The Cville People Project

Tim, the reporter

If you’ve lived in Charlottesville for very long, you’re probably familiar with the Daily Progress, The Hook, and the C-Ville Weekly, but what about Cville Tomorrow? Have you ever read it?

I had heard about Cville Tomorrow but didn’t really know much about it until I met Tim the other day. He was on the Downtown Mall to publicize their Kickstarter campaign, which represents their attempt to expand their news coverage of local events. At this point, they focus on growth and development issues, as well as local politics, and they’re hoping to add education news to their offerings. If they meet their fundraising goal, Tim will be the reporter covering that beat.

Tim has been on staff at Cville Tomorrow for a little while now, but he’s been a writer for a lot longer. After getting an undergraduate degree in English, he went on to get an MFA in Creative Writing. He’s a published poet, and he told me that his poetry is typically about the relationship between people and the land, so his reporting on land use issues dovetails nicely with his creative work. You can read some of his poetry here and here.

Nia, the Sweet Lolita

There are all sorts of subcultures in Charlottesville, from the much-maligned hipsters to the more old-school preppies and even the occasional goth. Today I saw something new on the Downtown Mall: a pair of Lolita girls. Lolita fashion, for those of you who don’t know, is a Japanese import, and a quick trip to Wikipedia informed me that it began in the 1970s but really solidified as a street style in the 1990s. There are various subsets within Lolita fashion, all of which share a love for Victorian-era clothing. Nia was dressed as a “Sweet Lolita,” which differs from the “Classic Lolita” or “Gothic Lolita” styles in that Sweet Lolitas wear lighter colors and often have a more fantasy-inspired look.

Nia, a student at Charlottesville High, doesn’t dress as a Lolita too often, but she donned her outfit to go out with her good friend Amy, whose birthday they were celebrating. Nia is a Charlottesville native, and when she’s not in school or out sharing her friend’s love for Japanese pop culture fashion, she dances with the Chihamba African dance troupe. She told me that Chihamba will be performing at the African-American Cultural Festival in July, and I’m looking forward to checking it out.

Downtown Mall in Charlottesville, VA

Lauren, the permaculture pro

I had never been inside the Main Street Arena until the other day, when there was an event held to celebrate Earth Day. There were a number of different vendors and organizations, and one of the most interesting was a local outfit called Cville Foodscapes. Billed as a “worker-owned edible landscaping collective,” the folks at Cville Foodscapes have a unique mission: they turn lawns into low-maintenance gardens; in other words, they will come to your house, evaluate your space and talk to you about the sorts of things that you could grow easily there, and then transform your yard into a well-designed and efficient garden that is fairly close to self-sustaining.

Lauren told me that the driving philosophy for their work is the notion of permaculture. I’d heard the word before but had no idea exactly what it meant, and she gave me a good explanation. The idea, she said, is to be aware of the environment and to design a diverse group of plants that can thrive together in that environment. In other words, it’s all about interdependence and sustainability, so that a carefully constructed ecosystem is created that produces food without the need for lots of work on the part of the home-owner. She told me that she and her colleagues have made gardens out of even the tiniest urban backyards, as they design each project individually in concert with the land.

The more she talked about it, the more it became clear that the permaculture philosophy extends beyond simply gardening. As they write on Cville Foodscapes website, “Imagine your yard as part of an urban patchwork of perennially abundant and vibrant gardens that enrich, enliven, and enchant the lives of neighbors, children, elders, poor folks, rich folks, pets, wild animals, and the grand collective “y’all”.” What a lovely image! It makes me wish that I had a yard that I could cultivate.

Lauren is originally from Western Pennsylvania, and she first came to the area back in 2006, when she spent some time as a caregiver at Innisfree Village, a residential community for individuals with intellectual disabilities located in Crozet. The company has been around for three years, and she joined their team about a year ago.

Abby, the musician

In my last entry, I talked about Will, a member of a newly-formed trio that was playing some acoustic music on the Downtown Mall. They met each other after being competitors in the Mockingbird open mic finals, in which winners of each week’s contest faced off against each other for some pretty nice prizes. None of them ended up winning that competition, but they did meet each other, and now they’re starting to make music together.

Abby is another member of that group, and she plays the guitar and ukulele, as well as singing. When I approached them and asked about taking a photo of one of them, Abby quickly demurred. After I photographed Will, though, she said that she’d be willing to participate in my project, so I made a portrait of her, as well. Abby is from Staunton, and she’s currently a student at Robert E. Lee High School. She told me that she likes all kinds of music, although their group plays mostly folk and bluegrass.

Downtown Mall in Charlottesville, VA

Will, the musician

Now that the weather is so nice, the street musicians have started popping up all over the Downtown Mall like wildflowers after spring rain. One trio that I hadn’t seen before was made up of Will, Abby, and another friend. Will told me that they met at the Mockingbird, a restaurant and concert hall over in Staunton that closed its doors back in January. The Mockingbird used to hold open mic competitions every Wednesday, with weekly winners going on to face off for a substantial cash prize and the opportunity to have a concert there. Will was one of the weekly winners, as was Abby. Unfortunately, neither one won the big prize, but they got to talking and decided to team up to form a band. They haven’t been playing together for too long, and they haven’t even picked a name for their group, but I thought that they sounded pretty good.

Will is from Waynesboro, and he’s studying English at Blue Ridge Community College. He told me that he’s hoping to transfer to the University of Virginia once he finishes his associate’s degree.

Hector, the former rap star

One of my regular stops when I’m spending some time on the Downtown Mall is the Market Street Market. They sell some of the best bread in town, their ham biscuits are very tasty, and I often pop in for a sarsaparilla soda to take with me down to the Cville Smoke Shop, which is only a few doors down. One of the best things about the Market Street Market, though, is the staff: a number of friendly and interesting young people work behind the counter, and some of them know about my project; Hector, for example, asks me about it almost every time I see him.

Hector is from New York, originally, but he and his family moved down to Virginia in 1996. He has lived in Richmond, Goochland, and now Charlottesville, and he told me that he likes Cville quite a bit. Like a lot of folks I’ve met since I started this project, Hector is a musician. As a teenager, he established quite a reputation regionally as a freestyle rapper, and he was even featured in Vibe and the Source. He said that he still raps and is active as a musician, but these days, he’s more interested in web design and making videos.

Hannah, the Harry Potter fan

I’ve heard about folks who are devoted Harry Potter fans, sometimes going so far as to attend parties dressed as their favorite character to celebrate the release of the latest volume of the saga. With the series now complete, it’s pretty rare to see someone walking around looking like they just popped in for a visit from Hogwarts. Today, though, there were a group of University of Virginia students in Harry Potter garb on the Downtown Mall; they were members of the UVa Book Club, and they were trying to publicize their annual philanthropic event, a Harry Potter Festival hosted at the Library just off the Downtown Mall.

Hannah told me that her favorite character from the Potter books is Hermione Granger, as she likes the fact that Hermione is both intelligent and in touch with her emotions. Hannah is a third-year computer science major from Northern Virginia, and she said that she is quite happy at the University. Like her fictional hero, Hannah likes spending time at the many libraries on campus or in town, and she told me that she also shares my love for the Downtown Mall.

Rachael, the robot designer

It’s not every day that I spend a few minutes watching a robot play tic-tac-toe, yet that’s just what I did the other day, as Rachael and her teammates on the First Teach Challenge (FTC) Robotics team had brought their robot out to the Downtown Mall to publicize their participation in the upcoming World Championships. Rachael has been involved in various technology competitions since she was a middle-school student. She has competed in First Lego League (FLL) teams, both as a team member and as an adviser, and this year she’s the head of the FTC team..

Rachael’s FTC team won the Virginia state-level contest, and they are one of two teams from Virginia that will be competing in the World Championships. She told me that thousands of teams around the world began the competition, but only 123 have made it though all of the round to compete in St. Louis for the title of World Champions. You can learn more about their team, Defying Gravity Robotics, by clicking here or by “liking” them on their Facebook page.

Rachael is a senior at St. Ann’s Belfield School. She told me that she wants to study industrial engineering in college, and she’s considering Virginia Tech and RIT as potential options.