I have once again found myself about 18 miles southwest of Copper Harbor, Michigan inside the lovely Jampot Bakery, owned and operated by the holy order of the the Society of St. John. It’s my third visit in as many weeks to this hallowed ground, where black-robed monks have decided to glorify god through the art of baked goods. Today, most of the shop’s customers seem to be those who have relocated and have felt compelled to make the pilgrimage back to their favorite spot in the Upper Peninsula (I spoke to a retired couple who are returning for the first time since moving to Maryland). This strong feeling of nostalgia appears to be universal. Even after nineteen years of loyal patronage, I still find it mesmerizing, as if it were the first time I stepped up onto the bakery’s rickety wooden porch and through its bright red door. As my eyes adjust from the blinding daylight to the dimness of the tiny room, I get right down to business. Scanning the cluttered shelves in hopes to spot something involving chocolate, my gaze falls on a hand-packaged collection of half a dozen hearty cookies. I reach to grab it, look up at the monk behind the counter, and comment, “Gosh, these almost feel warm!”

“They are warm,” he corrects me with a grin. “Oatmeal-raisin-peanut butter-chocolate chip.” This feels like entrapment – I thought the monastic lifestyle was meant to separate oneself from the sin of the world, yet here they are, creating vast quantities of delicious stumbling blocks that will lead me astray. Gluttony is certainly a sin – I know my Bible – but how can something be wrong when it tastes so right?

Attempting in vain to not salivate right in front of this austere, bearded baker monk, I set the cookies down next to the rest of my rapidly-growing collection of treats. In a place which overtly displays its pure and holy nature, the only sin I can imagine would be to leave the shop without at least a solid month’s worth of bakery (and let me tell you: I will NOT be needing to repent this visit).

The Jampot Bakery, nestled near the Lake Superior coast in the woods of the Keweenaw Peninsula, is the fruit of the labor of the Monastic Order of the Society of St. John. These monks have made it their life’s work to build a working monastery in this remote, beautiful place, and the Jampot serves the dual purpose of raising funds for the monastery and creating an attitude of service, focus, work. In all earnestness, these men are baking to glorify god.

From their website, “The Monastic Vocation“:

We came to the shore of Lake Superior at Eagle Harbor in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan’s Keweenaw County in late Summer of 1983 and began the struggle of building this monastery. The unlikely work of picking wild berries and making jam we undertook during our first summer proved the seed of larger things. Our jam shop and bakery, Jampot, has become one of the best known businesses in our area and now more than provides for our physical needs….
Called more than twenty-five years ago to the task of founding a monastery dedicated to building up God’s Kingdom through the arts, we joyfully persevere in the struggle, mindful of the long road ahead and grateful for the many consolations and graces the Lord continues to provide. Truly, He has prospered the work of our hands….
We practice the various renunciations traditional to religious life. Commonly called the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience — to which monks add a vow of stability — these Evangelical Counsels seek to eliminate the many distractions and obstacles that plague us in the world and impede our openness to God. Setting aside acquisitiveness, sexual desire, self will, and wanderlust, we are free to devote ourselves to God. Emptying ourselves of worldly concerns, we make room for the Divine.

To that end, the monks have created one of the finest bakeries I’ve ever come across. Open from May until October (peak tourist season), it is home to a diverse selection of baked goods, jams, jellies, and candies. And these aren’t your mom’s BETTY CROCKER recipes- these are true originals, slow food before slow food was a thing. Some of the highlights include: brandy-moistened lemon pound cake, cinnamon sourdough breakfast bread, rum raisin brownies, cream cheese pound cake muffins (which contain, to my delight, a generous amount of almond extract), chocolate pound cake muffins with coffee/cream cheese frosting, gingerbread muffins with lemon butter frosting, orange truffles, ginger truffles, almond truffles, pear-cinnamon jelly, highbush cranberry jelly, brandied peach jam, wild strawberry jam, and cranberry ginger jelly. You can order from the Jampot website year-round.

Most customers walk away with a modest one or two paper bags in which rest a couple muffins or jars of jam. I, however, always seem to leave with at least a small cardboard box packed snugly with my favorite goodies. What can I say? I’m a true “one of everything” kind of gal.

Lucky for me, despite their rare and gourmet status, most of these treats are quite reasonably priced. The affordability at which the monks offer their products may persuade you to throw a buck or two into their normally heaping tip basket (they’re some of the most charming guys you’ve ever seen, eyes twinkling, bearded).

Once the shopping has been done, many people choose to head over to the nearby beach at Great Sand Bay, or to the adjacent Jacob’s Falls to take pictures, explore, or just find a sunny spot to relax. I like to go around to the porch on the side of the shop to enjoy a few bites of my purchases with friends or family. If you are really keen on getting a true “yooper” experience, however, it should be noted that some of the densest patches of thimbleberries (an Upper Peninsula delicacy – despite what you may have heard, they do exist) in the area can be found right around the Jampot- just look for bright red berries surrounded by what look like maple leaves.

Sitting outside on the porch writing this article, I overhear a conversation between two customers as they make their way to their car.
 

“Oh my god.”

“Isn’t that wonderful?”

“It’s amazing. And the people there are just so NICE!”

“It’s awesome.”
 

If I can take the liberty (just this once) to bring back the literal implications of the word “awesome,” then I would have to agree. The Jampot is exactly that.
 
 

Story and photos by: Terra Schneider

By the time I’d finished with my Friday afternoon class, I was running late, and ended up springing for a $40 rush-hour taxi to LaGuardia, only to learn that my flight had been delayed, my connection missed, and the next available itinerary didn’t depart until 8am the following morning. The next day, after an ill-considered egg-and-chorizo wrap at the Denver airport, I got nauseous on the plane, which never happens to me, almost threw up during the final descent, and arrived on the runway in Boise drenched in sweat and dizzy in a way that didn’t let up for twelve hours. I had arrived on the last of a string of warm spring days and my stay encompassed all of the ensuing cold & rainy spell. Boise, Idaho met me at a bad disadvantage, but it won me over anyway—I’d go back in a hot minute, but I’ll take a damn car next time, thank you very much.

If you’re a born and bred New Yorker, like myself, whose conception of certain parts of the rest of America actually resembles that old New Yorker cover with the view out over the Hudson from 9^th Avenue, in which everything west of the Passaic is squashed together into a featureless orange rectangle—then the word “Idaho” might conjure nothing but endless gray fields of spuds. In fact, the potato farms are all in the eastern part of the state. The area around Boise is a sea of rolling hills. Bare except for a stubble of short grass and scrub, the hills have an eerie, primordial beauty, as if they’re left over from one of the early days of creation—day 3 maybe, late afternoon, after he’d separated the land from the sea, but before he’d covered it with plants and beasts of the field.

About an hour north of Boise by car, the bare hills give way to craggy mountains and sheer river canyons, their sawed-off slopes lined with giant fir trees, their hearts riddled with sulfur springs. A naked insurance claims adjustor in a hot-spring up a muddy slope from the highway, under a cold rain, when wisps of cloud floated through tree-tops and the upper cliffs vanished into white void, told me that Idaho has ten times more hot springs than the other north-western states combined. Sure, I could fact-check that, but I kind of prefer to take his word for it. (What does it say about the future of a society when all the people skinny-dipping at the hot springs are over 25 and the ones in bathing suits are mostly teenagers? Nothing good, I fear.)

Cliff-top hot-springs definitely take the edge off the city jitters, but there’s nothing like a good place to stay to sweeten a weekend getaway. In that capacity, the Boise Guest House will not disappoint. Owner Eve-Marie Bergren has turned this 1895 Victorian town-house into an independent hotel, in which each of the six, elegantly decorated guest suites is equipped with a full kitchen and dining area and furnished with all manner of cookware and even a few basic pantry staples. It’s a good place for a long stay, and Ms. Bergren offers discount rates for visits in excess of five days.

The Boise Guest House is a hotel, not a bed and breakfast—Ms. Bergren lives off-site, there are no complimentary meals, and the atmosphere is more private than communal—but its furnishings split the difference. It’s got the single-serving soaps and shampoos of the hotel industry but the irregular, homey furnishings of the private inn. The bathrooms feel like bathrooms in real houses; the floors are made of wood; the pillowcases and blankets in some rooms are hand-embroidered by a friend of Ms. Bergren’s. Work by local Boise artists adorns the walls, and Ms. Bergren’s own series of encaustic paintings on magnetized tile—she had an earlier career as a professional artist—form abstract, modular mosaics in the corridors between suites. The local art is a new addition to the guesthouse, and Ms. Bergren has plans to add a lot more of it in the near future, commissioning works and even whole room-themes from Boise artists; she sees herself as the curator, the guesthouse her gallery. “If you’re an independent hotel,” she says, “you might as well go all the way in that direction—you can’t compete with a Hilton at being a Hilton.”

Too true, but who wants to stay in a Hilton, anyway? The suites are larger at Boise Guest House, the furnishings prettier, and the accommodations equally comfortable. Plus, the Boise Guest House has bike rentals. The guesthouse is located in between the restaurant-laden downtown hub and the beautiful North End residential neighborhood, and it’s only a ten-minute walk from the former, so you can easily get by without wheels—but there’s nothing like a bike for exploring a city. The Boise Guest House’s two fire-engine-red cruisers are equipped with baskets and rent for $10 per day.

Once you’re on wheels, there’s plenty to see in Boise. (According to locals, it’s actually pronounced “boy-see”—who knew!) (Editor’s note: New York regional accents do no favors for pronunciation. Give Max a break!) To the south and east, the city sprawls out into the strip-malls and modern developments of contiguous municipalities, like Kuna and Meridian, but Boise proper is mostly older buildings and tree-lined streets. The downtown is bristling with restaurants, the fanciest of them about as expensive as a Manhattan diner, and the residential neighborhoods to the north are varied and beautiful—I recommend twilight perambulations through the North End and hikes up onto quail ridge, whence you can look down on the city and see why, despite the barren hills, it’s called Boise: at a 30° from above, it looks more like a forest than a state capital.

Boise’s got a couple universities and some hip coffee shops. There’s a large Basque population and a whole block of Basque-style restaurants. Have a happy-hour fish taco at Matador or locally grown meat and neon-colored cocktails at Bardenay, where several of the liquors are made right there in the giant, polished still that sits behind a glass wall in the dining area, like something out of a steam-punk reimagining of Mickey in the Night Kitchen. End your night at The Balcony, a couple blocks away. It’s the local gay club, but everyone comes there to dance on the weekend: frat boys and fag-hags and middle-aged couples, all undulating together, beneath the disco lights and the smoke machine.

My favorite spot in Boise isn’t downtown, though; it’s a greasy, free-standing diner out along the strip-malls near the airport called “Rockies Diner” with a checkerboard floor, a life-size plastic Harley & rider doing a wheelie in the middle of the room, and waitresses in mini-skirts and roller-skates, where you can get eggs, sausage links, hash-browns, and biscuits & gravy (a meal which, if you don’t mind the 90-minute wait, is available at all the hippest restaurants in downtown Manhattan, for about $13.50) for six bucks—and you should see those girls delivering drinks on wheels! They seem to be having a ball doing it, too; as my companion put it, “Anyone who works at a place like this knows that roller-skating is fun as hell.” She’s got a point—it probably beats the hell out of hunching over a laptop all day, but I guess I’m not complaining. It takes all kinds, doesn’t it: roller-skaters and laptop-hunchbacks and nude insurance claims adjustors, too.

Story: Max Bean
Photos: Paris Mancini

More writing by Max Bean on The Anti Tourist:

• The Staveleigh House Comforts
• Beijing By Train to Nankang

Living in Oregon, I’ve been pretty satisfied with my mountain viewing options.  There’s nothing like driving along I-5 and then – bam!  There’s Mt. Hood looking all majestic, standing alone without any other craggy peaks competing for attention.  Mt. St. Helen’s, Mt. Jefferson and the Three Sisters also strike up their fair share of awe.  So, there’s definitely something validating about singling out the dramatic, single peaks along the northwest’s Cascade Range as some of the best views in our country.   And, sure, Colorado’s Rockies can be impressive – the craggy peaks in Telluride are phenomenal lines of natural perfection.  But, I didn’t  experience true North American mountain majesty until I drove through the Canadian Rockies.  I made my way through Banff National Park in Alberta, and as we entered the kingdom of the Canadian Alps, every view progressively flourished.  The rivers and streams that lined Highway 93 (the main roadway) were pure, mineral mountain waters in chalky blue-greens.  I had never seen fresh water like that!  Big horn sheep were grazing on the shoulder of the road.  And each mountain view ahead became more impressive than the last.  Points of interest that I got to visit in the Canadian Lakes/Banff National Forest include Radium Hot Springs, glassy Lake Louise, with it’s sister lakes, Mirror Lake and Moraine Lake, and the fabulous alpine town of Banff.

Once in the national park, we found our way to Radium Hot Springs.  We were on a tight schedule and didn’t get to take a soak, but it’s on the list of things to do for the next trip.  We drove straight to Lake Louise, “Canada’s Diamond in the Wilderness” - our main point of interest.  Nestled beside the base of Lake Louise, and in the shadow of impressive Mt. Victoria, is the historic Chateau Fairmont Lake Louise.   Stunning views and luxury accommodations make the Chateau Fairmont a spectacular stay.  I hiked around the lake with my father, working hard up the incline to where we found ourselves in the middle of a storybook forest on the edge of the snowline where elk were feeding.  Lake Louise is world famous for its  hiking trails.  While in the woods, we made our way to the smaller Mirror Lake, often called “the goat’s looking glass”, tucked away and missed if not for a hike.  If you’re lucky, you’ll see mountain goats drawn to the mirror-like water.  Also near Lake Louise is Canada’s “other lake”, Lake Moraine.  Another amazing and generous accommodation is the Moraine Lake Lodge.  We ended our tour of the Canadian Rockies in the quaint town of Banff with it’s Old World charm and panoramic views to take in.  It boasts its own premiere hotel – the Fairmont Banff Springs.  Depending on the season you visit, you can find lots to do – from skiing, white water rafting, hiking or simply kicking back with a brew at one of the seasonal pubs.  Tip – go see Lake Louise between 4 and 7 p.m.  There are hardly any tourists then and it affirms the perfect virgin view of the pristine lake.

By: Leah Jorgensen
 

I love these dusty coffee shops, a taste likely instilled by my many hours spent in the Motherlode Coffee House in Houghton, MI, where I hail from. (Unfortunately, the Motherlode has since closed, robbing this Earth of one of its last perfect sanctuaries. I couldn’t find any site to link to, so to fill that void here’s a picture of our famous lift bridge, Houghton’s other claim to fame. Er–I meant “fame”.)

Luckily for me, Austin’s East Village Cafe is close to home, a little out of the way of any kind of hustle or bustle (it’s in a largely residential neighborhood), and is the kind of peaceful place with winsome proprietors who go out of their way to give you the Austin Coffee Shop experience you crave. It’s the kind of place where the barrista will stop by every so often to offer a glass of water or another drink, which I find to be awfully sweet of them.

We moved here from New York, a dismal and lovely place (I MISS IT SO MUCH) where charming coffee shops that let you sit for hours using their free WiFi just do not exist in any meaningful number. Even my favorite, Grey [sic] Dog Cafe, has a strict “No Laptops” policy, at least during busy hours. And so East Village Cafe in Austin fills, for me, a niche that needed filling, a quiet place with great coffee and a great selection of Mexican sodas.

I’ll be back. I already have been, many times.

PS: The guy who works here just gave me a bagel for absolutely no reason at all. He doesn’t even know I’m writing this. Southern Hospitality is the best part of the South.
Story and Photos by: Ben Britz

Back in the Gilded Age of the late 19th Century, when the mansions of millionaire industrialists dotted the countryside of western Massachusetts, the Berkshire Railway connected New York City and Boston to the Berkshires. Nowadays, if you want to spend a weekend up in those lush hills where music festivals and art museums are sprinkled across the verdant countryside like fairy lights, you’ll have to find yourself a car. If you’re like this humble reporter, that could mean taking Metro-North into rural Connecticut and walking two miles on country roads to an overgrown driveway, where a disused and decidedly rickety Saab may or may not start at a twist of the key that you picked up from a family friend in Park Slope two days earlier.

Even the interstates bypass the Berkshires. US Route 7 winds north through the empty farmlands of Connecticut towards the Massachusetts border; as the ribbon of highway unrolls across the land, winding and leaping, beneath the deepening sky, and you feel the old, rocky wilds of primordial New England awakening in the gathering twilight—you’ll know then that it was worth all that bother, to be up here where the air is cool and sweet, and the noise and manic heat of the city are far behind you. (And that gurgling sound the Saab is making—don’t worry about that. It’s just gurgling with pleasure.)

If getting to the Berkshires has gotten more difficult, finding where to stay in the Berkshires has only gotten easier since the 1920s as dozens of inns and bed-and-breakfasts have sprung up in those very mansions where the daughters of steel moguls once lounged in white cotton dresses in rococo drawing-rooms with mirrored walls.

Staveleigh House is among the best these converted mansions. Located immediately south of Sheffield town square, Staveleigh House offers luxurious accommodations for the weekend visitor, as well as special services for all types of events, from bridal showers to small company retreats. The bedrooms and private baths are beautiful, clean, and homey; the staff friendly and helpful; the food delicious and sustainable.

The force behind Staveleigh is owner, innkeeper, and chef, Ali Winton. A former antique dealer and lifetime collector, Ali’s taste for the decorative arts are on rich display at Staveleigh. Dinner plates, intricately painted with vivid, almost lascivious fruit-arrangements, adorn the walls of the 2nd floor landing; a giant rooster of wire and Spanish moss sits atop a tray of gourds in the dining-room; the stained-glass window-panes of long forgotten houses decorate the windows of the bathrooms; spindly lamps, wooden dressers, delicate, side-tables are all carefully arranged about the rooms. The old Staveleigh mansion teems with the carefully crafted, abandoned objects of decades past, now gathered and given new purpose, along with the giant house they inhabit.

If a less generous visitor might accuse the interior of primness, he would find the careful arrangement of the house itself balanced by the wild lusciousness of the front gardens, where the purple tendrils of Love-Lies-Bleedings hang amidst a riot of untamed vegetation. Marigolds rise on fine stems, like the sky-cities of a science-fiction dream, and explode into vivid red and yellow mouths, gnashing at the sky; and dahlias stand, calm as blood-colored anemones; and giant leaves and vines and wild sprays of green reach towards the hanging painted sign of Staveleigh. Thus the well-ordered mind of Staveleigh House is betrayed by the wild heart of Staveleigh Gardens.

Wandering the halls and rooms of the mansion, the observant guest will notice a recurring theme of dogs: framed photographs, china sculptures, and on the bedside table, a copy of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night. (The literarily-minded guest might even flip through the latter while his girlfriend is running a bath in that immense tub and find it, well, not quite as clever as its author seems to find it.) If you go around the back of Staveleigh, past the pointillist shadows of the lattice roof above the veranda, you can meet Ali’s three rescue dogs, along with her chickens, sheep, baby goats, donkey (from Craigslist), and miniature horse. Ali and her husband are animal lovers, and richly adorned as it may be, Staveleigh House is enthusiastically pet-friendly.

Whenever there are guests at Staveleigh, Ali is up at 6am to start breakfast. Using organic ingredients from local Berkshire-area farms and eggs from her own hens, Ali constructs elaborate breakfasts of Belgian waffles with fresh fruit and apple-cheddar quiches. If you’re lucky, you’ll be there for one of her cheese soufflés which she fills with kale and onions from her garden. On the side, she serves piles of roasted potatoes, croissants, and apple-cider. Her coffee is high quality, and her syrup is the pure maple kind.

From the coffee on up, a weekend at Staveleigh is a thoroughly satisfying experience—luxurious yet informal, rustic yet classy, carefully curated yet touchingly personal. Personally, we had such a good time that on the way back down to the city, my girlfriend (who took the photos for this article) started talking about buying that old Saab, so we could go up there more often. “It only shakes like that in the 60s,” she explained. “Once you get up to around 70, it smooths out real nice.”

Story by: Max Bean, author of education and pedagogy blog Dewey to Delpit
Photos by: Paris Mancini


Gallery: click on a thumbnail to view full size.

Day 1: Austin – Wimberly

After a couple weeks of planning and lamenting about the trip we are on our way!

The trip couldn’t have started any worse.

• One of my compatriots, Brooks, would be arriving late from New Orleans.
• The one thing you would think I had packed would be the maps but I left that at home.
• Brooks left his bivvy sack in his friends car.
• Dammit.

After finally collecting all our missing pieces and loading up our bikes I felt that the two person tent I was bringing was unnecessary. The sucker weighted a good 4-5 pounds and easily draped over my rack. A last minute REI trip was necessary to procure a bivvy sack.

A bivvy sack or Bivouac bag is a shell that slips over your sleeping bag. It is a waterproof shell that protects you from the elements, adds a little extra warmth to your sleeping bag, and makes a tent unnecessary. With this I could not only cut my weight but also my footprint.

So all together we wasted enough time to delay our departure a good 6 hours.

Once we hit the road we had to deal with Saturday traffic around South Congress and it wasn’t really till we hit old San Antonio road that I felt we has left Austin. One of the things that frustrates me most about biking in the city is all the starting and stopping. It’s really hard to get into a rhythm and allow your body to just let let go and just bike.

The first day proved a new experience for all of us. I don’t think any of us had biked with all of stuff we would be carrying for the trip. We moved slow by at a steady pace. Eventually we crawled into Wimberly, Texas.

Wimberly is a small town located 40 miles west of Austin and about 16 miles north of San Marcos. Because of it’s close proximity to Texas state in San Marcos is has a college feel to it but still maintains the charm of a small Texas town. We found a place to eat and grab a beer at Ino’z Brew and Chew. The venue is really nice with a large outdoor patio, a stage up top, and to the south, a small creek. The live music was great and the pitcher of beer hit the spot after a long first day.

According to our map there was a bike-only camping ground but we couldn’t find it due to its unhelpful directions: “off route 0.2 miles behind emergency service building”. THANKS FOR NOTHING.

So instead we camped in the cemetery. It was fitting, considering how “dead” we felt.

Day 2 Wimberly-Kerrville

We started Day 2 with a mileage deficit: we still had to make up the 20 miles we didn’t make on Day 1.  There was a lot of climbing today.  Hills rolled up and down giving us a nice opportunity to work on our endurance.  Most of the day I spent slowly pushing my way up a hill, the only sounds my breathing and the clicking of my chain. The click click click of the chain mastering a hill reminds me of going up the first incline of a roller coaster.

Right when everything in my body started to shake and gasp for air, I’d be reprieved with a nice descent.  I’d let my legs can breathe for a second and regain some composure. But the break only lasts a second before I’d snap back into action, striving to take you as fast as possible down the hill to make the most of my momentum.  Everything suddenly feels as if it is moving underneath you instead of a struggle to push your way against gravity.

Before we even got to the climbing section of the day, Bob decided to call it a day and return home to Austin, to tacos and barbecue.  His presence will be missed as the wise sage on our quest.

While resting in Comfort, Texas I received an email from a guy that I had met online through couchsurfing.com. He had a place for us to stay, a hot shower and some warm food.

It only took us 2 days to figure out we were carrying way too much stuff.

Brooks and I weighed our bikes and gear to see how much we were lugging.  My total weight was 90lbs and Brooks had about 80lbs of stuff.

If that sounds like a lot, imagine how it feels hauling it uphill for 50 miles.

To put it into perspective, I weigh 170lbs. That means I’m carrying over half my weight in gears and gear.  By the end of the night Brooks and I made the necessary choice to drop a good week’s worth of oatmeal, rice, pasta, peanut butter, as well as a pot with lid and some extra clothing.

Hopefully this lost weight will allow us to gain some speed and take some stress of our body. I’m a little worried about running out of food but I don’t think it is realistic to carry that much weight.  If anything I can start that diet I so desperately need.

Previous: EPIC BIKE TRIP

It’s a gray and rainy day in Austin. My windshield wipers are on, my headlights are on. As if to intentionally disapprove of the weather forecast, I have iced tea beside me, rattling in my old Honda’s cup holder. I feel depleted. One of the reasons I moved to Austin was to escape the bitterness of the brutal New York weather; to escape the weight that pulled me down on days like these. I welcome these gray days in Austin more than I ever welcomed them in New York, but the way my body feels, the sheer exhaustion at the hand of the climate, is undeniable. But I’ve made a plan to check out my friend’s vintage store today, Charm School Vintage.

Charm School Vintage isn’t far from my house. It’s a straight shot from where I live down to Caesar Chavez‘s eastern-most parts and, pro-gentrification as this may be to say, I really like this street. I really like this area.

Glowing with the flashing bulbs of an arrow-shaped sign, the front porch of Charm School Vintage looks just like the porch of any other house in the neighborhood, but with a few additional components:

1. Said glowing arrow sign.
2. A porch swing. Good for the swinging.
3. A clothing rack or two.

Enter through the front door and you’ll find yourself in a building that hosts not only Charm School Vintage, but also a fabulous wig/accessories/makeup shop called Coco Coquette, and an additionally fabulous salon–the whole collection is called Daisical Industries. The ceiling’s paint is chipped, just as it should be. A beacon of the old shining onto the old. Browse through Charm School’s clothing selection and you’ll find yourself asking this question, I’d reckon:

“How come I don’t ever find these kinds of great clothes at second-hand stores”?

The answer is: you’re not Shari Gerstenberger. That’s why.

Shari Gerstenberger was one of the first people I met upon moving to Austin and I liked her right away. She’s a lady with a clear sense of irony and unstoppable ambition. Furthermore, she’s a lady with impeccable taste–which is handy considering her line of work.

It’s Shari’s job to make ladies look better. To doll them up and accentuate the things that deserve accentuating. She approaches this task through the eras before us; through vintage fashion. So just to be clear, here’s what vintage clothing means, definitionally:

Second-hand garments originating from a previous era.

Which eras?

Well, clothing produced before the 1920s, generally speaking, is considered antique. Clothing produced between the 1920s and 1980s, generally speaking, is considered vintage.

Shari’s specialty is vintage, particularly bohemian-hippie-beautiful vintage. Her eye is what makes Charm School Vintage different than other vintage stores. Once a buyer for Buffalo Exchange, Shari’s natural sense of style was honed through her work and when the opportunity to open her own shop came a’knockin’, well, she came a’runnin’. Her store is stacked full with a few closets’ worth of apparel I’d like to purchase, and to be fair, it’s not expensive. It’s cheaper than American Apparel. It’s cheaper than Urban Outfitters. And lets face it: it’s way better than both. Nothing quite says ‘unoriginal’ more than wearing the same floral print sundress every other girl on the block also got from the sale rack at ____________.

But the strength of Shari’s style is in her eye. I’ve been thrifting with her. And you know what? She’s a clothing magician. She sees potential in pieces you wouldn’t see potential in. She sees flaws in pieces you think are good. She recognizes quality fabrics, quality craftsmanship, and quality brands. She likes earth tones. (I like earth tones!) But she’s handy with a sewing machine and jewelry-making tools. Shari can make glorious what was once left abandoned. And she does it with such finesse, you’ll want to keep coming back to her shop, no matter the rain, no matter the gray.

By: Elizabeth Seward
Photos by: Ben Britz

Gallery: click on a thumbnail to view full size.

This is Jon here.

I’ve been helping out at The Anti Tourist for a little while and with the new site and thought I’d take a second to introduce myself.

I grew up in Cleveland, Ohio and now reside in Austin, Texas.

In less than a week I will be biking over 2500 miles to San Francisco.

(For illustrative purposes and braggadocio only – the actual route may differ! -Eds.)

Going on a bike tour has always been a long dream of mine. I have been biking as long as I can remember.

When everyone was learning how to drive, my dad offered me a choice; he’d go half on a shitty car or I could get a new bike. I chose the bike and have never looked back.

I love to share my love of biking with others every chance I can. This trip will allow me to explore parts of the country I have never seen before, push myself to new limits, and meet some great folks along the way. I’ll be posting updates regularly on Facebook and The Anti Tourist to share the experience with all of you as often as I can.

Cheers,
Jon

Next: Biking Austin to LA: Days 1 and 2

When I asked my friend for restaurant recommendations in Austin, she told me to go to the East Side Showroom. She described the place in such rich tones that I envisioned a bordello atmosphere, velvet red decor, sexy cocktails, and excellent food. When I pushed open the heavy street front doors of the East Side Showroom, finally making my entrance, finally checking it all out, it didn’t take me long to register that I was seeing what she claimed I would see: a vibrant restaurant and bar with a knack for eccentricity.

Used paint can lids find themselves bound together in cloud-like bursts on the walls beside the dining tables at East Side Showroom. Old jars and vases find themselves on display on shelves under bright light; the rest of the room is dimly-lit; the romance in the room is tangible. The Showroom.

The waiters are Southern Belles and Gentlemen, eager to make you feel at home.

The food awaits your swooning.

The bartenders are alchemists; the drinks are magic.

Silent movies continuously play in an empty picture frame.

They serve wine in jars.

We dined on a busy Friday night and I swirled the Malbec around in my mouth for an unnecessarily long while, hoping its flavor would seep into my tongue and last through the evening. The flavor did persist, my mouth did rejoice, and I tipsily made my way home with Ben Britz at the wheel.

By: Elizabeth Seward
Photos By: Ben Britz

Gallery: click on a thumbnail to view full size.