The Bluegrass and Beyond

When I moved back here 15 years ago, Lexingtonians were battling with bumper stickers. Builders and developers had “Growth is Good” stickers on their bumpers. Preservationists had “Growth Destroys Bluegrass Forever” on theirs.

It was a pointless debate. Growth is inevitable. The question is how best to handle it.

Fortunately, discussions about growth and development are now less heated and simplistic and more productive. Both sides realize that Lexington’s future depends on steady, well-planned growth that encourages compatible economic development but doesn’t spoil the Bluegrass’ unique beauty and quality of life.

I gained some valuable insights into these issues recently by joining 28 other local people in a program called Citizens Planning Academy. We met two hours each Wednesday morning for six weeks to hear experts speak about all aspects of local growth and planning from a variety of viewpoints.

The program was organized by the land-use advocacy group Fayette Alliance and co-sponsored by the Home Builders Association of Lexington, the Fayette Farm Bureau, the American Society of Landscape Architects and The Plantory, a shared workspace for social entrepreneurs.

While Lexington has made mistakes over the years, it has been trying longer and harder than most cities to manage growth. The city’s first comprehensive plan was adopted in 1931. My house was then at the eastern edge of the city limits. Now, many people refer to it as being “downtown.”

The 1931 plan referred to Union Station, the long-ago-demolished train depot, as the most important building in town. Ironically, it is now the site of the recently renovated Helix  parking garage and the office where people take automobile driving tests and get their licenses.

In 1958 — 15 years before city-county merger — Lexington became the first city in America to set an urban growth boundary to limit suburban sprawl and protect rural land. Over the years, the Urban Services Area has been expanded from 22 percent of the county to about 30 percent.

From the 1950s to the early 2000s, Lexington experienced rapid, automobile-centric growth as residential subdivisions and shopping centers were built on former farmland. In recent years, there has been more focus on urban infill and redevelopment as everyone realized Fayette County’s farmland and open space is precious, finite and a vital to Lexington’s economy, image and quality of life.

Unlike most areas of Kentucky, Lexington is likely to see continued population growth, from a current 302,000 people to about 376,000 by 2030.  How are we planning for that growth?  Here are a couple of trends to watch:

Future growth will likely be more dense, more urban and less dependent on automobiles.

“We’re planning for a different type of population,” said Chris King, director of Lexington’s Division of Planning.

Many aging baby boomers and young people want to be able to walk or bike to work, shopping and entertainment. That means different styles of new neighborhoods and retrofitting older neighborhoods to make them less isolated.

Residential development and revitalization of in-town neighborhoods has been a key piece of the renaissance of downtown Lexington as a mixed-use area. That trend is likely to continue, King said.

That’s good, because it makes more efficient use of land. But increasing density is sure to spark conflict with some existing neighborhoods.

Another big factor in Lexington’s future growth will be outdoor water quality. Many developments in recent decades were built with inadequate infrastructure, which led to storm-water runoff problems and pollution of local streams. The city must spend millions of dollars to remedy past sins and prevent new ones under a consent decree with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

That means that sewer capacity will limit future growth much more severely in the past. But the consent decree also has prompted city officials to get creative with natural solutions for storm-water management and filtering: permeable pavement, stream-bank restoration and systems for capturing and reusing rainwater.

The exciting Town Branch Commons proposal could be another piece of “green” infrastructure, creating both a linear park through downtown and helping to manage storm-water runoff.

The Fayette Alliance plans another Citizens Planning Academy next year, but dates have not been set. Watch FayetteAlliance.com for more information about how to apply.

At Thursday Night Live, Dave Floyd watches Ilias Pappas of the Athenian Grill food truck prepare his gyros sandwich. Pappas started his business as a food truck last September and plans to transition to a small Greek restaurant in Chevy Chase this summer.  Photos by Tom Eblen

Since food trucks and stands started popping up in Lexington a few years ago, they have become popular with customers but created tension with bricks-and-mortar restaurants.

Some restaurant owners have fought efforts to make food trucks more accessible, saying their low overhead makes them unfair competition. So far, the city has only permitted them to operate on private property or at special events.

Council member Shevawn Akers chairs a food truck ordinance work group, which has streamlined the permitting process. Last week, the group came up with a proposal that council should approve. It would allow a pilot project to let food trucks operate in designated downtown parking areas.

What will be interesting to see is how many food truck operators go on to start restaurants.

Ilias Pappas, owner of the Athenian Grill food stand, is well on his way.

Pappas, 33, was born in Lamia, Greece, and emigrated to this country to attend college at Lexington Community College, the University of Kentucky and Florida International University. After working in technology in Miami for a year or two, he returned to his first love: food. He worked in several Miami restaurants.

Pappas is now renovating a former bakery on South Ashland Avenue to be his Greek restaurant and market.

Pappas had grown up living over a bakery and eating traditional Greek food prepared by this mother and grandmother. While attending college in Lexington, he had helped his aunt and uncle, George and Louiza Ouraniou, a welder and a chef. They also were caterers and became popular fixtures at community events over the years, serving barbecued lamb and Greek gyros.

Then tragedy struck: George Ouraniou, 71, died in a car wreck in September 2011. Pappas returned to Lexington to help his aunt. Then he moved back for good a few months later.

“I never imagined I would end up living here,” Pappas said of Lexington. “But I realized this was the place I wanted to stay.”

Pappas said his uncle had always dreamed of opening a Greek restaurant, but never did. Pappas had the same dream, and figured a food truck would be an affordable way to start.

Last September, he created Athenian Grill, a food stand serving four types of gyros, Greek salad, spinach pie, Cypriot meatballs, hummus and baklava. With help from several friends, it became a popular fixture outside Country Boys Brewing and West Sixth Brewery and at Thursday Night Live on Cheapside.

“I didn’t have a business plan; I learned on the job,” Pappas said. “The (brewery) owners have been very good to me. The exposure I got as a food trucker provided opportunities for exposure and allowed me to introduce myself to people.”

That has led to catering and event opportunities. But Pappas wants to do much more than he can do now cooking on the street and preparing things in advance in commercial kitchen space he rents in Nicholasville.

“The food truck doesn’t allow me to give people a good exposure to a traditional family-style Greek dining experience,” he said. “It’s very limited what you can do out on the street.”

So Pappas has rented the former Belle’s Bakery building in Chevy Chase — an old two-car garage set back off South Ashland Avenue between Euclid and High streets— and has begun renovations. He hopes to open the restaurant in July.

In addition to a few inside and outside tables, the non-mobile Athenian Grill will have lunch delivery and a Greek market upstairs, which can be booked for small private dinners. In addition to traditional Greek food, Pappas plans to offer some of the flavors he grew to like while working in Miami.

“Ninety percent of the menu will be things you cannot find in Lexington at the moment,” he said.

Pappas is financing the venture with his own savings, plus loans from family and friends. He also has launched a campaign on Kickstarter.com, as much to attract community involvement as financing.

“Because of my food truck, people have given me the chance to take the next step,” Pappas said. “My uncle worked very hard in the food business. I want to dedicate my restaurant to him.”

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 Alfalfa Restaurant moved into the Downtown Arts Center on Main Street a decade ago, decorating its wall with the sign letters from the original location on South Limestone Street. Photo by Tom Eblen

The way restaurants come and go, this one would seem like a long shot. A group of idealistic 20-somethings with little money and no experience wanted to serve wholesome food at reasonable prices.

Short of chairs on opening day in April 1973, they offered free meals to customers who donated them.

“We had an unusual business plan at first: six partners and two menu items,” said Art Howard, one of the original partners. “I wouldn’t recommend that now.”

Alfalfa Restaurant not only survived, it became a local institution that is now one of Lexington’s oldest restaurants. Current and former customers and employees are invited to a 40th anniversary party, 4 to 10 p.m. April 28 at the current location, 141 East Main Street.

“We’ve basically tried to have fun with the place,” said Jake Gibbs, an off-and-on minority owner who started washing dishes as a graduate student in 1979 and now tries to manage Alfalfa as well as a reluctant capitalist can.

“We don’t do a huge business,” Gibbs said. “We roughly break even every year.”

Artie Howard cooks during Alfalfa’s early days.

Making money was never the main goal. Alfalfa, after all, was started by what the restaurant’s website calls “hippie-type” young people with what was then a novel interest in healthy, locally produced food.

“We were pretty much ahead of our time,” said Howard, who sold his interest in Alfalfa a few years later, became a chef and, since 1995, has owned The Ketch Seafood Grill on Regency Road.

“They bought real vegetables from real local farmers before it was cool,” said Rona Roberts, a regular Alfalfa customer since 1973 who now writes the food blog Savoring Kentucky. “They have a lot of distinctive food; they’ve never given up on making everything themselves.”

When Alfalfa opened at 557 South Limestone, near the University of Kentucky, it was financed with $2,000 that Howard inherited from a grandmother and $100 or $200 kicked in by each of the other five partners, he said.

The restaurant’s name was the result of a desperate brainstorming session as opening day neared. Howard can’t remember who came up with “Alfalfa,” but he said it might have been less a reference to the forage legume than to a character from the 1930s Our Gang comedies, then in TV reruns.

Howard had been interested in starting a bakery, so he became the baker, setting a standard for fresh-baked, whole-grain bread that baker Tom Martin has kept going for the past 35 years.

Partner Leslie Bower, who had trained at Le Cordon Bleu culinary school in France, was the first head cook. (She was murdered in 1979 when she stopped in Georgia to ask directions.)

The restaurant’s most notorious employee was a cook in 1974 known as Lena Paley. Soon after she abruptly left town, Alfalfa employees recognized her on an FBI “wanted” poster as Susan Saxe, an accomplice in a 1970 Boston bank robbery in which a police officer was killed. Captured in 1975, Saxe pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was paroled in 1982.

Jake Gibbs, who manages the restaurant, began as a dishwashing graduate student in 1979.

Alfalfa left its original home a decade ago and moved into the Downtown Arts Center on Main Street. Gibbs said the restaurant is negotiating for another 10-year lease.

All of the original partners left Alfalfa long ago, and there have been several owners over the years who started as employees of the restaurant. They included Marina Ubaldi, Jeff Gitlin and Gibbs, who teaches history at Bluegrass Community and Technical College.

Jim Happ, the main owner since 2004, also is CEO of Labcon North America, a California-based manufacturer of sustainable laboratory materials. He and his wife, Betsey, met while working at Alfalfa. They named their daughter for Helen Alexander, who has been a cook there for 25 years.

Like previous owners, Happ and Gibbs have tried to maintain the quality and variety of Alfalfa’s health-conscious food, as well as the family atmosphere for both customers and employees.

“Alfalfa’s is such a nice family,” said Lexington artist John Lackey. He and his wife, Jenny, both worked at the restaurant, as did their son, Quinn, 21. Their younger son, Dylan, 17, works there now.

“It’s a labor of love,” Lackey said of Alfalfa. “It’s just such a great, interesting collection of people; the right balance of service and insanity.”

Alfalfa staff members photographed in 1974, the year after the restaurant opened. Among the owners at the time were, left to right, Marina McCulloch (wearing hat), Leslie Bower (front left in dark shirt), Artie Howard (tallest in back,  with beard), Lucia Walls (front right in dark shirt) and Ann “Panny” Hobson (right center).  Photo by Guy Mendes

Shuyler Warren, left, and Keith Hautala of Magic Beans Coffee Roasters follow the progress of a batch of roasting beans. Their roaster uses hot air, and the temperature can be calibrated to within 1 degree Fahrenheit.  Photos by Tom Eblen

For some people, a great cup of coffee is worth a little extra trouble and expense. Keith Hautala and Schuyler Warren are two of those people, and they hope more Kentuckians will be, too.

Last December, the friends started Magic Beans Coffee Roasters, which uses a high-tech process to produce fresh, precisely roasted single-source coffees from around the world.

Bags of the whole-bean coffee are sold at Sunrise Bakery, Wine + Market, Town Branch Market and West Sixth Brewery. Brewed coffee will be on the menu of County Club restaurant, which opens later this month at 555 Jefferson St.

Magic Beans also will sell beans at the Lexington Farmers Market at Cheapside on Saturdays, beginning April 13. The company has a Kickstarter.com campaign under way to raise money for a brewed-to-order coffee bar at its market booth.

“We’re trying to convert people,” Hautala said. “We’re trying to create demand for something among coffee drinkers who are, by and large, satisfied with the coffee they’re buying from Starbucks or the grocery store.”

Hautala said that when he moved to Lexington in 1999, “I discovered there wasn’t much in the way of coffee options.”

He missed the fresh coffee available in California’s San Francisco Bay area, where he grew up.

So he started a coffee shop called Magic Beans near the University of Kentucky campus. Warren, 37, was then an undergraduate working at a nearby restaurant and they became friends.

The coffee shop struggled and closed after a couple of years. Hautala became a copy editor at the Herald-Leader and now works for UK public relations.

Warren moved to Oregon for a decade before returning to Lexington, where he works in recycling programs for Bluegrass Pride.

“I also got spoiled by all the coffee options on the West Coast,” said Warren, who reconnected with Hautala and told him, “We’ve got to re-imagine Magic Beans as a roasting-only operation.”

They knew what they needed: A fluid-bed roaster patented by Michael Sivetz, an Oregon man who was a guru of coffee roasting for decades before his death last year at age 90. The only other Sivetz roaster they know of in Kentucky is used by Heine Brothers’ Coffee in Louisville. Hautala and Warren found a used one for sale online and borrowed from their retirement accounts to buy it.

They have installed the roaster in a small, dungeon-like room they rent inside the Bread Box at West Sixth and Jefferson streets, the former bread bakery that houses West Sixth Brewery and several other tenants.

Each Saturday, Hautala and Warren roast only as much coffee as they expect to sell the next week.

A Sivetz roaster floats the beans on a bed of super-heated air until they are evenly cooked to a temperature that can be controlled to within 1 degree Fahrenheit. Hautala said the process preserves flavors often lost in conventional steel-drum roasting. Each bag of Magic Beans is marked with the roasting date.

“There’s a huge difference in coffee that was roasted today and coffee that was roasted a week ago,” he said. “As time goes on, there’s sort of diminishing returns.”

The coffee Magic Beans buys from a Minnesota-based company is imported fresh, and each variety can be traced to the farm where it was grown.

“For single-origin coffees, you’re able to highlight the individual characteristics of the beans themselves as opposed to the roast,” Warren said. “We really believe that great coffee is made on the farm. We’re only the last step in the process.”

Magic Beans’ buying method means it doesn’t always offer the same coffees. From month to month, coffee may come from Central America, Africa or Indonesia, depending on the best variety available at a given time.

“If you’re the kind of person who likes something different and likes to buy seasonally, that’s appealing,” Hautala said.

All Magic Beans coffees sell for $12 per 12-ounce bag — about $5 more than premium whole-bean grocery coffee and about the same as Starbucks. But Hautala said Magic Beans is two or three dollars a bag cheaper than coffee from similar specialty roasters elsewhere.

The friends say their business is off to a good start, but they don’t plan to quit their day jobs.

“It is a labor of love for us right now,” Hautala said. “We’re not going to be taking on Starbucks anytime soon.”

Carol Neal started Little Elks Pre-School at South Elkhorn Christian Church. Photos by Tom Eblen

As a trained educator, Carol Neal was picky when it came time to look for a pre-school program for her son and daughter. When she couldn’t find one she liked, she convinced her church to let her start one.

Now, after working with 33 fellow teachers and more than 3,000 students, Neal is retiring as director of the Little Elks Pre-School at South Elkhorn Christian Church.

“It was my calling, but I never thought I would be doing it for 43 years,” she said. “I tell people I’ve never been smart enough to get out of pre-school.”

All of those former students and teachers are invited to a reunion honoring Neal from 1-3 p.m. on April 14 at the church, 4343 Harrodsburg Road.

After months of searching for addresses, the staff has sent reunion invitations to 1,400 former students and teachers, but is still looking for more. RSVPs for the reunion are requested by April 7 to Littleelkspreschoolreunion@gmail.com.

“It has been a big part of my mother’s life for as long as I can remember, obviously,” said Neal’s son, Rick, who is a lawyer in Louisville. “My wife’s a pre-school teacher, too, and I know it’s hard work and you take a lot of it home with you.”

The school has about 30 3-year-olds in four classes on Tuesday and Thursday mornings and about 65 4-year-olds in six classes on Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings. About 10 current students are second-generation Little Elks — one of their parents attended pre-school there.

“I had gone there, my niece had gone there and I wanted my son to go there,” said Carolyn Sandusky Slone, whose son Grant turns 4 next month. “The education they provide is outstanding. It’s a loving and caring environment.”

Slone works with medical data, but when she was studying early-childhood education at Midway College in 1993, she did an internship at Little Elks.

“At least three of the teachers I worked with are still there,” she said. “I think that says a lot about the program.”

Neal agreed that the pre-school’s strength has been being able to hire and retain good teachers. The current staff members, who all have education degrees, include Marsha Salmon (28 years), Kim Wemyss (26 years) and Vicki Garrett (25 years).

“Kim Skidmore, who’s taking over for me, is the newest kid on the block; she’s only been here seven years,” Neal said. “I have never advertised for a teacher in all those years. They just magically appear when I need a teacher.”

Although many of the teachers attend other churches, Neal has been an active member of South Elkhorn Christian Church, which knows a thing or two about longevity. Founded on the present site in 1783 as a Baptist congregation, it affiliated with the Disciples of Christ in 1831. The current sanctuary was built in 1870.

“A lot of people know about Little Elks and have a positive impression of our church because of it,” said the Rev. Mickey Anders, the fourth senior pastor at the church since Neal started the pre-school. “She has led it with such expertise.”

Neal plans to remain active in her church, but retirement will give her more time to spend with Bill, her husband of 47 years, her son and daughter, Missy Watts, and her five granddaughters.

Still, Neal said she will be available as a substitute teacher at Little Elks, where she has seen big changes in both children and parents over the years.

Parents are often more involved with their children, but less demanding of them. They also are more protective — sometimes too protective. Children often come to pre-school now with less discipline and a shorter attention span, but more academic knowledge and comfort with technology.

“Kids are like sponges. They’ve always been smart, but they are exposed to so much more,” she said. “They can pick up the iPhone, they can pick up the iPad. That’s the way they’re used to learning.”

Neal said one thing that hasn’t changed in 43 years is the bond that forms between a young child and his or her first teacher.

“They think you are wonderful, that you rule the world,” she said. “They’ll just be walking by and grab you and hug you on the leg. Where do you get that kind of unsolicited love other than from a 3 or 4 year old?”

Coba Cocina has a huge jellyfish tank and special effects lighting. Photos by Tom Eblen

With its golden dome, colorful lighting and huge jellyfish tank, the new Coba Cocina building on Richmond Road has created a lot of buzz.

The public will get its first look — and taste — Monday when Greer Companies opens the 400-seat restaurant, bar and confectionery, which serves Latin-inspired food at moderate prices in a Vegas atmosphere.

“We’re hoping to wow people with the building,” said Lee Greer, president of the Lexington-based company. “The food is the best I’ve ever had. If we can nail the service — we’re aiming for a New Orleans level of service — we’ll have something special.”

Coba Cocina is the prototype for what Greer hopes will become a restaurant chain. In many ways, it is a collection of the favorite things he and his father have seen and tasted in their travels throughout Latin America.

Phil Greer started the commercial real estate development and hospitality company in the late 1980s after many years as a teacher and coach at Tates Creek High School. Greer Companies owns a number of franchised hotels and restaurants, including 35 Cheddar’s in Kentucky and five other states.

After the University of Virginia and a brief career as an investment banker in New York, Lee Greer, 36, came home to work with his father. He immersed himself in the restaurant business and began gathering ideas for creating their own concept.

Many of those ideas found their way into the unique building designed by architect Todd Ott and interior designer Brittney Lavens of Lexington-based CMW Inc.

“It was all just described to us in adjectives,” Ott said of the instructions they received from the Greers. “Phil said, ‘Go away for a month and come back and wow me. If you wow me, you get the job.’”

Ott and Lavens spent the time researching Mesoamerican culture, ancient Incan and Mayan architecture and Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula. Coba is a site of Mayan ruins in the Yucatán.Cocina is Spanish for kitchen.

The Yucatán is famous for cenotes — deep natural pits leading to water-filled caves. Coba Cocina is designed to make customers feel as if they are sitting inside one.

Ott said almost everything in the building is custom-made. There are wavelike panels of precision-cut wood on some walls and translucent wave panels over lighted ceilings.

Six chandeliers, which resemble Dale Chihuly sculptures, each contain 125 pieces of Italian glass hand-blown in Poland. Other lighting is computerized so color schemes can be changed to create different moods.

A column-shaped aquarium, 18 feet tall and six feet in diameter, will contain more than 300 jellyfish. The column rises to a gold dome in the center of the restaurant, giving the illusion of sunlight filtering into a cenote.

The reception desk and bar tops are made of backlit onyx. There are terrazzo and bamboo floors, and walls with enough curves to make a drywall mason cry. There are water walls, glass staircases and large expanses of iridescent tile.

“Some of the most exceptional craftsmanship was done locally,” construction manager Mike Balog said. “We tried to use as much Lexington talent as we could.”

Lee Greer wouldn’t say how much the family-owned company has invested in the building, although he acknowledged it is more than the $4.5 million estimate on the construction permit. Site acquisition and preparation cost an additional $1.2 million.

The building is designed to impress, but Greer knows that what will make customers come back is great food, service and value. That is the responsibility of a team of restaurant industry veterans: development director Larry Kerns, general manager Bahman Fakharpour and Alejandro and Shanyn Velasquez, husband-and-wife chefs from Texas.

Alejandro Velasquez oversees a high-tech kitchen designed to quickly turn fresh ingredients into dishes served with just the right temperature and presentation. Of the restaurant’s 200 employees, 40 work in the kitchen.

“Our food is simple, but it has a lot of flavor,” said Velasquez, a second- generation chef. “It’s been a great brainstorming effort to figure all of this out.”

The menu includes creative adaptations of tacos, fajitas and other traditional Mexican dishes. Among the signature entrees are agave-glazed salmon and barbecued ribs, specialty burgers, Cuban sandwiches, chicken, tilapia and steaks.

Only four entrees are priced at more than $13. At $24, filet mignon is the most expensive item on the menu. The restaurant also serves weekday lunches and Sunday brunch, with no entrees priced at more than $9.

The upstairs Cobar Cantina has a large selection of beer and wine, premium bourbons and tequilas, specialty margaritas and signature cocktails. Cobar also has small-plate “tapas” dishes priced from $4 to $8.

A third concept within the restaurant is Cocoh!, serving gelato, coffees, confections, cakes and other baked goods. Pastry chef Shanyn Velasquez directs this kid-friendly operation.

Lee Greer said he and his team want Coba Cocina to be a unique experience — one that will become so popular in Lexington that it will create a market for expansion and make their big investment pay off.

“Everything I’ve ever done in some form or fashion is in this building,” Greer said. “We knew it would take a lot of investment. We wanted to do it in Lexington, get it right and see where it goes.”

IF YOU GO

Coba Cocina

What: Restaurant serving Latin American-inspired food in a Las Vegas atmosphere. Also has a Latin lounge with signature cocktails and tapas dishes and a confectionery with gelato, premium coffees, fresh baked goods and pastries.

Where: 2041 Richmond Rd., at St. Margaret Dr.

Coba Cocina hours: 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Mon.-Thu.; 11 a.m.-11 p.m. Fri., Sat.; 9:30 a.m.-9 p.m. Sun. (Cobar Cantina stays open one hour later every day except Sunday.)

Cocoh! Confectioner hours: 6:30 a.m.-10 p.m. Mon.-Sat., 7 a.m.-9 p.m. Sun.

Learn more: (859) 523-8484 or Cobacocina.com

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Richard Gersony was a pre-med student at Columbia University in New York City when he started drawing illustrations for the campus newspaper. Soon he faced a dilemma: which career path to choose?

“I was going toward medicine,” he said. “But I knew inside that what I was best at was making visuals, illustrating and creating art.”

Then a professor suggested he become a medical illustrator. After an internship and rigorous graduate program at the University of Michigan, Gersony moved to Lexington for a medical illustration job at the University of Kentucky. There he met his wife, Kim, who studied three- dimensional animation and interactive design.

After eight years of training and work in Chicago and Baltimore, they returned to Lexington in 2000 and started Medmovie to take medical illustration into the digital world of online multimedia.

This past weekend in San Francisco, at the annual meeting of the American College of Cardiology, Medmovie unveiled its newest product: an iPad application that explains how the heart works, its common problems and treatments.

CardioSmart Explorer will sell for $5.99 to the public through Apple’s online App Store. The American College of Cardiology, which sponsored development of the app, will give it to physician members.

This is the company’s third iPad app but the first sold to the public. Gersony said it represents an important step toward what he sees as the future of his company: developing educational tools that use the ever-growing library of cardiovascular multimedia imagery he and his staff are developing.

The Gersonys and their three employees all have master’s degrees and other advanced training in science, medical illustration and animation. Their job is to take complex medical information and translate it into simple, understandable visual stories.

“The idea is you are making a visual decision between highly realistic and symbolic, then you are putting it in a storyline that’s understandable,” Richard Gersony said. “We want people to have that visual aha moment: ‘Wow! Now I understand.’”

There are many markets for such stories: educating and making sales to physicians and other health care professionals; explaining complex medical information to juries; and helping patients and their families understand medical problems, procedures and treatments.

For example, a physician could use an iPad with the CardioSmart Explorer app to sketch out a heart patient’s problem and explain how it will be treated. Then the illustration can be instantly emailed to the patient for future reference.

Medmovie’s newest staff member is Pina Kingman, who moved here from Vancouver, British Columbia, after graduating from the University of Toronto’s prestigious biomedical communications program. Her background in cell biology and animation will help Medmovie develop animations to show how drugs work in the body. They could be used to create educational tools for pharmaceutical salespeople, physicians and patients.

Gersony, who grew up in the New York City suburbs, said he and his wife did a national search when deciding where to start Medmovie. Lexington had an edge, because they had met here and Kim Gersony’s mother lived in Frankfort.

In the end, though, they chose Lexington for a variety of reasons that have also attracted other small, high-tech startups: a good talent pool; a central location with decent airline service; attractive and reasonably priced downtown office space; local universities; and a good quality of life.

Medmovie’s offices were in the circa 1913 Fayette National Bank Building at Main and Market streets until recently, when the company had to relocate so Lexington’s first skyscraper can be converted into a 21c Museum Hotel.

Gersony was able to find even nicer quarters around the corner: a loft-like space in another former bank, a circa 1924 building at the corner of West Short and Market streets. The offices have big windows with a commanding view of the old Fayette County Courthouse square.

Gersony said Lexington’s low cost of living, vibrant arts community and planned improvements downtown such as Town Branch Commons will make it easier for Medmovie to attract top talent as the company grows.

“Lexington is a fantastic size for a company like ours,” he said. “Almost all of us here can ride our bikes to work. The kind of space and the costs here are way, way lower than San Francisco and New York.”

I got a lot of response to last Sunday’s column. Many readers shared my dislike for Lexington’s clunky official name, Lexington Fayette Urban County Government, and its even more awkward acronym, LFUCG.

And then there was the silly sounding State of the Merged Government address, the annual speech the mayor gives at a high-profile luncheon sponsored by the Lexington Forum, a civic discussion group.

Why not, I asked, just call it the State of the City speech?

Board members of the Lexington Forum agreed, and, before the day was out, they had voted unanimously by email to change the name.

“We just felt like the old name was passé,” said Winn Stephens, the Lexington Forum’s president. “It was time to think of us all as the City of Lexington. Nobody with any marketing or public relations savvy would come up with a moniker like LFUCG.”

A few readers said they worried that a “city” emphasis might somehow devalue Fayette County’s strong rural tradition.

But others doubted that would happen. Ask anyone from elsewhere what they think of when they think of Lexington and the first things they are likely to mention are horses and green pastures.

Other readers took aim at the city’s official seal. To refresh your memory, the seal is a circle surrounded by the words “Lexington Fayette Urban County Government Kentucky.” Inside the circle are four local symbols: a horse shoe; tobacco leaves; 1775, when Lexington was named for the recently fought first battle of the American Revolution; and Transylvania University’s Old Morrison hall, a symbol of Lexington’s education heritage and historic architecture.

As government seals go, it’s not bad. But, as an all-purpose logo or flag, it doesn’t do Lexington justice.

“Could we redo our city’s flag?” reader James Bright asked in an email. “The current flag seems to be a history lesson that must be read to be understood. Learning is good. I am a teacher after all. But it is way too busy.”

Bright noted other cities, such as Chicago and Cincinnati, that have more elegant and inspiring flags.

I have always liked the flag of Washington, D.C., with its three stars and two stripes taken from George Washington’s coat of arms, and the flags of Louisville and New Orleans, which feature the traditional French fleurs-de-lis.

Bright suggested a competition among local artists to design a new city flag. That could be a good place to start.

Open design competitions often produce better (and less expensive) results than hiring a company to develop ideas. We saw an example of that recently, when the Town Branch Commons design competition attracted some of the world’s top landscape architects and produced impressive results.

Whatever local symbolism is chosen for Lexington’s flag should be adaptable to other “logo” uses, as is done with the fleurs-de-lis in Louisville and New Orleans.

The Lexington Convention and Visitors Bureau has gotten a lot of mileage out of the “blue horse” — the Pentagram design firm’s adaptation of Edward Troye’s 1868 portrait of the great stallion Lexington, rendered in Wildcat blue.

I think the blue horse is a brilliant symbol for promoting local tourism. But Lexington is more than a one-horse town. Despite the name Bluegrass and the popularity of University of Kentucky athletics, I see Lexington, with its lush farmland next to urban areas, as more of a green city than a blue city.

Image and marketing are important. They create a brand that both attracts outsiders and engenders pride among locals. Think about it: the guys behind the guerrilla “Kentucky Kicks Ass” promotional campaign have sold a lot of T-shirts.

Of course, Mayor Jim Gray and members of the Urban County Council have bigger issues to worry about, so this probably isn’t at the top of their agenda. There are pensions to fund, budgets to balance and water-quality problems to solve from all of that farmland converted into subdivisions over the years.

But it is good to put these sorts of ideas out for public discussion and debate. When we just leave it up to government, we can end up with things like, well, LFUCG.

Darryl and Linda Bond live in the house in St. Martin’s Village where he grew up. His father and uncle did much of the concrete work  for the neighborhood. Photo by Tom Eblen

It looks like many Lexington subdivisions built in the 1950s and ’60s — rows of modest brick and stone houses with well-tended yards.

But St. Martin’s Village took the American dream to a whole new level in Lexington: It was the first large subdivision where black people could buy a home.

“They were the crème de la crème for African-Americans in the 1950s,” said Porter G. Peeples, longtime president of the Urban League. “You were somebody if you got a place in St. Martin’s.”

It had always been hard for black people to find good housing in segregated Lexington. Few banks would lend in traditionally black parts of town. White neighborhoods were off-limits, by strict social custom, if not legal covenant.

For example, a 1907 marketing booklet for the new Mentelle Park development off Richmond Road promised: “No Negroes can ever own property or live in the park. No adjacent or near-by Negro settlements.”

When rumors circulated in 1925 that black-owned land off North Limestone would be developed into a subdivision for blacks, more than 200 white citizens gathered in a nearby church and organized a successful effort to block it.

But after World War II, Lexington’s business leaders realized their little college and farming town needed to attract industry if it was to have a strong economy and viable middle class. Factories hired a diverse work force. Things had to change.

Ovan Haskins, an insurance executive who helped start the Lexington Hustlers semi-pro baseball team, realized a long-held dream in 1948 when he bought land off Newtown Pike and began building 26 homes for sale to blacks on what is now Haskins Street.

But the big break came in 1955, when Joe Fister teamed with Chuck Seeberger and Joe Tuttle to build a 200-lot subdivision for blacks on 40 acres of farmland Fister owned on Price Road off Georgetown Road.

St. Martin’s Village was named for St. Martin de Porres (1579-1639), a mixed-race monk in Peru who is the patron saint for those seeking interracial harmony. The main street was called De Porres Avenue.

“This will be as good as any subdivision in Lexington,” Seeberger said in a 1955 Lexington Herald article that carried the headline, “First Negro Subdivision Planned on Fister Tract.”

Seeberger, president of the development company, was a Kansas native who had lived in Los Angeles before moving to Lexington, where his father-in-law owned an insurance business. He wanted to become a developer, building homes for people who had never been able to afford one, and he recognized an unmet need.

“People from the white community said, ‘You don’t need to be doing this — the status quo is just fine’,” said his son, Kirk Seeberger. “It upset him, but he expected it.”

Seeberger recalled his father, who died in 2003, describing how some St. Martin’s Village homeowners would weep at their closings.

“They said they never thought they would ever own a nice house in Lexington, Kentucky,” he said.

Many of those black homeowners were professional people — and, eventually, city leaders. The late Harry Sykes, who became city manager and mayor pro-tem, lived in St. Martin’s Village, as does former Councilman Robert Jefferson.

Two brothers, Alvin and Bennie Bond, did much of the concrete work on houses in the subdivision. That included “sweat equity” to help them buy their own homes across the street from each other on De Porres Avenue.

“I was born and raised in this house,” said Darryl Bond, 48, one of Alvin’s children. He and his wife, Linda, raised three children there and now operate a licensed child care center in the house. Like his father, Darryl Bond also does concrete work.

Bond’s lifelong tenure in St. Martin’s Village isn’t unusual: he guesses that 80 percent of the homes are occupied by original owners or their descendants.

“It’s a nice neighborhood,” Bond said. “Everybody knows everybody. Everybody pretty much looks out for everybody else. If kids are misbehaving, somebody will correct them.”

Michelle Davis, 55, who also lives in the De Porres Avenue house where she grew up, agreed.

“It’s a family-oriented neighborhood; almost like a big extended family,” she said. “We all grew up together. We were always in each other’s houses. We even got to know each other’s relatives from out of town when they would visit. It’s home.”

Joseph Fister breaks ground for St. Martin’s Village in April 1955. Watching, left to right, are J.J. Tuttle, Tom Robinson, Chuck Seeberger, Don Saylor and G.W. Gard. Herald-Leader file photo.

 Feather signs along North New Circle Road. Photo by Tom Eblen

The days are numbered for those gaudy banners that have been sprouting up like dandelions along Lexington’s major commercial roads.

The Division of Planning has begun a crackdown against those so-called feather signs, which like many of the temporary signs that litter Lexington roadways, are illegal under city ordinance.

Zoning enforcement is first focusing on New Circle Road, between Georgetown and Richmond roads, where the signs seem to be thickest, said Chris King, the planning division’s director. Letters went out earlier this month to property owners, followed by site visits last week.

Properties where the signs remain up after March 18 will be subject to civil citations and fines that under the ordinance could initially be as high as $200 a day. King said enforcement officers also would be going after other types of illegal signs and in other parts of town. In addition to creating “visual blight in the community,” King said, illegal signs can distract drivers and put businesses that obey the law at a competitive disadvantage.

“There has just been an explosion of those things,” King said. “We want to send a message to other businesses, too, that in case you were thinking about it, don’t waste your money.”

Words matter to me. I spend hours each week carefully choosing words and phrases to balance precision with poetry in the hope that readers will find them interesting enough to keep reading to the end of my column.

So I can’t help but be annoyed when well-meaning people and institutions trample poetry in the interest of unnecessary precision.

The latest irritation came last Sunday, when my pastor announced that, from now on, our church service would use the “ecumenical” version of the Lord’s Prayer.

I’m all for being ecumenical, but, as with the ecumenical version of the Apostles’ Creed we switched to some time ago, this one is far less elegant than what English-speaking Christians have been reciting for 400 years. Why forsake “thy”? Who isn’t quick enough to figure out “the quick and the dead”?

But when it comes to assaults on the language of Shakespeare, Dickens and Hemingway, the church is no match for the state. I was reminded of that last month when Mayor Jim Gray gave his State of the Merged Government speech.

Why isn’t it called the State of the City speech? Or the State of Lexington speech? I asked Gray about it, and he said he didn’t like the traditional name for the mayor’s annual address any more than I do.

That led to a discussion about the clunky moniker Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government and its acronym, LFUCG, which, depending on how you say it, sounds either like alphabet soup or an obscenity.

How did the government of such a beautiful place end up with such a bureaucratic name?

I asked Foster Pettit, who was mayor when the name was adopted in 1974 as the governments of Lexington and surrounding Fayette County were merged. It turns out he has never liked the name much, either.

“It’s always been a little awkward, and it’s hard to write it on a check,” Pettit said. “Then people say ‘LFUCG’, which is even worse.”

The name was chosen for constitutional reasons, said Pettit, a lawyer who was first elected mayor of the old City of Lexington in 1972. The next year, the Lexington and Fayette County governments began the process of becoming the first in the state and one of the first in the nation to merge. That raised a host of legal issues that Kentucky had never dealt with before.

As Pettit explained it, the state constitution and acts of the General Assembly had specific provisions for counties and different types of cities, but not for a merged city-county government. The new entity was legally neither fish nor fowl.

Plus, Pettit said, there were concerns by residents of both the city and county at the time that they not lose any of their rights or identities. Thus, an inelegant mouthful was born.

For many reasons, both legal and practical, it wouldn’t be worth the trouble to officially rename the Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government, Pettit said.

But, he added, that doesn’t mean people can’t come up with something better for everyday use.

“It would be nice to call it the ‘Community of Lexington’, which covers a wider concept,” Pettit said. “Of course, there’s no such thing as a community, legally, but that’s OK.

“I’ve thought about it, and that’s the best I could come up with. Or, just say ‘Lexington, Kentucky’ and let it go at that.”

That works for me.

Next January, Gray should deliver the State of Lexington address. And, whenever the lawyers aren’t looking, the citizens of both urban and rural Fayette County should simply call their community Lexington.

Then we could move on to other local language puzzles, such as this: How old does New Circle Road have to be before we stop calling it “new”?

With his own debt of freedom repaid, Lewis Hayden could focus on helping others become free. The escaped slave from Lexington already had accomplished a lot by this time, as I wrote in last Wednesday’s column.

By the late 1840s, Hayden was a leader in Boston’s black community. His boarding house and clothing store were important stops on the Underground Railroad, which helped escaped slaves start new lives in the North.

The American Anti-Slavery Society hired Hayden in 1847 as an “agent” to travel throughout the North and speak about his experiences as a slave. He was sorely disappointed when the organization’s white leaders let him go after about six months, according to Lewis Hayden and the War Against Slavery, a 1999 book by Joel Strangis, a former administrator at Sayre School in Lexington.

Apparently, Hayden was not as effective a speaker as some of the society’s other agents, who included Frederick Douglass and William Wells Brown, another former Lexington slave, who would become America’s first successful black novelist.

The break might have been for the best. Hayden was growing impatient with the Anti-Slavery Society and pacifist leaders such as William Lloyd Garrison, publisher of The Liberator newspaper. They seemed to be all talk and no action. Circumstances would soon force Hayden into action.

The Compromise of 1850, Henry Clay’s attempt to avoid the inevitable Civil War, included a fugitive slave law. Among other things, the law made it a crime to help an escaped slave, and it forced federal officials to become slave-catchers.

The law sent shock waves through Boston’s black population. Hayden and most of the city’s 2,000 black residents were now in personal jeopardy, and they were determined to fight back.

After federal marshals arrested an escaped slave named Shadrach at a coffee house where he worked, Hayden and others snatched him from the courthouse and smuggled him out of Boston. President Millard Fillmore was outraged, and Clay denounced the incident on the floor of the Senate, asking “whether we shall have a government of white men or black men in the cities of this country.”

Hayden continued to help dozens of fugitive slaves, sometimes by force, and his fame grew.

Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of the 1852 best-seller Uncle Tom’s Cabin, interviewed Hayden and included his harrowing account of childhood slavery in Lexington in her 1853 follow-up book,The Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin. (Read the excerpt here.)

In 1858, Hayden met abolitionist John Brown, who spoke of his plans to incite an armed slave revolt. Hayden raised money for what would become Brown’s unsuccessful raid on the arsenal at Harper’s Ferry in October 1859.

When the Civil War finally came, Hayden had a friend in Massachusetts Gov. John Andrew. They had known each other for years, and Hayden had helped the lawyer get elected to the legislature in 1857.

Still, many eyebrows were raised when the Pilgrim State’s governor accepted an invitation to dine at Lewis and Harriet Hayden’s home on Thanksgiving 1862. It wasn’t just a social occasion: Hayden took the opportunity to urge Andrew to persuade President Abraham Lincoln to allow blacks to fight for the Union.

Once Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation took effect a few weeks later, Andrew formed the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry. Hayden was too old to serve, but he recruited troops for the unit, which had black enlisted men but white officers. The regiment’s story was told in the 1989 Academy Award-winning movie Glory, starring Denzel Washington, Matthew Broderick and Morgan Freeman.

After the war, Hayden promoted Freemasonry as a way for black men to help one another advance. And, in 1873, he was elected to a term in the Massachusetts legislature. (He was one of Massachusetts’ first state employees in 1858, when he got a job as a messenger in the secretary of state’s office.)

Hayden spent his last years on a goal he had worked 30 years to achieve. He wanted a monument on the Boston Common honoring Crispus Attucks, the only mixed-race man killed by British troops in the “Boston Massacre” of March 5, 1770, which helped spark the American Revolution.

Hayden had to settle for a monument honoring all five “massacre” victims. But he was on the platform when it was dedicated in 1888, with Attucks’ name at the top of the list. Hayden died the following year and is buried in Everett, Mass.

Harriet Beecher Stowe’s anti-slavery novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, created a sensation when it was published in 1852. It also brought complaints from Southerners that her depictions of slavery were fabrications. So, the next year, she published A Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin to bolster her case. The book included her interview with Lewis Hayden. Here is that excerpt:

The following account was given to the writer by Lewis Hayden. Hayden was a fugitive slave, who escaped from Kentucky by the assistance of a young lady named Delia Webster, and a man named Calvin Fairbanks. Both were imprisoned. Lewis Hayden has earned his own character as a free citizen of Boston, where he can find an abundance of vouchers for his character.

I belonged to the Rev. Adam Rankin, a Presbyterian minister in Lexington, Kentucky.

My mother was of mixed blood—white and Indian. She married my father when he was working in a bagging factory near by. After a while my father’s owner moved off and took my father with him, which broke up the marriage. She was a very handsome woman. My master kept a large dairy, and she was the milk-woman. Lexington was a small town in those days, and the dairy was in the town. Back of the college was the masonic lodge. A man who belonged to the lodge saw my mother when she was about her work. He made proposals of a base nature to her. When she would have nothing to say to him, he told her that she need not be so independent, for if money could buy her, he would have her. My mother told old mistress, and begged that master might not sell her. But he did sell her. My mother had a high spirit, being part Indian. She would not consent to live with this man, as he wished; and he sent her to prison, and had her flogged, and punished her in various ways, so that at last she began to have crazy turns.

When I read in “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” about Cassy, it put me in mind of my mother, and I wanted to tell Mrs. S—about her. She tried to kill herself several times, once with a knife and once by hanging. She had long, straight black hair, but after this it all turned white, like an old person’s. When she had her raving turns, she always talked about her children. The jailer told the owner that if he would let her go to her children, perhaps she would get quiet. They let her out one time, and she came to the place where we were. I might have been seven or eight years old—don’t know my age exactly. I was not at home when she came. I came in and found her in one of the cabins near the kitchen. She sprung and caught my arms, and seemed going to break them, and then said, “I’ll fix you so they’ll never get you!” I screamed, for I thought she was going to kill me; they came in and took me away. They tied her, and carried her off. Sometimes, when she was in her right mind, she used to tell me what things they had done to her. At last her owner sold her, for a small sum, to a man named Lackey. While with him she had another husband and several children. After a while this husband either died or was sold, I do not remember which. The man then sold her to another person, named Bryant. My own father’s owner now came and lived in the neighbourhood of this man, and brought my mother with him. He had had another wife and family of children where he had been living. He and my mother came together again, and finished their days together. My mother almost recovered her mind in her last days.

I never saw anything in Kentucky which made me suppose that ministers or professors of religion considered it any more wrong to separate the families of slaves by sale than to separate any domestic animals.

There may be ministers and professors of religion who think it is wrong, but I never met with them. My master was a minister, and yet he sold my mother, as I have related.

When he was going to leave Kentucky for Pennsylvania, he sold all my brothers and sisters at auction. I stood by and saw them sold. When I was just going up on to the block, he swapped me off for a pair of carriage-horses. I looked at those horses with strange feelings. I had indulged hopes that master would take me into Pennsylvania with him, and I should get free. How I looked at those horses, and walked round them, and thought for them I was sold!

It was commonly reported that my master had said in the pulpit that there was no more harm in separating a family of slaves than a litter of pigs. I did not hear him say it, and so cannot say whether this is true or not.

It may seem strange, but it is a fact. I had more sympathy and kind advice, in my efforts to get my freedom, from gamblers and no doubt the other, and such sort of men, than Christians.

Some of the gamblers were very kind to me.

I never knew a slave-trader that did not seem to think, in his heart, that the trade was a bad one. I knew a great many of them, such as Neal, McAnn, Cobb, Stone, Pulliam, and Davis, &c. They were like Haley—they meant to repent when they got through.

Intelligent coloured people in my circle of acquaintance, as a general thing, felt no security whatever for their family ties. Some, it is true, who belonged to rich families, felt some security; but those of us who looked deeper, and knew how many were not rich that seemed so, and saw how fast money slipped away, were always miserable. The trader was all around, the slave-pen at hand, and we did not know what time any of us might be in it. Then there were the rice-swamps, and the sugar and cotton plantations; we had had them held before us as terrors, by our masters and mistresses, all our lives. We knew about them all; and when a friend was carried off, why, it was the same as death, for we could not write or hear, and never expected to see them again.

I have one child who is buried in Kentucky, and that grave is pleasant to think of. I’ve got another that is sold nobody knows where, and that I never can bear to think of.

— LEWIS HAYDEN.

Don Ament’s photo of a dogwood tree in his front yard was enlarged to 42 feet wide by 11 feet tall to cover a folding wall that separates an employee cafe from a meeting room at TempurPedic’s new corporate headquarters building in Lexington.   Photo by Don Ament

Many artists dream of landing a big commission. For photographer Don Ament, it came from Tempur-Pedic, the Lexington-based mattress company.

Representatives from Tempur-Pedic met Ament last March at Kentucky Crafted: The Market. Then they saw an image on his website of dogwood blossoms in sunlight. The website has images Ament made all over the world, but this one was shot in his yard in Lexington.

The company was furnishing its new headquarters building near Coldstream Park, and executives thought Ament’s photo would be perfect for a folding wall that separates the employee café from a meeting room.

This commission was challenging because it literally was big. The image, taken on a 2.25-inch square piece of film, needed to be enlarged and printed 11 feet tall by 42 feet wide.

Ament scanned the film to create a high-resolution digital file, then, with help from friend and fellow photographer Frank Döring, manipulated the image to sharpen edges and preserve color vibrancy. A company in Maine printed the photo in sections, and last week it was installed like wallpaper. The result is stunning.

“They could go anywhere for art,” Ament said of Tempur-Pedic. “But they seem really dedicated to local.”

Indeed, as Tempur-Pedic settles into its new 128,000-square-foot space, much more local art will be purchased, said Patrice Varni, a senior vice president.

The only other pieces now are two Italian glass and stone mosaics designed by Guy Kemper, a Woodford County glass artist who has done installations all over the world, some as big as airport terminal walls.

Kemper’s mosaics for Tempur-Pedic are abstract evocations, roughly 10 feet square, for the fourth-floor executive area.

One is called After the Storm. “It recalls the feeling of a Kentucky forest after a summer storm, when a steamy sun comes out and everything is dripping wet,” Kemper said.

The other mosaic, called Daybreak, is “a shot of color to energize the work environment and promote creativity,” he said. “A reference that you’ve had a good night’s sleep.” (On a Tempur-Pedic mattress, no doubt.)

Kemper said Tempur-Pedic executives and their interior designer, Gary Volz of Champlin Architecture in Cincinnati, approached him after seeing two mosaics he did for elevator lobbies at the University of Kentucky Chandler Medical Center.

“We couldn’t be more thrilled with the pieces by Don and Guy,” Varni said. “I’ve really been struck by the positive response from employees.

“There was a steady stream of people stopping by to watch the installations.”

Tempur-Pedic built its new headquarters, which has large windows and expansive views of the Bluegrass landscape, to replace a former warehouse that had evolved into offices and become overcrowded as the company grew.

“This building was designed with a particular focus on collaboration and integrating the various work groups, and engendering creativity and innovative thinking,” Varni said. “Art is a big part of that, that is meant to showcase and inspire creativity and innovation.”

Varni said the company has budgeted purchases of more art during the next few years, as its 360 employees settle into the building, figure out what would complement the space and learn more about the work of local artists.

“We feel very much a part of the community, because the company was founded here,” Varni said. “In our support for the arts, we felt first and foremost we should support local artists.”

Varni said the Kentucky Arts Council has suggested several local artists whose work might be a good fit.

“Art is such a subjective, personal taste kind of thing,” she said. “We like things that have some sense of nature and that run the range from more literal to more abstract. And we’re interested in a different range of mediums.”

As part of its mission to help Kentucky artists be able to earn a living from their art, the council sponsors Kentucky Crafted: The Market, which returns to Lexington Center from March 1 through 3.

Kemper and Ament hope more Kentucky companies will follow Tempur-Pedic’s example because the arts flourishes only in places where artists find good patrons. Plus, when that investment is made in the community, it help’s Kentucky’s economy.

“You don’t have to run to New York or Chicago to look for something great,” Ament said. “There’s more good work being done here all the time.”

Click on each image to enlarge and read caption:

A rendering for Scape/Landscape Architecture’s plan for Town Branch Commons, showing how it might look west of Rupp Arena. Images provided.

Kate Orff, whose New York landscape architecture firm was chosen last week to design Town Branch Commons, has made a name for herself by looking below the surface and beyond the conventional.

The approach served her well with Lexington’s Downtown Development Authority, which hopes to create green space through the center of the city along the path of the long-buried Town Branch Creek.

Orff said in an interview that her team figured out quickly that the key to this project wasn’t recreating the stream as it used to be, but working with the complex limestone geology and hydrology beneath Lexington’s streets and structures.

She also realized that Town Branch Commons should do more than create beautiful public space to attract people and private development. It should play an important role in solving Lexington’s persistent storm-water and water pollution problems.

In addition to being a partner in the firm Scape/Landscape Architecture, Orff is an assistant professor of architecture and urban design at Columbia University. As founder and co-director of the university’s Urban Landscape Lab, she leads seminars on integrating earth sciences into urban design and planning.

With Town Branch Commons, Orff said she saw an opportunity to accomplish goals that are often seen as contradictory: increasing commercial development and sustainably improving the environment.

“This Lexington project is an amazing opportunity for me to try to bring those two realms together,” Orff said. “I really think that’s the future, this concept of green infrastructure.”

Orff said green infrastructure has many advantages: It is less costly to build and maintain than concrete and pipes. It is less prone to massive failure, because it is less centralized. And it provides the side benefit of public green space.

“But you have to think very systematically,” she said. “It requires more, frankly, of the urban space. It’s more of a dispersed strategy of touching the water where it lands at multiple points in multiple ways. But a more dispersed model leaves you more room for resiliency.”

Orff, 41, grew up in Maryland and earned a bachelor’s degree in political and social thought from the University of Virginia, then a master’s degree in landscape architecture from Harvard University.

She started Scape/Landscape Architecture in 2004. The firm’s projects have ranged from a 1,000-square-foot park in Brooklyn, N.Y., to a 1,000-acre landfill regeneration project in Dublin, Ireland.

Orff has made several national lists of up-and-coming designers. Last year, the organization United States Artists chose her as one of 50 American artists to receive $50,000 fellowship awards.

She was co-author, along with photographer Richard Misrach, of the 2012 book Petrochemical America, which created an ecological atlas of the petrochemical industry’s effects on the 150-mile Mississippi River corridor between Baton Rouge and New Orleans known as “Cancer Alley.”

Currently, Orff’s firm is doing projects in New York, New Jersey, Chicago and Greenville, S.C., where she is working on an environmental education center with Jeanne Gang, the Chicago architect and MacArthur “genius” award winner who did the site plan for the proposed CentrePointe development in Lexington.

Perhaps Orff’s most high-profile effort is a proposal to restore the Gowanus and Red Hook sections of New York harbor with a system of designed oyster beds. Before harbor dredging and industrialization, oysters flourished there. One oyster has the ability to cleanse 50 gallons of water per day. (She explains the project in a TED talk online. Watch it at the end of this post.)

Her “Oystertecture” plan, which will begin with a pilot project in March, has attracted a lot more attention since superstorm Sandy showed the vulnerability of the Northeast’s urban coast. Orff is part of a task force New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg appointed to study those issues.

To prepare her Lexington proposal, Orff said she studied water flow data and made floodplain maps to understand downtown’s hydrology and geology. For local knowledge and engineering expertise, she engaged Lexington-based EHI Consultants and Sherwood Design Engineers, a major national firm.

Orff also met with city officials to understand Lexington’s consent decree with the Environmental Protection Agency, which will require millions of dollars in fixes for long-ignored water quality problems throughout Fayette County.

“Before we ever started to design, we did a very comprehensive series of maps that included flooding, the SSO (sanitary sewer overflow) events and so on,” Orff said. “We had a very clear sense of how water was moving and the amounts of water and what would be possible and what would not be possible.”

Orff said her team also tried to work with what already existed or was proposed for downtown “rather than tearing down and starting over from scratch, because clearly a lot of money has been spent already.”

Orff plans to return to Lexington in a few weeks to meet with stakeholders and the public to gather feedback and ideas. Then, more civil engineering will be needed, as well as a plan for how to build the project in phases.

“We are aiming to refine the plan and provide some alternatives for different areas,” she said. “I think the way our scheme kind of fits within the landscape, it provides a lot of alternatives and backup plans.”

Click on each thumbnail and image to enlarge:

When the Marquis de Lafayette visited Lexington in May 1825, during his celebrated national tour, a slave child of 13 slipped away from his chores long enough to try to catch a glimpse of the French hero of the American Revolution.

Lewis Hayden would later recall sitting alone on a fence as the parade passed through town. As Lafayette’s open carriage approached, the most famous man Hayden had ever heard of turned and bowed his head to acknowledge him.

“That act burnt his image upon my heart so that I shall never need a permit to recall it,” Hayden would later tell friends. “I date my hatred of slavery from that day.”

One of the things I love about reading history, especially black history, is discovering fascinating people of great accomplishment I previously knew nothing about.

I had never heard of Hayden until last year, when William Thomas gave me an old library copy of Joel Strangis’ 1999 book, Lewis Hayden and the War Against Slavery. That led me to other sources that also told the story of a Lexington man who escaped slavery, settled in Boston and led a remarkable life.

Thomas, a Lexington retiree, is the leader of a nonprofit foundation trying to raise money to buy and preserve the old First African Baptist Church building at Short and Deweese streets. Thomas dreams of turning this handsome old church, built around 1856 by a slave congregation, into a performance hall and arts academy.

Like Hayden, Thomas found success in Boston. After graduating from Lexington’s then-segregated schools, Thomas became an accomplished musician, built an outstanding orchestra during a 36-year career at Phillips Andover prep school and headed Project STEP, a classical music academy for gifted minority students run by the Boston Symphony and New England Conservatory of Music.

Thomas says the restored church building would be a fitting tribute to 19th-century Lexington blacks who accomplished great things against all odds. Coincidentally, he said, the church is at the site of a former clock and cabinet shop where Hayden worked for one of his masters, Elijah Warner.

Strangis’ book tells how Hayden was sold to Warner by his first master, the Rev. Adam Rankin, whose circa 1784 house is the oldest still standing in Lexington.

While Hayden belonged to Warner, he married another slave, Esther, and they had a son. But when Esther’s owner’s business failed, she and their son were purchased by Henry Clay. The statesman later sold them South, and Hayden never saw his family again. He married a second time, to Harriet Bell, a slave who had a young son.

Hayden was sold in 1840 to a man who whipped him, then two years later to two businessmen who leased him to the Phoenix Hotel, where he worked as a waiter.

Through his various jobs, Hayden learned more than most slaves did about the white world, including how to read. Inspired by Lafayette and angry with Clay, Hayden vowed that he and his second family would be free someday.

In the fall of 1844, Hayden planned his escape with help from two white abolitionists, Delia Webster, a Vermonter who ran a Lexington girls’ school, and Calvin Fairbank, a ministerial student at Oberlin College in Ohio who helped free several Kentucky slaves. They smuggled the Hayden family across the Ohio River, and the Underground Railroad helped them all the way to Canada.

Webster and Fairbank were not so fortunate. Convicted of helping the Haydens escape, Webster became one of the first women imprisoned in Kentucky, although she was pardoned two months into her two-year sentence. Fairbank spent five years in prison.

After a short time in Canada, Hayden felt called to return to this country and join the anti-slavery movement. His family settled in Boston, running a clothing store and boarding house, and assisting escaped slaves.

Hayden learned in 1849 that if he repaid his Lexington owner $650 as compensation for his loss, the man would petition Kentucky’s governor to free Fairbank. So Hayden bought the freedom of the man who had helped him secure his.

If Lewis Hayden’s story ended there, it would be remarkable. But he went on to do much, much more. Read about that in my column next Wednesday.

Conceptual sketch of a proposed park between the Kentucky Utilities and Phoenix buildings along Vine Street as part of the winning design for Town Branch Commons. Illustration: Scape/Landscape Architecture PLLC

All five finalists submitted imaginative plans for Town Branch Commons, but the entry from Scape/Landscape Architecture PLLC was the clear winner.

Scape’s plan is the most authentic to Lexington. It is the most practical and affordable. It disrupts current traffic patterns the least. And it highlights the role natural ecology can and should play in solving Lexington’s storm-water problems, not only downtown but throughout Fayette County.

Kate Orff, the New York firm’s lead partner and a rising star in the world of landscape architecture, is well-known for paying close attention to the natural ecology of places where she designs. She clearly did her homework on Lexington.

The inspiration for Scape’s plan goes deeper than Town Branch Creek. It showcases Central Kentucky’s karst geology, where water unexpectedly rises from and disappears beneath limestone formations just below the lush Bluegrass soil.

Rather than trying to rebuild a long-buried creek, Scape’s plan artfully creates water features that interpret the region’s natural springs, pools, sinks and boils at strategic points along the creek’s historic path. They would rise and fall with the seasons.

One thing that made her plan the most practical and affordable is that it can be done in phases, as money is available. Also, the city already owns almost all of the land it would need and should be able to acquire the rest of it.

Property for the two largest pieces of this linear park is now surface parking lots. So two of downtown’s ugliest and most under-utilized pieces of land would become beautiful magnets for people and surrounding private investment.

Unlike the other finalists, Scape’s plan calls for minimal change in current traffic patterns. The biggest proposed change would be replacing the Martin Luther King Boulevard viaduct between High and Main streets with a pedestrian walkway to a new park below. But, if necessary, the project could still go forward if the viaduct remained.

The plan also would eliminate the crook at the west end of Vine Street around Triangle Park, which city leaders have been trying to close for years. It also would rearrange some lanes and sidewalks on Vine Street to make space for a boulevard-style park in the center of the street between Limestone and Broadway, but without significantly reducing traffic capacity. Ideally, Vine Street would go from one-way to two-way traffic, but it wouldn’t have to.

The plan would create green space downtown that would act like rain gardens to manage and filter storm water using much of the existing underground infrastructure. That aspect of the plan is brilliant.

City officials should be looking throughout Fayette County for places where stream restoration, rain gardens and other natural techniques can be used to manage runoff and filter runoff from streets, parking lots and development. In many places, this approach could be more attractive and less costly than traditional engineering solutions.

In both result and process, this Town Branch Commons design competition has been remarkable. After getting proposals from 23 firms, Lexington chose five finalists and gave each a $15,000 honorarium to work on a detailed plan. That money was donated by the Nashville family of Lee Ann Ingram, an investor in Shorty’s Market on Short Street.

The result was that Lexington got the benefit of having five teams of the world’s best landscape architects and urban designers take a deep look at the city’s issues and propose detailed solutions — at no cost to taxpayers.

How could little Lexington attract such talent? One reason is the personal connections Michael Speaks, dean of the University of Kentucky’s College of Design, has in the global design community. Another is Mayor Jim Gray’s vision for a world-class downtown. And another is the successful Arena, Arts and Entertainment District Task Force process, which engaged a world-class master planner (Norway-based Space Group) and is now following through on its recommendations.

Lexington has a lot of work to do before these grand plans can become reality. But, for the first time in a very long time, it at least has some truly grand plans.

Click on photos to see larger images. For more images and information, go to Townbranchcommons.com.

Hardly a week goes by that people don’t tell me how they wish the open block where the Webb Companies hopes to build CentrePointe could become a public park instead.

As the block awaits redevelopment, it is planted in grass and surrounded by a plank fence to resemble a horse pasture. It has become a popular gathering place during downtown festivals. (At other times, it is off-limits, just as horse pastures are.)

CentrePasture’s popularity points to a couple of ironies about Lexington.

One is that we have a lot of open space, but little public space. The other is that we are surrounded by some of the world’s most beautiful rural landscapes — an artful blend of the natural and man-made — but our central business district is a generic jungle of concrete and asphalt. There are only a handful of small parks or plazas downtown, and few trees of any size.

Although recent renovations of Triangle and Cheapside parks have been excellent, the comments I hear make me think Lexington residents still yearn for more public space downtown.

Town Branch Creek resurfaces west of Rupp Arena. Herald-Leader photo

The Downtown Development Authority on Monday will choose the winner of a design competition for Town Branch Commons — some form of linear park on city-owned property along the path of the long-buried stream that gave birth to Lexington.

This project would involve bringing parts of the creek back to the surface, either literally or symbolically, to create attractive public spaces for nature and a variety of activities. A jury of design professionals was to recommend a winner to the DDA board after closed-door presentations Friday by the five finalists.

The competition attracted 23 entries. The finalists are among the world’s best landscape architects and designers: Coen + Partners in Minneapolis; Denver-based Civitas; the Netherlands firm Inside Outside; Scape Landscape Architecture of New York; and Copenhagen-based Julien De Smedt Architects working with Balmori Associates of New York.

All five finalists’ designs will be on display at the Downtown Arts Center from Tuesday until Feb. 22, including during Gallery Hop on Feb. 15.

I can’t wait to see the designs, especially after hearing the finalists make presentations about their previous work Thursday at the Lexington Children’s Theatre. They showed amazing projects from all over the world, including in cities such as Bilbao, Spain, that had far more daunting problems than Lexington has.

(An interesting side note is that three of the six presenters were women: design legends Diana Balmori and Petra Blaisse and one of landscape architecture’s rising stars, Kate Orff.)

(Also worth mentioning: several of the landscape architects showed projects that used wetland parks to effectively solve storm-water problems. Lexington officials should remember that as they decide how to spend millions of dollars on storm water issues under terms of the federal consent decree.)

I can already hear Lexington’s naysayers: This whole idea is impractical, unaffordable and frivolous. It is none of that.

The compelling argument for Town Branch Commons is not esthetic, but economic. This sort of urban public space has been an effective way to attract people and investment dollars to cities of all sizes, from Seoul, South Korea to Yonkers, N.Y.

People who have attended recent Commerce Lexington trips have seen it work in Greenville, S.C., where a long-neglected riverbank became Falls Park; and in San Antonio, where a once-buried stream similar to Town Branch became the Riverwalk, now Texas’ second-largest tourist attraction after the Alamo.

New York’s High Line project turned an abandoned elevated rail line into a linear park that has transformed a once-decaying section of lower Manhattan. Despite huge cost overruns, the Millennium Park that Chicago built over an urban rail yard has more than paid for itself with the private development it has attracted.

The kind of public-private partnership envisioned with Town Branch Commons is under way in Atlanta, which is turning an abandoned rail line around the city into 1,300 acres of parks and 33 miles of trails, and in Louisville, which has raised more than $60 million in private money for the 21st Century Parks project that is creating 4,000 acres of linear parkland and 100 miles of trails around that city.

What excites me about the potential of Town Branch Commons was mentioned frequently by the world-class designers who submitted plans. This isn’t about building Disney World in a swamp; it is an authentic reflection of Lexington’s history, geography and culture.

Pioneers chose Town Branch as the site for their town, laying out Lexington’s grid according to the creek’s path rather than a compass. Its banks were where early Lexingtonians gathered for fun and refreshment before the stream was polluted, built over and eventually buried.

Town Branch Commons will require public money and even more private money. But it could be a great long-term investment, one that uses the authenticity of Lexington’s past to create both an amenity and economic generator for the future.

The Headley-Whitney Museum includes a building known as the Shell Grotto, decorated with shells and other objects.  Photos by Tom Eblen

George Headley had the money and talent to create his own little world of art. He did it with jewelry and curios he designed for the rich and famous, and with the gem he left Lexington, the Headley-Whitney Museum.

The designer, collector and socialite died in 1985. His museum now faces some real-world money troubles, just as many other museums have since the 2008 financial crisis reshaped the economy.

Before the Headley-Whitney reopens in March after its annual winter break, the museum’s board is taking steps to shore up finances. It is putting Headley’s home, named La Belle, up for sale and is deaccessioning — that’s museum-speak for selling — several pieces from the collection that are rarely displayed or are costly to conserve.

The goal is to pay off debt incurred when two wings were added to the museum in 2009 and build up operating cash reserves, said Linda Roach, the board chairman.

“There’s no question it is tough,” Roach said of the museum’s situation. “If selling La Belle, deaccessioning and paying off the wings doesn’t work, the museum may not make it.”

George Headley studied art in New York and Paris before going to work for Paul Flato, the first celebrity jeweler in Beverly Hills. Headley then set up his own boutique in the Hotel Bel-Air in Los Angeles, designing jewelry for movie stars.

In 1949, Headley moved back to the family farm on Old Frankfort Pike. He lived at La Belle, a house designed by the noted local architect Warfield Gratz and built in 1936. Headley married Barbara Whitney, a sister of Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney.

Headley continued designing jewelry and bibelots, small curios made of gems and precious metals with intricate craftsmanship. Dozens of bibelots became the core of Headley’s personal collection, and in 1968 he built a “jewel room” and library of art books beside his house.

He then opened his collection as the Headley-Whitney, adding a museum building in 1978. The grounds also contain the quirky Shell Grotto, a small building whose interior is covered with seashells and other decorative materials.

In addition to being an artist and designer, Headley was quite a character, famous for his personal style, gregarious personality and lavish parties. Roach said she got to know him shortly before his death, when he was hospitalized.

“His robe was a fur coat,” she recalled. “And he would open the bar at 5 o’clock, and the doctors would all make him their last visit of the day.”

The museum suffered a crisis in July 1994, when burglars broke into the jewel room and stole 103 pieces worth $1.6 million, including most of the bibelot collection. The biggest art heist in Kentucky history remained a mystery for five years, and then a group of Ohio thieves was caught and convicted.

Unfortunately, the bibelots apparently had been dismantled and sold as scrap for a fraction of their value. Since then, the Headley-Whitney has commissioned several artists to create bibelots for its jewel collection.

The museum has broadened its scope in fine and decorative arts, said Amy Greene, curator and administrator. The new museum wings have played host to some first-class exhibits, such as a recent display of Chinese woodblock prints.

The museum’s permanent collection also includes huge, elaborate dollhouses commissioned by Headley’s sister-in-law Marylou Whitney.

Like many museums, the Headley-Whitney has faced pressures to cut costs, focus its collection and reach beyond its core audience and financial supporters.

A big step in that process will be the sale of La Belle. The house, along with several outbuildings and 8.42 acres of land, will be put up for sale soon with an asking price of $1 million.

“We hope someone will fall in love with the property and be good neighbors,” Roach said.

The museum bought La Belle after Headley’s death. In recent years, it has been a decorator showcase house and a venue for weddings, receptions and other events. All current bookings will be honored, Roach said.

The Headley-Whitney has contracted with Neal Auction Co. in New Orleans to sell some Asian textiles, Chinese porcelain, a Kentucky coin silver pitcher and a few “politically incorrect” art objects made years ago from such things as endangered animal tusks. They will be auctioned Feb. 23 and 24.

The Headley-Whitney has been an affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution since 2003. It also has formed several other partnerships, such as with the Confucius Institute at the University of Kentucky, and is seeking more relationships to broaden its range of exhibits and public appeal, said Christine Huskisson, a board member who teaches museum studies at UK.

The museum has increased education programs, including sponsoring adult and family how-to workshops ranging from woodblock printing to tie-dying. It also has sponsored a faux bibelot competition for middle school students. The best ones this year, which showed some amazing creativity, were displayed at the museum.

“One of the problems we have had is that people look at this as an elitist museum,” Roach said. “We’re trying very hard to be engaged with the community and have the community engaged with us. This isn’t some snob place. This is a place where people can come and learn about the arts.”

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Chad Needham has renovated some of Lexington’s most damaged historic buildings and turned them into valuable commercial space. Photos by Tom Eblen

When Chad Needham moved back to Lexington after a few years away working in corporate marketing, he started a pizza company. Then he recognized another business opportunity all around him.

He noticed that older neighborhoods he had become familiar with while attending Bryan Station High School and Transylvania University were changing, and for the better. People were beginning to renovate classic, old buildings as places to live, work and play.

So, in 2009, the entrepreneur bought the old Spalding’s Bakery building at East Sixth and North Limestone streets. It stood across from the recently renovated Al’s Bar, which had become a popular hangout for young people interested in live music, poetry readings and good bourbon.

Needham gave the circa-1880 bakery a complete makeover, using its historic fabric, salvaged antique wood and adding some contemporary twists. The building is now leased to Arcadium, a bar featuring “vintage” arcade games.

He then turned his attention across the street to the liquor store, which was not exactly an asset to the neighborhood. After renovating that building, he leased it to the young founders of North Lime Coffee & Donuts and artist John Lackey.

Needham then took on a dilapidated Victorian house down the street. Meanwhile, others were doing similar work along the North Limestone corridor, including Brokenfork Design, Griffin VanMeter and Marty Clifford.

Needham has moved closer downtown for his seventh and most challenging project: a pair of early 1800s houses on Constitution Street that he plans to rent as offices.

“The Spalding’s Bakery was really bad, but this is worse,” Needham, 40, said as he took me through one of the houses and described how it had suffered from squatters, a fire and a long-leaking roof.

“These are the classic worst properties in good neighborhoods,” he said. “But they have a great character about them. You try to keep the good old and get rid of the bad old. And the bad old is usually the newer stuff that was added.”

He plans to have the first house finished by April. The former Transylvania soccer standout already has a lease signed for it with the Kentucky Youth Soccer Association, which is moving its office there from Chevy Chase.

“It’s going to be a cool office,” he said. “Essentially, a new structure within an old one.”

Needham is saving original doors and woodwork where possible. But the houses are getting new roofs, plumbing, heating, air conditioning and interior insulation, except where interior brick will be left exposed. Much flooring must be replaced. In one house, a new staircase is being built from reclaimed heart pine lumber salvaged from an old tobacco barn.

His business model requires that he buy old buildings cheaply and carefully watch his renovation costs, he said. He self-finances building purchases, because bank financing is rarely obtainable for a project like this until it is finished and leased.

Except for the Victorian house, which he sold, Needham has retained his other renovated buildings as commercial property. Rental income helps him finance future projects.

“The challenge of this business is that it takes a lot of money up front and it takes a lot of time,” he said. “And you have to do a lot of the work yourself. If I were to hire contracting companies, I don’t think on the other side that I could keep rents affordable.”

Needham works alongside his crew, which often includes his father, Phil Needham, who at age 71 is a competitive bicycle racer. A veteran Thoroughbred breeder, Phil Needham bred Mine That Bird, a gelding that won the 2009 Kentucky Derby as a 50-1 shot and went on to finish second in the Preakness and third in the Belmont Stakes.

“I’ve got a good crew, and what we can’t figure out we’ll subcontract out,” Chad Needham said. “I enjoy this process. It’s a creative process. I try to make each one as good as it can be, but you’ve got to figure out where to stop.”

He said his venture has been modestly profitable so far and is allowing him to create assets that will generate long-term income for his family, which includes wife Denise, a dressage horse trainer, and daughter Bella, 5.

“You really end up with a new building that has a lot of character,” he said. “But I couldn’t do this without the end-users. Everything I’ve done has found a customer.”

Needham also said he gets a lot of personal satisfaction from the work.

“I like giving these great old buildings a second life and seeing the area turn around,” he said. “It’s a nice feeling to keep investing in a neighborhood where I had fun times when I was at Transy.”

Click on each photo to enlarge and read caption: