Openings & Santacon

December 16, 2011



The Green Pineapple

Mark Duper



Openings & Santacon

In December, even the regularly scheduled events take on a holiday feel as the frenzied focus of the island spreads to just about everything. This week’s monthly “Walk on White” gallery walk featured a holiday theme and if that wasn’t enough for a single evening Kathy & I hit the Grand Opening parties of some other exciting new businesses that just happened to be scheduled the same evening.





We started the evening at the Studios of Key West, which took a break from the Fantazimo burlesque bonanza for a night and hosted a craft show featuring the work of local artisans. Also unveiled that evening was the fantastic new creation by local artist extraordinaire Lauren McAloon outdoors in the sculpture garden of the Studios. The amazing creation should be seen to be truly appreciated and I would urge people to head over to the Studios to check it out.

Marky

Christa & Najada

After hanging out for a while at The Studios, we headed over to the first Grand Opening of the evening, the opening of the wonderful new creative gallery Art Space at 1102 Truman Avenue. This fantastic new gallery is a collaboration of the wildly talented and creative team of Marky Pierson & Michael Marrero and features work by each of them as well as a cadre of some of the most talented and creative artists in Key West.



Kathy, Jolly & Shawna

Liz



With a full season schedule on tap for the upcoming year, the gallery looks to become another cultural touchstone in an increasingly blossoming creative community on our island. With upcoming shows focusing on graffiti and tattoos and erotic art, the focus here is on the edgy and offbeat- which works fine for us and is a welcome addition to the Key West art scene. The soft opening was crowded with happy people checking out the art and the cool space that Marrero & Pierson have created. It was brilliant and a lot of fun. We wish them good luck with this new venture.





Our next stop was at the new Duval Street store the Green Pineapple, located at the upper Duval street former home of the Lucky Street Gallery. This fantastic new retail store was packed with cool merchandise and happy people who jammed the place for their opening. Another excellent addition to our island, the upscale gift store is full of quality unique gifts and is also cool because our friend Gretchen has opened a new Yoga space in the back of the store which is beautiful as well.





This week also featured a brief visit to a local car dealership of one of the NFLs greatest wide receivers and half of the famous "Marks Brothers" tandem that caught so many passes from Miami Dolphins hall of fame QB Dan Marino, Mark Duper. Duper was on hand signing autographs along with a pair of Dolphins cheerleaders. I attended high school with the other half of the duo, Mark Clayton at Cathedral High in Indianapolis and wanted to meet and say hello to Duper, who remains good friends with Clayton. We had a nice chat and I shared some amusing stories about Clayton's high school days.





The holiday season continued in earnest on Saturday evening with the second annual Key West version of Santacon. Santacon is a nationwide phenomena which first came to the island last year and basically features crowds of revelers all dressed up as Santa Claus or some other Christmas themed costume. A perfect fit for our island. While, I could not participate in the whole event, I had heard enough about it from friends to know that I wanted to head down to the Key West bight to see the start of the bar stroll.





Rick



Todd & Celia

It kicked off at the Conch Farm and by the time I got there somewhere in the neighborhood of sixty Santas were there, with more arriving by the minute. It was a festive group with a good number of familiar faces heading off for a night of holiday merriment that included jamming over 40 santas into the World’s Smallest Bar on Duval, breaking the previous record set last year.



Carolyn

David & Breanne

Breakfast with Howard & Najada

Art Space Key West