Braddock Journey

Friday, February 20, 2009

This week I’ve been working on the bathroom tiles with Jodi, Kevin, and Mike.

They turned out surprisingly well for being built from boxes and piles of tile collected over months of Construction Junction hunting.

Somehow I forgot to take a photo of the final completed wall this afternoon ... it was either because I was later than expected and rushing to get back or because I became fascinated with the strange view through the glass brick window and took a ton of pictures of that instead ...

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

One of the abandoned houses on our block that has been slated for demolition since before we bought our house is coming down today.

It is only one of three or four near us that will be coming down. 

Thursday, October 09, 2008

Volunteers planted the orchard the day I flew out to Atlanta. 

Thursday, September 25, 2008

Last month I posted about the changing landscape in Braddock. No surprise—things keep moving forward!

The brick oven now has a roof and was set in motion with a pizza and bread baking evening. Today the oven is puffing away again as Josh bakes up bread and pizzas for the Post-Gazette coverage.

What I thought was going to be a sculpture garden on the lot behind the Verona bus stop was actually being made into a mosaic garden. The Post-Gazette covered Braddock’s mosaic and linked efforts to create an art community.

This weekend volunteers will be planting fruit trees on the lot at the entrance to town near the steel mill. The urban orchard will take the place of an abandoned lot, which already looks better since it has been leveled and seeded.

And down on 6th street between Talbot and Braddock the building that burnt down this past winter is being rebuilt at an impressive speed.

Friday, September 19, 2008

It’s amazing what a difference framed in walls and some light bulbs make!

Nicholas Electric finished the rough in last week, a day ahead of schedule, and we have switches with working overhead lights for the first time in the house! We can see the basement.

Having outlets, switches, and light really makes the place look like it’s coming together. We can see the final steps ... heat, insulation, drywall. When we had the latest materials delivered from Lowe’s the delivery guy took a tour of the house and left us with some reassuring thoughts. He did the same thing to his place, but one room at a time while he lived in it. In the end, he said, it’s worth all of the hard work.

Around the same time that the electric was being isntalled, Dun-Rite came in and repaired and replaced the windows. The new subfloors are mostly done. Maybe some day we will actually have a livable house.

Monday, September 01, 2008

Food may be one of the most difficult transitions in moving to Braddock, depending on the city of comparison. There are very few options for purchasing food, prepared or not, in Braddock. A far cry from our short time spent in Portland, but not too different from Juneau.

In general, Pittsburgh food is like a northern version of southern food - lots of really tasty stuff that’s bad for you. Heaping reubens, chicken wings of all varieties, hamburgers, pizza, pierogies. All great stuff, but we’ve found little that is so impressive we want to go out for it. We’re cooking in very often, just like in Juneau, because the variety seems limited when eating out. Sure there’s an excellent sushi place and a German restaurant, but those are things we do every once in a while. We haven’t found a place that has such good dishes that we want to go back again and again to try everything on the menu. But we’re still looking ...

Yet even when cooking at home, Braddock is definitely a town that requires transportation for sustenance. The stores in the proximity to Braddock (two Giant Eagles) offer lackluster produce and limited selections in the deli. The larger store in the Waterfront has more selection, but the store in Braddock Hills is easier to access. There is the option of driving to Whole Foods, which is a complete circus because of its unique offerings. I drove out to that area, hitting either Whole Foods or Trader Joes, maybe once every two weeks for the first month or so. Until the CSA boxes started coming in this summer, then the Pennsylvania farms began to shine. I am a huge fan of community supported agriculture, and the boxes from the Dillner Family Farm have given us an excellent sampling of local produce.

But what to do if you are in Braddock and you don’t have a CSA box? Or a car?

Every Wednesday, in season, the Braddock Farm Stand is open. Excellent locally grown produce, including enormous ocra, is supplemented with other veggies they bring in so that there is a wider variety available.

Family Dollar on Braddock Avenue has a prime selection of junk food, boxes/canned items, and a small selection of refrigerated goods.

Stambolis’ poultry shop and Bells Market are also on Braddock Avenue. You can stop into the poultry place for a cold soft drink, fish, or poultry. Bells seems to sell a lot of their combination box deals (buy x, x, x, and x and you get a free bag of potatoes!) and it always looks busy. When I was in there the produce was not impressive, but again that was before the local produce came into season and the produce at Giant Eagle wasn’t impressive either. At least there is a small selection of produce in Braddock along side the larger selection of meats.

Al’s at the start of town has general convenience store fare. And there are two bar/diners within walking distance. Heidy’s under the Rankin Bridge has great burgers a la carte for under $4. I hear their veggie burger is excellent as well. We keep meaning to try out the Green Castle Cafe on Talbot, but haven’t been there yet. 

Sunday, August 17, 2008

Friday at noon I stopped working and started cleaning. 48 hours later we had completed the set up of a two-room cafe and opened the doors for a surprise brunch: Espresso, fresh oj, hot cocoa, bloody marys, iced toddy, tea, vegan waffles, peach crepes, quiche, muffins and more in Braddock’s own The Bad Habit cafe!

For months this cafe bar hardware has been collecting dust (and lots of it with our proximity to the steel mill) in a back room at the convent. A little less than two weeks ago Jodi, Emily and I decided that we should set it up and put it to use. It would clear out that room and create a space for socializing, working, and caffeinating in Braddock. We decided to surprise everyone with a completed cafe on August 17, but to do that we needed to wait and set it up right before the event.

Jodi went back to Brooklyn and started collecting donations for the bar. My friend Liz was in town from Massachusetts, and we brainstormed cafe names over dinner. Then we came back and ran them by Emily, who came up with art for the name with the most votes: The Bad Habit. We also called on Ryan to send a series of his photographs of Braddock to hang in the cafe with Emily’s drawings and Mary Beth’s photos of Braddock. Then we waited.

Finally this week rolled around and Jodi showed up with a car brimming with cafe supplies and decor. Jodi, Mary Beth, Emily and I cleaned and shopped and set up and cleaned and moved things and disassembled and rebuilt things and learned to use an espresso maker and baked and shooed people out and hid the progress with closed doors ... until it was complete. Then we stood in the room, 15 minutes to brunch, and took a collective deep breath. Inhaling the waffles and espresso and enjoying the moment.

If chaos, excitement, and swearing in surprise are good signs, then the cafe opening* was a success. There was a good turn out for the brunch, and everyone seemed to enjoy the cafe experience.

Over at the Matchwood Festival blog there are more photos and an interview with us on the day of the opening.

*unfortunately, the cafe is only open now for private events. We have some amazing volunteer baristas, and hopefully soon it will be able to open as a full cafe.

Saturday, August 09, 2008

The compound is looking different these days. From small things left by passers-through to the greenhouse and brick oven, this place is shaping up.

The greenhouse atop Kristin & Joel’s building brightens up the sky, bestowing an almost beachy feel on sunny days.

Joe Bonifate’s crew is finishing up the brick oven in the courtyard beside the convent. Over the next year I’ll be volunteering on Braddock projects, and one of my goals is to get a series of healthy eating/living events set up using the brick oven and Braddock Farms produce.

And down Braddock Ave at the Verona bus stop, there is construction underway to create what I’ve heard will be a sculpture garden. 

Thursday, July 17, 2008

We kept thinking the demo was done. Almost done. But then something would happen. Like taking down a ceiling to put in a dryer vent revealing a giant rat’s nest encompassing the entire utility room.

Kevin was chatting and ripping out the ceiling when he started to see popcorn and wondered why it would be in the ceiling. Then there was the cloth and bits of things that formed what seemed to be many many bird nests pulled apart and combined into one. The abandoned nest covered the floor of the entire room once it was down.

After that, we decided the first floor walls that were being spared now had to go. So off with the walls ...

Now Kevin is coming back a little less dirty every day. Only a day or two left of filling contractor bags with lathe and plaster and soot.