Author: Catherine

posted content / cell phone photos mine, unless otherwise credited (thumbnail portrait of Catherine at MFA, Boston © David Cox photo) https://www.cryanaid.com/

Support Friends of Sawyer Free Library

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Support Friends of Sawyer Free Library by joining or renewing a 2020-2021 membership.

Print SFL Friends membership drive Oct 2020 form Download

Captain Vito’s Fresh Seafood: New Business on Washington Street downtown #GloucesterMA

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A new business has opened downtown during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Captain Vito’s Fresh Seafood opened on 53 Washington Street in Gloucester, Massachusetts, utterly transforming the space formerly held by wonderful Giovanni’s barbershop (and tailor shop at the back). Sclafani’s Italian bakery is located next door.

Seafood to go website here: https://www.captainvitosfreshseafood.com/

 

prepared meals and daily specials

 

Order to go menu (978) 491-0222

menu

Covid Halloween #GloucesterMA

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The Scream at the head of the harbor. Feeling it.

location, location, location 🙂

Clouds linger after sustained winds Long Beach

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Surfers and resting shorebirds making the most of Long Beach

A smile path helps wildlife.

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Walk around or pause if you can. We’re lucky to have tiny shorebirds visit beaches during fall migration.

Deborah Cramer describes impact of shorebird disturbances (specifically to red knots)

(Red knots) “feed amid congestion, constantly interrupted by the commotion of off-road vehicles, dogs and people. Forced to take flight repeatedly, they lose precious refueling time. Minutes lost during one ebb tide on one day accumulate into hour upon hour as the season continues. So many times I’d walk the beaches at home, unconsciously flushing flocks of sandpipers at the tide line, taking pleasure as they circled out over the water and then landed farther down the beach, never thinking that disturbing them might make a difference.” 

Deborah Cramer The Narrow Edge

photo below: Sanderlings, semipalmated plovers and semipalmated sandpipers dashing along Long Beach 9/22/2020. Dogs rushing at the birds flush them 100%. Wider smile path with your pet can really help. Ditto looking ahead before tossing a ball inadvertently in the direction of a flock. They’re hard to see. If you spot them and have time, pause to enjoy the tiny touch down marvels. The increase August-October is migration.

The Morning After- next day storm waves

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The Long Beach walkway was dry this morning: Storm Teddy did not surge up and over the seawall. Light debris was deposited on nearly spotless Long Beach. Beautiful rollers were distant as the tide was heading out.

photos 9/23/2020- click to enlarge to full size

 

 

Spotted less than ten shorebirds, three species. These tiny birds are migrating from the arctic and landing to rest and refuel. Give them space if you see them! The few I spotted were flushed off.

A smile path helps wildlife. Walk around (or pause if you have the time)

 

Shorebird visitors hanging out together today (sanderlings, semipalmated sandpipers and semipalmated plovs). Easy to add a smile path when you spot them.

 

Below L-R: Sanderlings, semipalmated sandpipers, and semipalmated plover visiting 2020

 

Scenes of waves from Storm Teddy yesterday 9/22/2020 here

Cheery blue boat on the Annisquam

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Art in nature. Seeing Sam Cady art here.

Essex National Heritage Trails & Sails 2020 FREE fun events start Friday September 18th! Plan ahead

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The Essex National Heritage Fall annual meeting is this Thursday, September 17, 2020 at 9AM — and it’s virtual so more people can RSVP than ever. The next day, Trails and Sails 2020 is back! Two fun three day weekends packed with FREE activities.

News from Essex National Heritage:

Discover special places in your backyard from Friday September 18 – through Sunday September 27, 2020!

Be guided through unique landscapes on land and sea, virtually explore historic properties, and take in experiences of all kinds. Find what makes Essex County like nowhere else during the annual two weekends of Trails & Sails. Event styles this year include: DIY Virtual Experiences; self-guided tours; tours by car; scavenger hunts; small group events; and arts and cultural activities and experiences…and so much more!

SEE upcoming trails & Sails events here (updated continually)

Trails and Sails 2020, Essex National Heritage,

Manchester Historical museum will be offering self guided tours: Download your choice of 3 self guided walking tours in the downtown area of Manchester-by-the-Sea from the Manchester Historical Museum website

Meanwhile Ipswich Marini Farm is featuring a farm forest ice cream hike.


There are no Rockport or Gloucester listings that I see- however, the Sargent House Museum is offering walking tours downtown September 26, October 3, 10, and 17 to sites and historic buildings associated with Judith Sargent Murray. It’s not too late for the museum to add the Sept. 26th one into the mix of free events for Trails & Sails 2020, or folks to plan “while you’re at it” activities. (Perhaps they’ll waive the $10 on that day for Trails & Sails participants?) The HarborWalk is open!

NEW Maplewood School apartment and town house condos are so loft-like soaring big and bright! Beautiful historic building #GloucesterMA

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There will be 12 brand new homes for sale within the former Maplewood School, renamed the “Maplewood School Residences” at 120 Maplewood Avenue. Open houses began last week, offering sneak peek access and sales for buyers eager to preview the thoughtful and modern layouts designed into this beautiful and historic Gloucester building. The Maplewood School Residences project has reached the exciting studs out stage for its interior raw spaces.  A model unit **still under construction** was made available for walk through.

 The school was built in 1899. Here are some BEFORE exterior photographs from 2016 when the building was on the market and from 2018 (when demo and major structural upgrades commenced) compared with AFTER photographs from February and September 2020.

BEFORE  | AFTER 

 

a few more BEFORE exterior and interior photographs

 

AFTER photographs interior and exterior details from 2020

– construction in progress

Original architectural features were restored and incorporated throughout. The space plans and configurations are stunning and creative. And big! The smallest two bedroom unit is a large and airy 1600 sf’. Every unit in the Maplewood School residences features classic design elements like generous entries that will make it a pleasure to come home to. How exciting to see this long term project come to life!

 

Cranes will be on site as early next week to facilitate delivery of granite counter tops and hardwood flooring for the upper floors. Some of the listings include extra outdoor space balconies. 

 

The visionary architect Kirk Noyes has developed 45+ historic buildings in multiple states, and several architectural treasures right here in downtown Gloucester, like Central Grammar on Dale Avenue and the Wesley Condos on Prospect Street.

 

 

 

 The Gloucester Daily Times published a release by Lillian Shapiro about this special project. Read it here

“When we first looked at this building, we were immediately struck by its great condition…What we have done is create an accurate reproduction of the 1899 schoolhouse by doing things like reinventing the cornice detailing around the building, re-configuring old classrooms, and refurbishing the original staircase.”

-Kirk Noyes, architect, construction team member Maplewood School Residences as quoted in Gloucester Daily Times article by Lillian Shapiro

 

South Shore Art Center features North Shore artists Coco Berkman, Pia Juhl and Juni VanDyke #CohassetMA

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The South Shore Art Center press release for September/October 2020 exhibition:                     

From North Shore to South Shore…Gloucester Comes to Cohasset 

Featuring three artists: COCO BERKMAN, PIA JUHL, JUNI VANDYKE

Cape Ann artist printmaker Coco Berkman creates images that delight her and hopefully others through the process of linoleum printmaking. Inspired by literature, the natural world, and the free play inherent in drawing, Berkman uses sharp Japanese tools to carve images into sheets of linoleum and then prints them one color at a time over several months to complete an edition. A member of the Boston Printmakers, Berkman’s work is represented by 13 Forest Gallery in Arlington and The Square Circle Gallery in Rockport. 

Pia Juhl, is well known for her light filled paintings depicting quarries and giant rock formations indigenous to her surroundings.  She has had numerous exhibitions in Europe and on Cape Ann including Jane Deering Gallery.    

Juni VanDyke will exhibit paintings related to her connection with Gloucester.  “The Cape Ann landscape is a subliminal force directing my art and tethering me to a love of color and the infinite configurations of abstraction.  Traveling to my work in Gloucester, I cross over the elevated Annisquam Bridge where below the sea is an ever changing miracle of patterns and light holding promise for later.”   VanDyke’s work is held in the permanent collection of Cape Ann Museum.  Her work is represented by Jane Deering Gallery, and throughout the US by Room and Board, Inc.

The exhibition continues through October 30th.

The South Shore Art Center is located at 119 Ripley Road, Cohasset

781-383-2787

 Zoom link (there is no password):https://zoom.us/j/91879749303

The event site link is: http://www.ssac.org/bancroft.asp

Images (in order)

Coco Berkman “The Reception” Lino Print

Juni VanDyke “View From Above” Acrylic and Oil on Board

Pia Juhl “Dogtown” Oil on Canvas

This week – Deborah Brown solo exhibition at Jane Deering Gallery

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News from Jane Deering Gallery:

Jane Deering Gallery presents Deborah Brown solo show September 5 – 20, 2020
Saturdays & Sundays 1:00 – 3:00 P.M. 19 Pleasant Street . Gloucester

Ephemerata | a timeline of creation and change
works by Deborah Brown

 

The highly textural paintings (12×12 and 8×8) have occupied my impulsive hands for several years (2008-2020). What started as an inquisitive exploration of materials and depth became the challenge of transforming a flat surface into a three-dimensional abyss. An additional challenge was to transform the restrictive visual enclosure of the square to a dynamic metamorphic journey. Primal materials such as earth pigments, charcoal and volcanic ash reiterate the grit of progression, stasis and ultimate demise. — Deborah Brown

 

Deborah Brown studied at the San Francisco Art Institute and has exhibited her work throughout the United States. She is intensely private so you will not unearth her presence on Social Media; not a philistine, just a hermit. Having spent considerable time in Alaska, she now continues her art practice in her recently adopted home of Gloucester MA. 

 

I see my work as visceral and evocative, an embedded imprint on the limbic brain, relentlessly touched, molded, scraped and scattered with earthbound dust. And with a certain threatening charm to engage and provoke the viewer.

Deborah Brown

Who are the Historic Women Trailblazers of Massachusetts?

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Massachusetts Office of Travel and Tourism readied a new digital publication for the historic women trailblazers trail. Check it out!

Link here

or download PDF

PDF – Historic Women Trailblazers of MassachusettsDownload

news from MOTT:

“August 26, 2020 commemorated the 100th Anniversary of the signing of the 19th Amendment granting women the right to vote. This historic anniversary of suffrage was the perfect time to celebrate our Massachusetts Foremothers, more than 70 amazing women whose contributions to the Commonwealth, the nation and the world are unparalleled and who are recognized as “Trailblazers” in their fields. Click here to learn about the stories of these remarkable women and their ties to Massachusetts, The Woman Suffrage Movement, commemorative sculptures and statues at the Massachusetts State House, the significance of the Sunflower, the Colors of Suffrage and much more!“