Mike Teixeira, board president of Art-Speak (Portsmouth’s cultural commission), saw a point of weakness in the port city once known for tall ships and whales. “We were frustrated that public art seems to take so long to get done for public property like parks and municipal property and the light bulb went on,” says Teixeira. “We could fast track getting art in the city to reflect the real spirit of what’s going on here if we started getting property owners directly engaged.” So they did just that, creating a Craigslist-like website for muralists to connect with business owners in need of art.

The Wilder | Dylan Haigh

This is how it works. First the building owner selects the indoor or outdoor wall that they want to upgrade. Once they’ve decided budget, dimensions, and timeframe, they post their wall on StreetCanvas. Artists can peruse the entries and when they find one that piques their interest, they can submit their ideas for the wall. The building owner selects their favorite submission and gets in touch with the artist directly to start the work.

The Wilder | Dylan Haigh

Since StreetCanvas got its start in June 2017, three murals have been finished. Artist Dylan Haigh, a creative director (among other things) living in Portsmouth, gives StreetCanvas high praise… “I didn’t consider (street art) as something I could really do around here until this year and when StreetCanvas went up,” he says. “Ever since I watched the page like a hawk just waiting for the right wall.” The right wall manifested in the form of The Wilder, a new restaurant within walking distance of Haigh’s home. The idea of having a giant piece of his own art in his neighborhood was too exciting to pass up. “I had the benefit of knowing the folks who own the business. They had been familiar with what I do and they liked the general aesthetic so they told me to go nuts,” he says.

“A city like Portsmouth can get frozen in time,” says Teixeira. The port city is known for its historical elements but that’s no reason to get entrenched in the past. There are troves of artists from newer generations and StreetCanvas was created to give them a voice and protect Portsmouth from falling to the wayside. Why not integrate new art with the more traditional pieces that already live on the walls of Portsmouth?

Live Artfully Chalk Mural | Brian Cartier

While the StreetCanvas initiative has received overwhelmingly positive feedback from the community, not every exchange between artist and business owner has been strife-free. “Some business owners and property owners came to the table with very specific ideas and unrealistic expectations and it has been an amazing learning curve of how to figure out how to mediate that kind of stuff,” says Teixeira. The nature of StreetCanvas encourages business owners who may not be particularly art-minded to think figuratively and step into the perspective of the artist to see how the process works on their end.

StreetCanvas is still young, but Teixeira has high expectations for its future. “I hope that this takes off, and it’s a place where business owners and artists can connect and create a bunch of cool financial opportunities for artists to get work on a regular basis for what they do.”

Mike Teixeira, president of Art-Speak
Portsmouth, New Hampshire
Website
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Instagram

Top image: Portwalk Transformer Fence Mural | Susan Bartlett Rice

The post Painting Portsmouth appeared first on Take Magazine.

We knew Take readers were ready for the challenge: help us find the quirkiest of the holiday tunes that now fill our ears in every space we inhabit for the next month. And you did. A lot of them.

So we put our Santa pants on and played all your submissions in the office—some we recognized, others left us scratching our heads (ya’ll are strange and we love it). We’ll admit, sifting through your favorite tunes wasn’t all Christmas bows and holiday cheer… while many of us enjoyed cozying up under a blanket of festive song, others claimed they endured suffering *ahem* looking at you, John.

John “The Grinch” Arvanitis

We even got western-Massachusetts based circus punk band Bella’s Bartok to contribute. Per their recommendation, you simply must include Mariah Carey’s Christmas album Merry Christmas in your holiday listening repertoire this year because, “that shit is absolute gold,” says bassist and mustache savant, Dan Niederhauser. Suffice to say, we’re officially in the holiday spirit thanks to you all! Well, most of us are.

LISTEN TO TAKE’S (QUIRKY) HOLIDAY PLAYLIST HERE.

The post Take’s (Quirky) Holiday Playlist appeared first on Take Magazine.

We’re not jonesin’ for just any old jingle, that is. We want the weird, the quirky, and the spinoffs for this potentially annual Take a Listen holiday Spotify playlist. That means, no decking of halls or jingling of bells allowed (unless you happen to know of cute parody versions), because frankly we’ve had enough of the old.

In addition to asking all of our favorite New England musicians and bands to contribute to the list, we want to know your favorites. So give ’em here! And don’t worry, we won’t bombard you with the playlist until after Thanksgiving. We’re not crazy. Please comment on the post pinned at the top of our Facebook page with your submission(s). Help us build a holiday playlist that’s off the beaten path. We promise, this isn’t just for us to play in the office through the entire month of December…

The post What’s Your Favorite Quirky Holiday Song? appeared first on Take Magazine.

Joshua Jenkins is one of the creatives behind Hartford menswear label demuerte, which was featured in Take’s October/November 2017 issue. Here’s a bit more about Jenkins and how he got started that we didn’t have room for in print.

Take: How did demuerte begin?
Joshua Jenkins: The brand was conceived in 2014. A friend of mine from college, Kevin, approached me with the idea of starting a brand at a time when I felt creatively starved. I always had creative tendencies but never had a focus. I took the opportunity with his encouragement to look further into attention to detail as well as conceptualizing things a little bit bigger than at first glance. From there we recruited a small team. One of the first people we brought on board was Ky Spence, now one of our managing partners and production director. He had very basic skills with sewing and showed me the ropes. We taught each other and sourced people from our community that had more experience with cut-and-sew and garment production. We launched our first production in fall of 2015.

Photo Courtesy of demuerte

T:Where did the name demuerte come from?
JJ: When you take the translation, it’s “of death.” Death is generally something that comes with negative connotations, but it’s also something that everyone will experience. The idea of mortality connects us and makes us all human. Ultimately, choosing it as the name of the brand calls on the wearer to seek a deeper interpretation rather than the initial negative response they get from it.

T: What is the brand’s role in streetwear? What drives the aesthetic of demuerte?
JJ: Streetwear hasn’t really been our immediate goal on a design level. It’s something that more naturally has been identified with our work just by how easy it is to relate with what people wear on a daily basis. In a lot of ways we would like to be identified on more of a menswear level. Initially when we started, a couple of the first samples I did for the conception of “de” was taking button-ups and reconstructing the collars and adding denim accents to them. Originally we asked ourselves, “How can menswear tie in with streetwear?” and “How can menswear be an everyday thing instead of something that’s just considered business casual or for special occasions?” We wanted to offer something you can comfortably wear and still have some sort of identity with how you decide to style it.

The concept of streetwear is very interesting to me. The market is very competitive but there isn’t a large amount that separates one garment from the next. In that way there’s not a lot of risk in streetwear. We’re trying to tackle that in how we integrate certain themes into our silhouettes or proportion in details, whether collars or pockets. By applying that to a black and white canvas is helpful in terms of identifying the different features of a garment as opposed to those elements being overshadowed by very loud or vibrant color ways. But it’s not to say that we don’t have interest in that in the future… we just have a lot more we want to present on a design level, for now.

Photo Courtesy of demuerte

Photo Courtesy of demuerte

T: Is the DIY fashion movement part of your design concept?
JJ: Definitely. I feel like I’m a student in this industry and I would say the same of our co-designer, Ky. Lately, I realized I’d like to make clothes that attract an audience who can make their own distinctions about style, who can ask themselves, “What is this supposed to mean?”—in terms of what our garments represent and how that translates to the world around them. The DIY aspect applies to how these everyday garments can be worn and how they can fit and how that can reflect the identity of the person who’s wearing them.

T: Who are your customers?
JJ: The range is limitless. One of my favorite clients is a gentleman named Thomas Foran. He’s a Hartford native with a youthful spirit and he has a very monochrome aesthetic, strictly black, and our work attracts him greatly. More recently I’ve been approached by a younger generation within the Hartford art scene that conveyed their interest and appreciation of what we’re trying to do. It’s great to have a combination of the styles within these generations, to see these worlds collide but still make sense with one another, just like streetwear and menswear. At this point I can’t see myself narrowing the demographic of who de belongs to because, getting back to the origins of where we started this, we are all so connected by the things that make us human.

We’ve always tried to make concepts that could be androgynous. We used to get a lot of inquiries like, “When are you going to make a women’s line?” and my response is always, “Well, you’re looking at it.” Depending on what look you’re going for, I’m sure you could find a way to style our garments to make them work for you as an individual.

Photo Courtesy of demuerte

T: How do you see demuerte evolving?
JJ: We would like to continue reaching a large audience with our concepts. I always hope that anyone who’s taking interest in our design is someone who reflects on, “How does this concept apply to me?” In that way, I imagine developing close relationships with stockists who have regard for that question. We also plan on extending our reach on an international level as well as different mediums with design. We’ve worked with different photographers and stylists from different parts of the world and want to keep that going.

T: What about the fall/winter 2017 line?
JJ: In the past few seasons we’ve taken a microscope on fashion concepts from the ’50s-’80s and looking at their societal and cultural significance. Last year our collection stemmed from a blue color aesthetic and how that applies to post-baby boomers, work ethic, and figuring out careers—what Dickies modeled after.

For fall/winter this year, we’ve taken a closer look at the 1950s. We want to bring an adolescence feel—taking common trends from different social groups of that era and connecting them with other styles. Take a varsity jacket for instance. How can that symbolic item be manipulated to represent something different than at its conception? Clothes and styles are all mixed up nowadays and items that used to carry stereotypes, like “the jock wearing a varsity jacket,” have lost their significance. You can’t point out the type of person this individual is just based on their attire. We’re working on trousers, a staple in a menswear, and wondering how that looks on a jock, typically wearing a pair of 501s and a varsity jacket.

Photo Courtesy of demuerte

T:What items or fabrics will be in the fall winter line?
JJ: We have an overcoat in the works. We want to continue to run off our concepts of staple pieces. Ky typically takes the reigns in overseeing the initial sampling phasing while our friend Vilinda McGregor plays a key role in pattern-making and design consulting. We’re looking to do a variation of the trousers with denim, as well as some accessories. We’re also exploring luggage, duffle bags, and most recently developed “the carrie.” It’s essentially a shoulder bag with an industrial look and feel.

We had the privilege of connecting with Jacob Long, the director at American Woolen fabric manufacturer based in Stafford Springs, Connecticut. They’ve been very helpful in our aim to improve the quality of our garments. We recently picked up some of their high grade wool that we’re incorporating for the overcoat and varsity jacket concepts. I think their product fits perfect with the allude approach we’re taking towards the ’50s and standard of fits from that period.

Joshua Jenkins–co-founder, demuerte
Hartford, Connecticut
Website
Facebook
Instagram

Top photo courtesy of Joshua Jenkins

The post Take Q&A: Joshua Jenkins—demuerte Co-founder appeared first on Take Magazine.

One of the bleak but unifying characteristics of all humankind is that everyone eventually dies. Less bleak, but just as universal—we all wear clothing. Joshua Jenkins, cofounder and creative director of De Muerte in Hartford, Connecticut, aims to look past the surface of negativity surrounding our shared fate and channel that ideology into refined garment design. This is how the brand’s unconventional, existential name was born.

De Muerte was conceived in 2014, when brand cofounder Kevin Dumont approached Jenkins while the two were studying at Eastern Connecticut State University and Jenkins was feeling “creatively starved.” Months later, in the fall of 2015, their first line of minimalist clothing came out. The reconstructed collars, refined-but-approachable silhouettes, hand-sewn pockets, and double-take denim accents in De Muerte’s launch became the foundation of the brand’s DIY aesthetic.

0232 Concept L/s shirt, $80. Photo by Joshua Jenkins

While considered “menswear,” De Muerte’s monochromatic styling works equally well for men and women. “From the beginning, we’ve always tried to make concepts that could come across as androgynous,” explains Jenkins. “We used to get a lot of inquiries like, ‘When are you going to make a women’s line?’ and my response was always, ‘Well, you’re looking at it.’”

This fall, De Muerte’s small team of New England natives will release a new line of garments inspired by fashion staples from the ’40s and ’50s, liberating them from their cultural context. Imagine a varsity letterman jacket paired with pleated trousers to form an unexpected, but harmonious, union. Monochrome junkies, art school kids, and jock-nerd hybrids: we think you’ll find these statement-making basics, well, to die for.

De Muerte
Hartford, Connecticut
Website
Instagram
Tumblr

Top image: 0243, the “Robert” suit, in wool suiting from American Woolen Company, $725.  Photo by Joshua Jenkins

The post To Die For appeared first on Take Magazine.

No matter which way you look at it, Susan Gaylord’s journey started with words. Her early and lasting relationship with books gave her companionship and a tool for learning about and connecting with the world around her. While she went on to major in English literature in college, her practices in art post graduation took her beyond the meaning of words to their form through calligraphy, book making, and writing.

A New Jersey native, Gaylord first lived in New England when she transferred to Boston University for her last two years of college. “I fell in love with its scale and its palpable sense of history as well as its color coded subways, wildflowers growing in the trolley tracks, and clam chowder with cream,” she says of her immediate love for Boston’s urban offerings. Gaylord has remained here in Massachusetts ever since.

“I love living in the part of the country where Dickinson, Thoreau, Emerson, and Whittier among many others lived and worked,” Gaylord says. She identifies with these literary greats and “their sense that the glory of nature can be found equally in something as small as a flower and as large as a mountain or as vast as the sea,” all of which are easily found in the varietal landscapes of New England. “I have spent more than half my life in the Merrimack Valley, first in the Lowell area where I began my life in the arts and immersed myself in the writing of Jack Kerouac, and then in Newburyport, where the river meets the sea, for the past 32.”

After 10 years of a calligraphy career, commercial work began to bore Gaylord. Through exploration of different mediums, surfaces, and fabrics, she discovered the book form that led her to her next arts adventure. Gaylord became a bookmaking teacher, preaching the art to 30,000 students and teachers over the years. “I came to see that what teachers needed were ways to work within the curriculum. Most of the books I taught in schools were designed to make learning facts and concepts and doing research fun,” Gaylord says.

The culmination of Gaylord’s work is visible in what she calls Spirit Books, where “words” exist at the abstract intersection of the history of books as testaments of faith and belief and nature. These wordless books were inspired by a massive pruning on Gaylord’s property. “We cut grape and blackberry vines, wild roses, honeysuckle, and old lilacs, and made a giant mound on our driveway,” she says. “As we handled the pieces to remove them, I felt such an attraction to them that I brought some into my studio.” Four years later came the Spirit Books—delicate, sculptural, but maintaining a mechanical “bookness.” The Spirit Books use their natural elements to tell the story. Each unique page speaks for itself, without words. “I like to think they can be read as meditation,” Gaylord says.

Spirit Book | Courtesy of Susan Gaylord

“My compulsion to do my work and to share it comes from some inner drive. I have to create the things I do and I am not content with just making them; I have to share them too,” says Gaylord, “but I don’t really have a plan about what I want to communicate or what kind of impact I want my work to have. I’m not sure why, but I think it may have something to do with the fact that I have always tried to let the work shape itself and lead me rather than the other way around.”

Susan Gaylord–artist
Newburyport, Massachusetts
Website
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Instagram
YouTube

The post Powered By Words appeared first on Take Magazine.

Lisa A. Foster works from her sunlit home studio in Longmeadow, Massachusetts. A practice in line, form, and reproduction quilting fabrics that once lent itself as a coping mechanism for her childhood sexual abuse and resulting dissociative identity disorder, has transformed into a thriving professional career bolstered by unfathomable feminine strength and resilience. Now Foster’s art sings the song of women, telling the story of her past to give a platform for the broad and varietal female voice of the present.

Gesture On Green; 24″ Square | Photo by Kevin Downey

Foster has drawn since she was a child. She was always fascinated with line and form. Her grandmother, with whom she was close, was a quilter. Foster’s memories of Nana are of the floor of her workspace, collaged with quilting fabrics destined to become a blanket for her bed. This element of care has become a central theme in Foster’s process.

When she was pregnant with her first child—of which she has two, Forest and Summer—she developed an aversion to oil paints. “I immediately went to a quilting shop and knew just what I was going to start exploring,” she says. The new intolerance propelled her into sourcing reproduction quilting fabrics—old patterns recreated from the Colonial and pre-Civil War eras—in a way picking up where her nana left off. “That pregnancy gave me permission to explore the feminine medium. I felt an obligation to find something worth doing to replace oil paints,” says Foster. “At that point I allowed myself to leave that tradition and create my own with quilting fabrics.”

An unfinished piece in Lisa’s studio | Photo courtesy of the artist

Don’t mistake Foster’s work for collage. Her paintings, which manifest on stretched canvas in the form of nude self-portraits and hand gestures, are made with mixed media but result in a cohesive unit with indiscriminate compartments. “The hands and bodies are so symbolic, emotional and full of context. To take a nude female figure and attempt to simply make a shape out of it, well- it is almost impossible,” she says, “There is so much meaning and story to a nude female body and to a hand, that will never just go away, no matter how you pose or manipulate them. They are too powerful to diminish into mere form, this is one of the things I use and play with in my work.”

Foster wants each piece to seek justice in the battle for women, using pieces of herself, her past, her own story, and the resurrection of the feminine tradition of her Nana’s quilt-making. That physical phenomenon is exactly what Foster attempts to do with form in the abstract realm. The history and power of the woman to heal is expressed in Foster as a woman, as a survivor, and resonates through her work.

Bullets, Bombs, Grenades 72” x 48” | Photo by Kevin Downey

At this point, Foster’s work has grown to be completely independent of her troubled past. “I do at the end want to make my art broader. That feeling before of relying on my work to live just doesn’t exist anymore. It has really gotten to be a profession and gotten to be art. I’m not dwelling on my past and I don’t want my work to,” says Foster, “It’s an attempt to contribute to a very male dominated art history in a very female way. But it is also a plea to all of us to hear all the stories and all the cries of all the women.”

The Salon Show at Abigail Ogilvy Gallery | Photo courtesy of the artist

Lisa’s work has recently appeared in the Abigail Ogilvy Gallery and at Art Market San Francisco.

Lisa A. Foster–Artist
Longmeadow, Massachusetts
Website
Facebook

All photos courtesy of the artist

The post Foster’s Care appeared first on Take Magazine.

“I’m 19,” says Dylan Rhode, one of the three frontmen of Flower Shop, a music and arts collective based in Portland, Maine. Dylan drifted around New England, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey through his upbringing, finally settling down in the Greater Portland area he now calls home. “It all kind of happened organically,” says Rhode, who goes by the moniker Monk, of the advent of Flower Shop. “We didn’t have anything else to do except get in trouble and do stupid shit, so turning this common interest into a business seemed like the most productive use of our passion.” In nine months, that passion has flourished into a hip-hop collective, studded with rappers, vocal artists, producers, videographers, beat-smiths, and musical magicians—most of them under 21—who are pushing out unique content by the day. A quick visit to their Soundcloud gives a sense of their musical range.

Mhon Griot & Monk | Photo by Justin Hardesty

Passion doesn’t always express itself in a pleasant way. “It’s different up here,” Monk explains. “It’s cold, everyone has seasonal depression, and the summer is fleeting. The summer is almost like a feeling as opposed to a time. It’s a different culture—everyone is collectively sad. We’re trying to bring the essence of that culture to our music.” Since August of last year, Monk and the other two frontmen, Trevor Tucker (THT) and Mhondoro Richards (Mhon Griot), have been pushing out masterful products of visionary talent steeped in sadness. However, this tripod of hip-hop wunderkinds couldn’t stand without a thriving community of audiovisual colleagues to lift them out of the perpetual sludge. The most powerful manifestation of that is their first music video for their track, FACES, which features the work of many talented collaborators.

The concept for the music video was dreamt of and engineered by Flower Shop visual artists, Dillan Hodak and Charlie ‘Buckets’ Mayforth. The Champlain College senior and SCAD graduate, respectively, pursued futures in visual media and connected with the collective through Flower Shop’s multi-talented booking manager and graphic designer, Tim Dubois. “They really liked the song and we wanted to do a project together,” says Monk. “They have all the equipment and happen to be incredibly nice at what they do.”

The Flower Shop crew whipped up an audiovisual gem in a single day. “One of our sets was in Tim’s little Burlington apartment. We had so many kids jumping up and down in the room with all this heavy equipment, the downstairs neighbors came up and said their ceiling was flexing in. They said, ‘The song’s really cool, but we’re afraid you’re going to collapse our ceiling!'” says Monk. While they claim the video was “thrown together,” the polished outcome can only be credited to expert work. Note the spray-paint jumpsuits that make appearances throughout the video, created late night on a whim by Mayforth. Talk about whacking it out of the park on your first try.

THT | Photo by Justin Hardesty

The Flower Shop members are not without pleasure nor plight. “Living in Maine has shaped my art because people think that a rapper has to come from a hard place and a crooked, dangerous city,” THT says, “and when people hear about rappers from Maine, they think the worst. They call us soft, but it doesn’t mean a thing—we all have been through a lot. But ah well, that’s just another person we have to prove wrong.”

FACES | Still shot by Dillan Hodak

Flower Shop – Music and Arts Collective
Portland, Maine
Website
Soundcloud
Instagram

Monk
Soundcloud
Instagram
Twitter

THT
Soundcloud
Instagram
Twitter

Mhon Griot
Soundcloud
Instagram

The post Maine’s Hip Hop Flower Shop appeared first on Take Magazine.

No matter your trade, Port City Makerspace in downtown Portsmouth has the resources and community atmosphere that make it a perfect incubator for creating, fixing, and tinkering. Whether you’re a seasoned veteran in your discipline or are looking to pick up a hobby, Port City Makerspace is “where we turn sticks into sawdust for the sake of art,” as their woodworking homepage candidly puts it. Break out the elbow grease and slap on a pair of closed-toe shoes you don’t mind getting covered with random debris, and go make something.

“The Makerspace was founded by Zak Robinson, Ross Beane, and Clint Crosbie in 2012. They heard the idea of a ‘shared workspace’ and thought about doing one for a long time,” says Alex Nunn, general manager of Port City Makerspace. “The rest is history.” PCM is a member- and volunteer-driven space with a friendly atmosphere. “Today there is only one regular staff member, and lots of members and volunteers that help run things. We have also grown in size, both member-wise and actual space. We have approximately 8,000 square feet of space.”

Photo courtesy of Port City Makerspace

No prior skills or prerequisites are needed to become a member at PCM except for a determined attitude and an openness to meeting good folks from diverse disciplines. This is not a hack-it-up, make-it-up situation—their philosophy is that it’s important to know how to use tools and they’ll help you get to that point safely and effectively. Seeing that the Apocalypse has never seemed more imminent than it does now, that standpoint is easy to agree with.

While Port City Makerspace is a great place to pursue personal projects or take woodworking classes, members have also been involved in more large-scale operations. “We have helped with community projects like the Prescott Park Green Room, and hosted open workspace days for costume-building for the Halloween Parade. Members have also built some amazing things; an interactive sandbox for Bewick Academy, humanoid sculptures for the Dover Children’s Museum, and a few tiny houses on trailers,” says Nunn.

Photo courtesy of Port City Makerspace

“I’ve lived in the seacoast area most of my life, and despite having moved around a lot in my younger days, it feels like home regardless of where I am in the area. The historical and natural appearance of everything is lovely, and makes life seem peaceful—and once you meet someone, you see them around a lot as though the whole state is a small town,” says Nunn. A community-oriented area such as Portsmouth is the ideal place for people to gather from varying areas of expertise into a breeding place of collaboration and learning, and Port City Makerspace seeks to be that hub. If there’s one thing we know about innovation in technology—it grows at an exponential rate.

So, summon upon your inner jewelry maker and craft that line of industrial bolo ties you’ve been fantasizing about, or make a modest but brag-worthy foot stool for the living room. Learn how to code or visit the 3D printing lab and make a memorial of your favorite deceased pop star. Explore microcontrollers and CNC routing with Alex Nunn. Come to repair your bicycle—hell, come to repair your car! The possibilities are limitless.

Port City Makerspace
Portsmouth, New Hampshire
Website
Facebook
Twitter

Top photo courtesy Port City Makerspace

The post Turning Sticks Into Sawdust For The Sake Of Art appeared first on Take Magazine.

It may be chilly in Bridgeport, Connecticut, this time of year, but at The Bananaland it always feels like a tropical getaway. This banana-themed marketing and design agency in Connecticut’s Park City will give your small business a makeover and have way too much fun doing it. The team of “specialist concierges”—Marcella Kovac, the outspoken civic-involvement advocate; Laurie Kovac, the cat-loving photography enthusiast; and Jordan Rabidou, the coding homesteader—are not only incredibly talented at what they do, but they’re also some of the most passionate people you’ll ever meet. The affection they have for their stomping grounds emanates through how they do business. They’ll curate your brand to perfection taking your vision and goals and sprinkling their own ideas and expertise into the mix, banana style.

Marcella Kovac

Laurie Kovac

Jordan Rabidou

The seven-year-old vacation of a company was founded on the notion that good design is born from crazy ideas. Their impeccable work and service has made for very happy clients, in turn filling a niche in the up-and-coming city. The Bananaland provides branding, website design, a strong social media presence, and everything in between. “We have so much fun in what we’re doing. We don’t want to be taken too seriously and we don’t want this to be like ‘work work,’” says Jordan. How can you have a bad time working in an office with pineapple wallpaper, tropical plants, and assorted banana paraphernalia strewn about?! It goes without saying, seasonal depression is not a thing here.

The magic of The Bananaland lies in the three co-owners’ unshakeable passion for the city they live in. Disclaimer: If you don’t want to be persuaded to move to Bridgeport, don’t talk to them. “Marcella and I moved here nine years ago, and we saw so much potential in the city,” says Jordan. “There’s so much rich diversity, and an art scene that’s coming out from underground and flourishing, and we are just so happy to be a part of it,” Marcella adds. Their love for their city is infectious and so well-spoken, making them the unofficial marketing department of Bridgeport.

This is why starting one badass company wasn’t enough. Four years ago, Marcella and Jordan founded B:Hive Bridgeport, a place where local business owners, freelancers, and creatives can go to foster positive energy, enthusiasm, and an infallible sense of community in a co-workspace. “Collaborating with other people and creatives is what we’re all about,” Marcella declares. The cleverly casual atmosphere of B:Hive allows for friendly connections, business growth, potlucks—nothing fuels entrepreneurship like home-cooked goodies, that’s a fact—and serves as a catalyst for a reinvention of the city. “We try to act as a partner to the city and try to show everyone how wonderful it is. Our goal is to change the stigma around Bridgeport and show how cool it is if you look below the surface,” says Jordan.

Not a small business or instagram model seeking to expertly curate your aesthetic? No problem, The Bananaland doors are always open and Marcella, Jordan, and Laurie would love to meet you! Grab your boarding pass, The Bananaland is going to take you on your dream vacation—and you don’t even have to leave New England.

The Bananaland – marketing and design company
Bridgeport, Connecticut
Website
Facebook

All photography by Victoria Gloria Photography

The post Heading to the Bananaland appeared first on Take Magazine.