Featured Stories

Videoline: Celebrating the Midtown Greenway

Streetfilms Wednesday, October 19, 2011

To accompany Jay Walljasper's take on bike policy and bike culture in the Twin Cities, here's a video by Streetfilms that shows just how valuable one of the crown jewels in our bikeway system is--the Midtown Greenway, running more or less parallel to Lake Street from Chowen Avenue to the Mississippi River.

Coordination/Collaboration, Creative Leadership, Strong Local Economy, Sustainability, Transportation

Riverfront/Mill District, Phillips, University, Macalester - Groveland, Cedar - Riverside/West Bank, Downtown, Lake Street, Southwest, North Side, Uptown/Lyn Lake, Seward, Nokomis, Longfellow, Calhoun - Isles, Powderhorn, Warehouse/North Loop, Northeast

Lighting up the night with Northern Spark

Tristan Pollock Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Hobbled by a broken ankle but determined to see as much glow-in-the-dark art as he could, our reporter plunged into the dusk-to-dawn art extravaganza called Northern Spark on the night of June 4. He saw luminescent plankton, 1,600 light-bulb pixels, and a wall of perfectly legal virtual graffiti.

Arts and Culture

Downtown, Downtown/Lowertown, Riverfront/Mill District, University

Owners, chamber join forces to keep Corridor businesses healthy

Michelle Bruch Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Nobody expected Central Corridor light-rail construction to be easy on the small businesses along the route. But now that the challenges of access and parking are hitting, business owners, the Saint Paul Area Chamber of Commerce and other local organizations are working to keep the Corridor as customer-friendly as possible.

Central Corridor, Creative Leadership, Entrepreneurship, Regionalism, Strong Local Economy, Transit Oriented Development

Downtown/Lowertown, Midway, Saint Anthony Park, Summit - University, Thomas - Dale/Frogtown, University

Editor's Pick: The Minneapolis LOHAS Forum

Jon Spayde Wednesday, May 11, 2011

LOHAS means "Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability"--people concerned with health, the environment, social justice, and personal growth who buy $290 billion worth of goods and services in support of these ideals. The first regional LOHAS conference kicks off tomorrow at the U of M, for merchants, marketers, and others who want to reach these consumers.

Creative Economy, Entrepreneurship, Green Jobs, Strong Local Economy, Sustainability

University

"Human-centric" design makes health care friendlier

Dan Haugen Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Most medical spaces and procedures aren't designed with the patient in mind. But that's beginning to change as health-care designers pay more attention to making the patient's experience pleasant and even fun. Here are four local examples of "human-centric" med-design.

Arts and Culture, Design, Emerging Technology, Life Sciences

Northeast, Downtown, Riverfront/Mill District, University, Warehouse/North Loop, Phillips

EcoDeep and ICON Solar: Two elegant experimental houses that are about as green as you can get

Camille LeFevre Wednesday, January 05, 2011

While many of us do our best to retrofit our houses to be more sustainable--adding insulation, putting in low-flow toilets, installing a solar panel on the roof--some Twin Cities architects and designers are going all-the-way green with rehabs and new house designs that are radically--and even experimentally--devoted to environmental responsibility. Two of the most prominent locally are the EcoDEEP Haus in Saint Paul, an environmentally concerned architect's refitting of his own house, and the University of Minnesota's ICON Solar House, the result of the input of some 150 design students. And these sensible, responsible houses also happen to be way cool to look at and live in.

Design, Green Jobs

University, Highland Park

Where is product design headed? A U of M symposium offers up-to-the-minute answers

Camille LeFevre Wednesday, October 13, 2010

To celebrate the creation a graduate minor in product design, and raise awareness of the field within the Twin Cities' vibrant design community, the University of Minnesota's College of Design held a wide-ranging symposium on the discipline of designing objects to sell. Experts weighed in on everything from the role of humor in design creativity to the popularity of vintage clothing stores--and more than one presenter warned that the increasing geographical separation of design centers from factories is weakening product design in the US and favoring China, where designers and producers interact with ease.

Arts and Culture, Creative Economy, Creative Leadership, Design

University, Midway

Replacing the Replacements: Our music scene is still hot, and here's where to catch rising stars

Dan Heilman Wednesday, September 29, 2010

The palmy days of Prince, H�sker D�, the Replacements, and other iconic Twin Cities bands may have passed, but our music scene is just as vital, and a lot more diverse, today. Just as in the golden age, seeing and hearing the bands live is crucial to really getting to know the scene, so here is our list of definitive venues--from the legendary and cavernous former home base of the Purple One, First Avenue, to the beer-fragrant holes-in-the-wall where tomorrow's stars are plugging in their amps.

Arts and Culture

Downtown, Cedar - Riverside/West Bank, North Side, Midway, University, Powderhorn, Lake Street, Uptown/Lyn Lake, Southwest, Calhoun - Isles

The Central Corridor's funky treasures: A slideshow of offbeat "stops" on the future light rail line

Jon Spayde,Bill Kelley Wednesday, July 21, 2010

In one magical zone in the Twin Cities, there's a loon made of junk, a chimney covered in shattered glass and ceramic shards, a place to buy tarantulas, and a hotel straight out of the Coen brothers. It's called the Central Corridor. The Line's ace managing photographer, Bill Kelley, and its managing editor, Jon Spayde, traveled University Avenue and Washington Avenue, where much of the light rail line will run when it's completed in 2014, seeking out their favorite offbeat, oddball, one-of-a-kind, things, things they hope and trust will be preserved through the construction of the line and the development of the Corridor neighborhoods. Herewith, their top ten.

Arts and Culture, Central Corridor, Transit Oriented Development

Thomas - Dale/Frogtown, Summit - University, Union Park, University

Building as eco-art: Dan Noyes' Vesper College trains architects to be hands-on visionaries

Karen Olson Wednesday, June 09, 2010

Dan Noyes was a veteran teacher of architecture and design who wanted to create something new: a small, hyper-hands-on school of "ecological architecture" where the goal wouldn't be simply to turn out well-trained designers, but to nurture visionary poets of space-making whose work would foster a connection with the earth. When Noyes discovered that a century-old telephone exchange building in Northeast Minneapolis needed a basement tenant, one of the nation's smallest--and most innovative--graduate schools was born.

Creative Leadership, Design, Green Jobs

University

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