we were the ones told she would be coming home with us on December 3rd. The only thing we really knew about her history was that her previous owner gave her up for financial reasons.

I was instructed to pick her up at a transport drop–where rescue volunteers bring more than 40 dogs in stacked crates, bungee corded together in the back of a large cargo van for the ten-hour drive from South Carolina.

Giselle was one of the first dogs off the van and almost immediately I could tell that her time in the shelter had not been good. She was caked with dirt, had a mangled ear and scabs on her face from a fairly recent attack by another dog, had infections in both ears, and was constantly straining to poop, probably from stress. She was disoriented and nervous, yet still desperate for any comfort or affection. I placed her head in my hands after putting her in the backseat of the car. “Don’t worry little girl,” I whispered to her. “The worst part is over.” She licked my nose and we drove home, already pretty much bonded.

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Vivi Mazarakis is the author of Forking DC. You can read her previous columns here.

Pork and Ramen Noodles

This recipe was inspired by my recent trip to the Atlas District’s Toki Underground, a Taiwanese noodle and dumpling shop inspired by Japanese ramen houses. (Read my review of Toki here). Ever since slurping noodles there last weekend, I just couldn’t stop thinking about the Hakata Classic (ramen with pork loin). So, I turned to one of my favorite chefs, “Iron Chef” Masaharu Morimoto, and his book “The New Art of Japanese Cooking” to feed my obsession. Sitting on my couch, I leafed through the colorful images of Chef Morimoto’s beautifully plated food looking for a recipe I could try.

I will admit that many of Morimoto’s recipes are a bit intimidating. They call for either complicated cooking techniques or many exotic ingredients that most local grocery stores don’t sell, or don’t sell for a reasonable price. (Yes, I’m referring to the grocery store commonly referred to as “Whole Paycheck,” with whom I have a love-hate relationship.)

When I came across Morimoto’s Za Jan Noodles recipe, I thought: bingo! It would satiate my craving for both noodles and pork, and it seemed relatively easy to prepare. Below is my slightly modified version of this recipe. For vegetarians, swap out the pork with tofu and skip the egg. Tofu is a great substitute since it will soak up the flavor-packed sauce.

Most of the ingredients can be found at your local grocery store. As for the red miso, you can find it and any other Asian specialty items at one of my favorite stores in DC – Hana Japanese Market at the corner of 17th & U St. NW. This place is a real gem and the owners are nice and very helpful. As for the sake, you’ll find that many liquor stores these days carry it. For example, you can find it at the liquor store across the street from Hana or De Vinos, a great wine store in Adams Morgan. Otherwise, cooking rice wine, which you can find at any grocery store, will work just fine.

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Streets of Washington is the brilliant blog covering some of DC’s most interesting buildings and history written by John DeFerrari. John is also the author of the equally brilliant Lost Washington DC. Following is a new occasional series called ‘Streets of Washington Presents…’ featuring some fascinating buildings around town. The Evening Star Building has always been one of my favorites. I was blown away to learn about the history. As a result it is a long post, not all contributions will be this extensive. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

It was a sad day in Washington in August 1981 when The Washington Star ceased publication after more than 128 years of service. The Star’s tenure had stretched back before the Civil War, an amazing run that witnessed the historic sweep of the city’s development from small town to sophisticated metropolis. “The Rock of Gibraltar in Washington journalism is The Washington Star, one of the world’s really great newspapers,” historian Fred A. Emery wrote in 1935. The rise and fall of this bygone institution has its own grand sweep, with its greatest achievements occurring when it was quartered in the majestic marble building at 11th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, that still bears its name today.

The Star began inauspiciously enough in December 1852, one of dozens of newspapers that sprang up for limited runs in 19th century Washington City. In fact, two other D.C. newspapers had already used the Star name, the Columbian Star from 1822 to 1827, and the first Washington Star in 1841. The third Star, the one that would matter, began as a four-page broadsheet with a run of 250 copies, printed on a hand press in a small office at 8th and D Streets, NW. The paper’s first owner, Captain Joseph Borrows Tate, sought to distinguish the Star from all the other rags published throughout the city by striking a tone of impartiality: “The Star is to be free from party trammels or sectarian influences…devoted in an especial manner to the local interests of the beautiful city which bears the honored name of Washington.” The paper’s neutral stance and focus on local news became its trademark and, in time, gave it broad appeal and commercial success. It also led at times to overly innocuous reportage, as in this oft-quoted remark by reporter William Tucker that appeared in the paper’s first edition: “Our courts are sitting, but the business with which they are engaged is not of a very interesting character.”

Tate sold the paper within a year to William Wallach (1812-1871), an aggressive Texan who worked hard to build up the business, moving its office to the southwest corner of 11th and Pennsylvania in 1854. Wallach hired a promising young reporter, Crosby S. Noyes (1825-1908), in 1853, and Noyes quickly became the Star‘s star. One of his many assignments was to report on the hanging of John Brown at Harper’s Ferry, WV, in 1859, which he did in flowery, dramatic prose. The Star maintained an anti-slavery stance in those days and, once the Civil War began, was decidedly pro-Union, despite the strong Southern sentiments then common in Washington.

Crosby S. Noyes (Source: Wikimedia Commons)

The paper grew in prestige during the war years, aided by its exclusive connections with an early incarnation of the Associated Press. Through the AP, the Star‘s vivid coverage of the war’s impact on Washington was relayed across the country. The New York Times often reprinted war reports from the pages of the Star, and the paper’s prestige increased. Supposedly, as soon as Abraham Lincoln finished delivering his second inaugural address, he handed the text to Crosby Noyes so that it could be printed in the Star.

In 1867, Wallach retired and the paper was bought by Noyes and four other investors: Samuel H. Kauffmann (1829-1906), Alexander “Boss” Shepherd (1835-1902), Clarence D. Baker, and George W. Adams. Shepherd, who would become governor of D.C. in 1873, sold his share of the enterprise within a few years, as did Baker, and Adams remained a behind-the-scenes investor. That left Noyes and Kauffmann to establish a family dynasty that would preside over the Star for another 100 years. Noyes exercised editorial control, while Kauffmann served as publisher and handled the business side.

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I’m happy to introduce Adventures of the 35 Year Old (Alcohol) Virgin. Since I personally had my first beer at 15 years old I was fascinated by Ben’s premise – “At 35 years old, I had never tasted, tried or drank an alcoholic drink of any kind. During 2012 that all changes drink by drink.” You can read more about the background here. For the first Vol. on PoP – AV will tackle Bud Light. If you have a drink you think he should try let us know in the comments. Follow all of his adventures here.

Bud Light

At first it was so much nicer than I expected it to be, almost enjoyable. But by the fourth sip I wanted to be f’ing done. I wanted a Sprite.

So the evening was all set. Joe and I headed over to our weekly dinner at our cousin’s Chris & Natalie and they were prepared to make dinner for my first beer—a classic starter beer—Bud Light. We had rustic grilled cheeses with several different cheeses to choose from, spinach, bacon and a few choice breads. And there was homemade tomato soup and some salad.

But I’m guessing you’re still stuck on “Bud Light”. Yes, yes, I know.

Let me quickly explain.

This journey, this Adventure, is a process. I will be trying at least 25+ beers on this little experiment during 2012 and so for me, it made sense to start with one of the most popular and common beers available to kick off my beer experience.

I had no regrets in my choosing, while many of you had several before I even had my first sip. And now I know why.

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The following was written by Lina Khan with photographs by Alison Klein. If you have a show you’d like to see reviewed send an email to princeofpetworth(at)gmail

With a sound so distinctly urban, Phantogram‘s small-town origins come as a surprise. The self-described “street beat/psyche pop” duo has earned a reputation for hipness since the 2010 release of their debut album Eyelid Movies, recorded in a barn by their very rural Greenwich, New York hometown.

Back on tour with Nightlife EP, the band played to a full house at Black Cat Wednesday night. A smooth mix of electronic loops, synth beats, and hip hop evocations, Phantogram professes an eclectic range of influence – old soul, French pop, shoegaze – that fuses subtly on their recordings. Live, though, that range flattened, producing a sound highly energetic but rarely powerful.

Keyboardist Sarah Barthel’s cool, breathy croon briefly came through on “16 Years,” a catchy electro-pop track, but remained mostly overpowered by percussion. “Mouthful of Diamonds” brought out the band at its strongest: Barthel’s confident vocals, guitarist Josh Carter’s tender riffs, and a pulsating backdrop of synth beats that roll unremittingly. The casual synthesis was lent depth by the single line “I wish I could believe,” repeated with a simplicity that verges on hypnotic.

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Lina Khan is PoP’s new music editor. She will review a monthly concert and in the near future provide a weekly agenda of who the local spots are featuring per readers requests.

A few songs into his set, Zach Condon made a confession. “I’ve been told we’ve played here
before, but for the life of me I just can’t remember,” he half-chuckled. For a musician whose
sound plays like an ode to hazy remembrance, the comment captured what Beirut best kindles: a
potent nostalgia for a time you can’t quite place, an undeniable gesture to memory without totally
detailing it.

Playing to a swarming crowd at Black Cat on Tuesday night, Beirut took the stage as a six-
member band with no shortage of brass, with two players alternating between trumpet, trombone,
and tuba, and Condon frequently joining them on horn. They opened with “The Concubine,” a
mix of humming accordion and playful percussion, before segueing to “Elephant Gun,” a crowd
favorite that gets Condon gently plucking his ukulele.

With three albums that span a staggering range of influence — Balkan and gypsy, electronic,
folk, early pop, and mariachi, to name a few — Beirut played a broad retrospective, with the
welcomed inclusion of pieces where the sweeping brass narrates songs, developing storylines
with unexpected crescendos and quickening tempos. Early in the set, “The Shrew” encapsulated
the part-drunken waltz, part-majestic fanfare into which a piece can ascend, as Condon, eyes
closed, stomps and claps.

In addition to sampling some newer tracks — “Santa Fe” and “East Harlem” — the band did
justice to timeless pieces like “Postcards from Italy,” whose hauntingly simple ukulele, layered
with a collection of horns, enacts a gorgeous hymn to a more sincere, uncomplicated past,
nascent young love, and a musky yearning for it all. “Those were our times,” Condon crooned
with his textured lilt, soaking in the memory, an elegy both triumphant and wistful.

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Ed. Note: On Monday we learned that Prince Charles would be visiting Common Good City Farm in Ledroit Park. Thanks to Tim Breen for sharing some photos and captions.

Gold pinkie ring on one hand, sunglasses in the other, and pocket square neatly folded,
the grey pin-striped prince waves to Shaw residents upon his arrival at the Shaw
neighborhood’s Common Good City Farm. Farm Executive Director Pertula Clark is on
his immediate left and volunteer Dana Bryson is next.

Go-Go Band. Washington’s signature pop music, go-go, greeted the prince courtesy of a live band.

Pertula George escorts the prince around the farm, where he viewed a cooking
demonstration and helped plant a redbud tree.

Ra Ra Riot

The following was written by PoPville reader, Gabby who won the tickets to the festival.

Sweetlife Festival 2011 was an excellent fusion of cross-genre musical performances, fresh food, and great people! As I made my way through DC to meet up with my oh so lucky concert going guest du jour at his house on U street, I saw the sidewalks filled with groups lugging coolers and sporting their finest music fest worthy threads towards the different shuttle pick up locations throughout NW. Note to self for next year, sign up for the party buses!

As this was my first time at the Merriweather Post Pavillion, I was pleasantly surprised by easy layout of the venue tucked away in a beautifully green space in Maryland. We made some stops at the various tailgates going on in the parking lot before making our way towards the stage. Without hesitation I made a bee-line to the pit for one of the acts I was most excited for, Theophilus London!

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Photo by PoPville flickr user AWard Tour

Ed. Note: Reuben Jackson shares poems and other commentary with us from time to time. Today he writes, “I began playing with this variation on Wallace Stevens’ “Thirteen Ways of Looking At a Blackbird” and decided to use the pit bull as a (ahem, ahem) metaphor for the yin and yang of urban existence.”

Thirteen Ways of Looking At a Pit Bull

I. Among twenty sleeping houses, The only restless thing Was the voice of the pit bull. II. I was of three headaches Like a neighborhood In which there are three pit bulls. III. The pit bull paced in the dealer’s yard. It was but a small part …of my anxiety. IV. A man and a dog Are one. A hustler and his stash and a pit bull Are frightening. V. I do know which to prefer, The disdain of neighbors Or the disdain of neighbors, The pit bull breeding Or the policeman rolling his eyes. VI. Raindrops filled the long window With a posse of teardrops. The ghosts of battered pit bulls Crossed it, to and fro. The mood Traced in the shadow Followed me into sleep. VII. O portly brothers of Brightwood, Why do you secretly long for Chocolate Labs? Do you not see how the pit bull Sits at the feet Of the hustlers around you? VIII. I know quieter cities, And black men with unconquered livers; But I know, too, That the pit bull is involved In what I wish I didn’t know. IX. When the pit bull strode into the shadows, It turned the asphalt Into a pungent river. X. At the sight of pit bulls Galloping down Madison, Even the most ardent dog lover Would cry out sharply. XI. He rode over the District of Columbia In a crowded subway. Once, a fear pierced him, In that he mistook A red-headed sister’s ringtone For a pit bull. XII. The block is silent. The pit bull and his owner must be away. XIII. It was evening all afternoon. It was raining And it was going to rain. The forlorn pit bull sat In his dog house.

Reuben Jackson 5/1/11

Sunsets at the Mall

This time of the year presents us with some interesting opportunities for photography, Allow me to go back to an older column and explain this a little bit better since I think you’ll find this knowledge useful.

Go to www.timeanddate.com, write Washington, DC on the “search for city” space and then look at the “sun and moon” tab. Make sure the information shown is about the sun (body) and the columns shown are rise/set time/azimuth. If you change any of the parameters, then hit “show” since it doesn’t change automatically.

Don’t be turned away by the word “azimuth”, the following information will help you understand what this is. Look for the information about March 19 (this Saturday!), the azimuth for the sunrise and the sunset are 90 degrees and 270 degrees respectively. Now imagine you are standing at the Washington Monument at 7:14 am this Saturday. North is zero degrees, The Capitol Building (East) is 90 degrees and the Lincoln Memorial (West) is 270 degrees.

All this is to explain that you’ll see the Sun rising behind The Capitol building at 7:14 and setting behind the Lincoln Memorial at 7:19 pm. There is an interesting optical illusion that the sun is bigger as it comes or shows next to the horizon and the buildings.

There are different techniques that can be used to photograph the sunrise or sunset. You may want to meter close to the sun to get some interesting silhouettes or maybe use software like Photomatix to create HDR or fuse images. The last one is what I’ve been using recently in order to show the sun but also the details of buildings, trees, etc. I have never used a graded ND filter for this kind of photography, I guess it can also be used, but the good ones are more expensive than HDR software so for now I’ll stick to the software.

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Kristi Green is the author of the blog DC Wineaux. She further indulges her love of wine in her work at a wine bar on U St NW.

Cleveland Park Wine & Spirits 3423 Conn Ave NW

In the realm of cool DC neighborhoods, Cleveland Park is fast becoming my favorite–and as a loyal U Street lover, that’s saying something. Cleveland Park is chock full of great restaurants (Dino, Ardeo+Bardeo, Palena…), great shopping (Carbon is incredible), and as I’ve recently discovered–this neighborhood is home to one of our city’s best wine selections at Cleveland Park Wine and Spirits.

The shop, which has been open for two decades, is big, bright, and wonderfully open. I love cute little tiny wine shops, but the wide open aisles and high oak shelves of Cleveland Park Wine and Spirits are a breath of fresh air. With all that space, the wine lovers are free to step back and ogle the incredible selection of wines from all over the world.

While this shop does have a great deal of labels you’ll likely recognize, they also have a great deal of unique wines. Within moments of entering the Bordeaux section of their wine shop, Tony Quinn approached me–we began talking about the Zweigelt I’d chosen already and he informed me that they have wines from Austria, Georgia, Urgugay, and Colorado (who knew they were making wine in Colorado?!)–and everywhere else, for that matter.

After exploring a bit, Tony allowed me to taste two Rhone blends though I ended up coming home with a 2005 Saint Emilion, a Cremant de Loire Rose, and a Zweigelt. The price range is comfortable to say the least–I took home three bottles for under $60 (before the bag tax–that’s what I get for leaving my green bags at home).

This upcoming weekend, like most weekends, Cleveland Park Wine and Spirits will host two free tasting events. On Friday, March 18th from 5-8pm the shop will hold a tasting of the entire XYZin portfolio. On Saturday, March 19th, Regis from Roanoake Vineyards will be in the shop tasting Virginia wines!

Recommendation after the jump. (more…)

Kristi Green is the author of the blog DC Wineaux. She further indulges her love of wine in her work at a wine bar on U St NW.

Upon first entering the warm, bright space inside Schneider’s on Capitol Hill I was a bit overwhelmed by the floor to ceiling shelves, tightly packed with 12,000 different bottles of wine.

I stumbled through the walls of bottles to the always-alluring funky-labeled Charles Smith collection. Charles Smith was Food and Wine Magazine’s winemaker of the year for 2009 and it was his Boom Boom Syrah that caught my eye (even though I went home with The Velvet Devil Merlot). Just above the shelves bearing the CS collection are the wines of the K Vintners label, also made by Charles Smith–these wines employ super vintage winemaking styles (like foot-stomping!), high quality grapes, and command a higher price than the collection of wines bearing his name.

After my solo exploration of the wine section at Schneider’s, I enlisted the help of the staff. I asked for some recommendations and was taken to Spanish reds and French whites–my two favorites of the old world.

At the recommendation of my newfound guide, I purchased a 2000 Bierzo, a rich full bodied Spanish red with great aging potential. Having already been in the bottle for eleven years, we decided together that it’s definitely ready to drink now. I did spend more than I typically would on this bottle but judging by some internet research, I got it for $15-$25 less than I would have spent elsewhere.

His next recommendation, a 2007 Savennieres (by Domaine de Baumard) is an exhibition of great quality and great value (only $20!). Savennieres (named for the place it’s made, like Champagne) is a full bodied, dry white wine, made from the chenin blanc grape. This rich white pairs well with poultry and light fish–it’s racy acidity works wonders with creamy sauces as well.

The store has a great selection for every price range–they boast that their least expensive bottle is a $5 Chilean “vino de mesa” and their most expensive bottle is $4500; what wine could command such a price? A 1991 Chateau Lafite Rothschild.

Specific recommendations after the jump. (more…)

Kristi Green is the author of the blog DC Wineaux. She further indulges her love of wine in her work at a wine bar on U St NW.

Cork and Fork (1522 14th St NW) is a reasonably new addition to the network of wine shops that weaves its way across our fair city. This bright little boutique is run by the Landragin family who own two other shops by the same name; one in Bethesda, MD and one in Gainesville, VA. The founder and official owner/operator is Dominique Landragin.

Dominique Landragin was born in the heart of France’s Champagne region where his grandfather was once a manager at Veuve Cliquot Vineyards, a premier producer of Champagne. Before coming to Washington, Landragin made a lasting impression on the wine world by co-founding Yellowglen, the first Methode Champenoise producer in Australia. This means that the production followed the rules set by the French government for sparkling wine from the Champagne region to the letter–and largely to Landragin’s credit.

The staff, particularly Monsieur Landragin himself, are charming and knowledgeable. If you need a recommendation, don’t hesitate to ask–I’ve not been disappointed yet. The best and worst thing about being such a “wineaux” is that, by having so much knowledge, I have too much to consider when choosing a bottle.

Nearly each time I’ve gone to Cork and Fork I’ve asked for a recommendation. The only time I did not request a recommendation was my first time in the shop, a hot day last summer, and I picked up juicy, bright white Bordeaux and a six pack of some light variety of Eggenberg beer from Austria. On various recommendations I’ve purchased an organic Cotes du Rhone, an organic Pinot Noir from Austria, a bold Spanish Monastrell based blend from Jumilla, a very well priced Chateau-neuf-du-Pape and countless other delicious finds.

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