Albany's Welllington Row - Updates

Wellington Row Developer Building Support

Plan lauded for "remarkable level of preservation" of historic architecture during key meeting in Albany

From Times Union

By Chris Churchill, July 20, 2007

ALBANY -- Preservationists and city officials are cheering the latest plan for the redevelopment of Wellington Row, the forlorn but historically significant string of buildings near the state Capitol.

The new proposal from Columbia Development Cos. -- the Albany firm wanting to build a 14-story office tower on the site -- meets the demands of historic preservationists by mostly retaining four of Wellington Row's five buildings while keeping all of the buildings' facades.

Under the $60 million plan, the buildings on either side of the former Wellington Hotel would be rehabilitated, with retail at ground level and apartments on upper floors.

The Wellington itself would be demolished, but Columbia would rebuild its facade on a new structure that would serve as an entryway to the mammoth, 400,000-square-foot office building.

"Given the circumstances, it's a remarkable level of preservation that Columbia has taken on," said architect William Brandow, a Historic Albany Foundation board member.

Wellington Row has long been an irritant to city officials and downtown boosters, who have watched the prominent site decline into a boarded-up eyesore at the heart of the city center. It has been hard, after all, to argue that downtown is succeeding with a key State Street site in such disrepair.

Columbia raised hopes when it bought the site for $925,000 last November from London-based Sebba Rockaway Ltd. But preservationists quickly objected to a Columbia plan to demolish most of the row and build an office tower immediately behind the historic facades.

Preservationists said the plan reduced the building fronts to window dressing, and they lobbied Columbia to reconsider.

The firm did so, and this week brought its revisions to the city's Historic Resources Commission, which reviews projects in historically significant areas.

"The purpose of the meeting was to make sure we're on the right track," said Columbia's Mike Arcangel, who is overseeing the Wellington Row project. "And it seems to be. It seems we've passed a litmus test."

The proposal has many hurdles to clear. It still needs a host of approvals from the city, and some preservationists are quietly questioning the size of the proposed office building, saying it may overwhelm Wellington Row and other area buildings.

"There's going to be a lot of details to review," said city planner Richard Nicholson. "We're at the big concept stage, which I would say was well received."

City officials are particularly pleased Columbia has added apartments to the project, a move that could further a long-stated goal of having more people living in the city center.

"What's nice about this is that is has all the elements," said Albany Mayor Jerry Jennings. "You're going to have residential as well as retail and office."

Jennings called Wellington Row critical to downtown redevelopment. "There's no reason for us to have buildings that look like that and have them 100 yards away from a beautiful state Capitol," he said.

While four of the site's buildings will not be demolished, it is unclear how much of their interiors will be saved. Some have decayed beyond repair -- that's especially true of the former Berkshire Hotel at 140 State St. -- while others have elements that may not fit into Columbia's redevelopment plans.

Susan Holland, executive director of the Historic Albany Foundation, said the former Elks Lodge, at 138 State St., has a magnificent ballroom. But that space likely will be lost under Columbia's plan, she said.

Rebuilding the Wellington Hotel facade on a new building is the most unusual component of the Columbia proposal, and preservationists said they were awaiting details of how that segment of the project would proceed.

Arcangel said Columbia would carefully remove the facade, catalog and store its pieces, then rebuild it. Yet it wouldn't be a replica: The "new" facade would be several feet higher, as Columbia wants to increase the building's interior ceiling heights.

Such plans have raised hackles in other cities. In Chicago, for example, preservations objected to a plan that reconstructed the facade of the historic McGraw-Hill Building on a new hotel.

Some have called the increasingly common practice a "facade-ectomy."

But in Albany, preservationists say they acknowledge the state of decay Wellington Row has fallen into, and say they are pleased the developer has agreed to save much of what is significant about the site.

"Given the obstacles," Brandow said, "it's a good preservation project."


Albany's Wellington Row plan detailed

From Times Union

By Ryan Hutchins, July 18, 2007

ALBANY - Representatives of Columbia Development Cos. detailed the Wellington Row project tonight night before the city of Albany's Historic Resource Commission.

The plan includes a new 14-story building of about 409,000 square feet fronted by the facades of four existing buildings.

In the center, the Wellington Hotel would be replaced by an eight-story building that would resemble the historic hotel, with pieces of the original building incorporated into the new facade.

As well as the facades, about 40 to 50 feet of the buildings behind the facade would be kept standing. Some of the space might be rehabilitated for residential or special retail use.
Columbia Development Cos. bought the properties for $925,000 from London-based Sebba Rockaway Ltd. The original plan was to demolish the entire row.

Loft Development in Another Troy Industrial Building

From Troy Record
By Danielle Sanzone; photograph by Mike McMahon.

6/08/07



TROY - The former Mooradians' furniture store on River Street, a 117-year-old Italianate-style building, will soon be home to 48 loft-style residential units ranging in price from $200,000 to $550,000, officials announced at a formal gathering Thursday evening.

The upscale abodes, which will be called "the mooradian lofts," should be completed by the end of next year, said Pietro Costa, one of the partners with the New Amsterdam Development Corp., which is transforming the historic building into modern lofts.

"There is no other housing like this in the capital region," Costa, a native of the Netherlands, said. "We feel there will be a large market for this type of housing with professionals, employees at the local colleges, baby-boomers and empty-nesters. Anyone who wants to experience living in a downtown atmosphere will appreciate the mooradian lofts. We are bringing chic, urban living back to this area."

While the development has received the appropriate permits and zoning approvals from the city, developers are still waiting for the final approval from the state attorney general before they can accept offers to purchase the lofts which range from 1,100 square feet to 1,600 square feet, officials said.

Following Thursday's event, however, the building's owners will begin to accept tentative reservations for people interested in purchasing the units. TL Metzger & Associates has been chosen by the developers as the exclusive broker from this project.

At Thursday's event, locals were able to tour through a couple floors of the building and see a model unit of what the loft residences could look like.

"It is very humbling seeing this vision turned into a reality," said Mayor Harry Tutunjian. "It will be great having this type of loft living available in our city."

The developers are still taking comments and suggestions from prospective buyers, but the current loft designs include units with two bathrooms, a kitchen, a loft storage area, and an open space with movable walls. The flexible walls are meant to appeal to all types of people - those with children can make another room with the walls, while single professionals can store the walls away and live in a true loft residence, said Pietro.

"We are a pioneer in loft-style housing in the city of Troy. There are no riverside residences like this in the Capital District," Costa said, referring to the Powers Park Lofts also located in the city but without a river view.

The eight-story brick building, which will include six stories of housing units, will also house a café and marketplace on the first floor with a terrace overlooking the Hudson River. The retail area will include a farmer's market-type space for local vendors and artists to sell their wares, officials said.

"As a woman who grew up in Troy, it is amazing to see this come to fruition since I know it will help revitalize the surrounding area," said Dorothy Ganz, one of the people touring the building. "It is great to see this old building turned into something new instead of torn down like so many other historic buildings in the city. I would definitely live here - it would be great to not worry about the upkeep of a house and to be able to do my shopping in the same building that I lived."

In addition to Thursday's event to showcase the new housing units, an open house is also scheduled for Saturday and Sunday.

Update on Albany's Wellington Row

From The Times Union

By Paul Grondahl, photograph by Michael P. Farrell.
05/29/07

ALBANY -- For 10 years, architect William Brandow has walked to work past the five forlorn buildings known as Wellington Row.

Brandow -- a savior of old buildings by temperament -- looked beyond moldering columns, pigeon droppings and moss growing on lintels. He focused instead on two centuries of exceptional architectural history embedded in the derelict structures that command the crest of State Street hill in the shadow of the Capitol.

"These buildings show the evolution of Albany's most important street," Brandow said. "Wellington Row is where the wealthiest citizens of Albany lived in the early 1800s and it's where the street first made the shift from residential to commercial."

Here is where John Taylor Cooper, from the famed Coopers of Cooperstown, settled in a sumptuous town house at 134 State St. In 1832, he hired the noted architect, James Dakin, to remodel the 1820s house into a stunning Greek Revival residence befitting Cooper's social status.

Next door, the first two floors of the old Christian Brothers Academy bear remnants of a Federal-style town house built during the 19th century.

Similarly, at 140 State St., the defunct Berkshire Hotel includes a superstructure built around a Federal town house.

Over the years, instead of tearing down the residences, new commercial buildings were simply constructed above and around them, leaving the low-slung and ornate edifices embedded in the high-rises.

At 138 State St., the Renaissance Revival flourishes of the early 20th century Elks Lodge were created by the New York City architectural firm of M.L. and H.C. Emory.
"There's not a city in the world that wouldn't love to have those two buildings (138 and 140 State) next to each other, whether it be Paris or New York City," Brandow said.

In 2000, the Preservation League of New York State placed Wellington Row on its list of the most critical buildings across the state to be saved.

Last November, Wellington Row was bought for $925,000 by Columbia Development Cos. from London-based Sebba Rockaway Ltd. (which had paid $1.75 million in 1987).
Now, hopes are high among preservationists that the historic character of the buildings can be saved.

Columbia has proposed building a $60 million, 14-story office tower with street-level shops and condominiums. The Albany developer has said it wants to preserve the exterior facades of the Wellington Hotel and two other buildings.

Discussions are under way regarding specifics of the project between the developer, city officials and representatives of Historic Albany Foundation. Details of those negotiations are not being released, and Columbia officials were not available to discuss their plans.

"Keeping just the facade is one of my least favorite choices and the buildings would be much more stable keeping three walls as opposed to one," said Susan Holland, executive director of Historic Albany. "I'm an eternal optimist. I believe the city and the developers are very sensitive and will come up with a great project we can all support."

Brandow's boss, architect Jack Waite -- who has won historic preservation honors for his firm's work at Tweed Courthouse, Baltimore Cathedral, George Washington's home in Mount Vernon, Thomas Jefferson's Monticello and other historic structures -- feels a sense of urgency about Wellington Row's fate.

"We can't afford to lose those buildings. There's no reason they can't be saved," Waite said. "Wellington Row forms a very important part of the downtown Albany streetscape on one of the great streets in America in terms of intact architecture."

The site has been both a blessing and a curse for the city as far back as 1980, when the buildings were listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

In 1986, the Wellington closed, bringing an end to a downtown fixture that had been home to generations of out-of-town visitors, University at Albany students and future governors Mario Cuomo and George Pataki.

When Sebba Rockaway bought the Wellington and two other buildings, it announced plans to tear them down and to build a new office tower. The London developer and the city squared off and their battle raged for years, while the vacant, boarded-up structures continued to slide into severe disrepair due to the elements and neglect.

Mayor Jerry Jennings' 1994 Capitalize Albany plan, which featured a revitalized Wellington Row as the centerpiece of a tree-lined expanse of stores and outdoor cafes, receded further and further into the background.

With Columbia's new ownership, coupled with a $2.5 million state grant to assist stabilization of the cluster of buildings, a clearer picture of Wellington Row's future should emerge soon, said Michael Yevoli, Albany's commissioner of development and planning.

"The developer is analyzing the structural and economic feasibility of as much preservation as possible," Yevoli said. "Preserving and re-using the buildings back into the fabric of the street would be a win-win for everybody."

Architectural historian Walter Wheeler, who has for years studied Wellington Row out of personal curiosity, wants as much of the buildings as possible to be preserved.

"They're fine buildings with nice proportions, good scale, excellent materials and wonderful use of shadow and light," Wheeler said.

"To settle only for the facades is rather defeatist," he said. "I think we can do better than what you see in parts of Boston, where they preserved little four-story ciphers as facades fronting 40-story buildings. Those facades are token symbols that are basically meaningless."

Preservation in the News

I've been working on several "meatier" posts, but am in a hurry today and wanted to post these interesting recent preservation articles from the Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun, Boston Globe, and Newsday before I lose track of them.

• Preservation becoming an illusion (David Bahlman and Royce Yeater, Chicago Sun Times, 04/07/07), which describes the Commission on Chicago Landmarks' recent approval "...of a developer's plan to dismantle the 11-story Farwell Building on North Michigan Avenue, in order to erect a new structure that would house retail and office space along with a parking garage to serve a new 40-story condominium tower." Bahlman is president of Landmarks Illinois; Yeater is Midwest regional director of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
  

• The danger of becoming skin deep, Chicago historic buildings become shells as new rules of preservation are letting city's history slip away (Blair Kamin, architecture critic, Chicago Tribune, Sunday, 04/08/07; free log-in may be required). Includes a slide show (14 slides) illustrating recent "facadectomy" projects in Chicago.

• Urban puzzle (Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh, Boston Globe, 03/31/07), a review of three recently published books about gentrification: There Goes the Neighborhood, by William Julius Wilson and Richard P. Taub; There Goes the 'Hood, by Lance Freeman; and Black on the Block, by Mary Patillo. Mr. Venkatesh, a professor of sociology and African-American Studies at Columbia University is the author of Off the Books: The Underground Economy of the Urban Poor.
  

• NYC home to nation's only high school arts preservation program (Emily Zeugner, Newsday, 04/08/07). Ms. Zeugner writes about the Preservation Arts and Technology Program at the Brooklyn High School of the Arts which was founded in 2000.
  

Downtown Revitalization: Troy (continued)

This morning's Record has more details about developer First Columbia's plans for the neighborhoods at the north end of downtown Troy that surround Hedley Park Place and Flanigan Square, where a new hotel/conference center, offices, retail, and residential development have been proposed. For previous posts on this subject, please click here and here. For the developer's Hedley Park Place project web site, please click here.

From The Record

Developer building on Hedley's vision for Troy
By James V. Franco, Monday, 03/26/2007

TROY - While a home in Colonie is getting an extreme makeover, there are plans in the works to give a 25-block area surrounding Hedley Park Place and Flanigan Square the same treatment.

Last year, self proclaimed used car salesman and developer John Hedley sold his two buildings and his Cadillac dealership to First Columbia, a major commercial development company from Latham, with the hopes it would take his vision for the area and turn it into a reality.

While nothing is set in stone, the vision First Columbia has for the area between Federal and Jay streets and Seventh Avenue and the Hudson River includes a hotel, an office building, condominiums, a riverfront promenade, a couple of parks and a new parking garage.

All told, it could mean $500 million in direct and indirect investment into the city over 10 years.

One of the first steps, said First Columbia President Kevin Bette, is to build a 1,000-car parking garage on River Street across from Hedley Park Place to consolidate all the parking spots currently scattered about in different parking lots in one spot thereby opening up the lots for development.

"The parking lots strangle future growth in the neighborhood because all you do is park on the land," Bette said. "Once we get the parking garage built, it will free up the lots and we will start to develop the waterfront."

The next step is to construct a seven-story, 120-room hotel/conference center between Hedley Park Place and the Collar City Bridge. Bette said the hotel/conference center will take advantage of "the biggest economic engines Troy has now, which are the universities." Bette has been talking to major hotel chains to get a franchise and hopes to break ground this fall.

"There are three colleges and 20,000 students in Troy, and right now their conference needs are being met outside of the market," he said, adding the lodging and conference facilities will help support the existing restaurants and retail establishments. "It will bring more student life into that section of town."

The section of the city open to the public will also get a makeover with two urban parks, one at the end of Jacob Street near the marina and one near where the former Cadillac dealership now stands.

The objective, Bette said, is to get more activity at the marina and still maintain a place for the farmers market and craft fairs.

There are also plans for a 200,000 square-foot mixed use office building for the parking lot to the south of Hedley Park Place. It will feature retail on the ground floor, office on the next six floors and the top floor will be residential.

This section of the city is one of the most underutilized, and critical in the city with 60,000 cars coming across the Collar City Bridge daily and 30,000 coming across the Green Island Bridge, Bette said. Plus there are already 1,500 people working in the area.

"It needs to be an economic and vibrant area for the city to flourish," Bette said. "We have the jobs here already and we want to add to it."

The plan, capacity and commitment to carry it out is one reason Hedley sold the two massive former manufacturing buildings he converted into office space to First Columbia. While Troy has had a steady stream of developers promising the moon and sky, Hedley thinks First Columbia can pull it off.

"I personally think he can. When you are of that size and you have the wherewithal and the equipment and people in house already, these things can happen," Hedley said. "And I think he is very committed, and when someone is that committed and they have already proven they are willing to spend money in the city ... why not?

"To put up one or two buildings is one thing but I couldn't do a 25-block area. I'm just a used car salesman," Hedley said.

Mayor Harry Tutunjian said the city will work with First Columbia and would consider extending Industrial Development Agency assistance. He did add the company has not said it would not move forward without the assistance either. He compared the scope of the plan to the Congress-Ferry Street corridor project, which Hedley is also involved in, and said construction on the two projects could happen at the same time.

"It is this type of for-profit construction that has been long overdue in the city of Troy," Tutunjian said. "It is nice to have organic growth and development and not development fueled by public dollars like (Schenectady's) Metroplex."

Bette said it would be easier to buy 50 acres of land in Clifton Park and start from scratch, and it would be easier yet to be a major landlord in the city by operating Hedley Park Place and Flanigan Square, but added, "We can't keep on cutting down trees and building suburban office parks or we will be shooting ourselves in the foot.

"We can't keep the blinders on and not worry about downtowns. John (Hedley) wanted to help Troy, and that is why he sold us the buildings. Some say we were crazy and things like 'the neighborhood is no good' and we do know that, but we feel we are up to the challenge."

Downtown Revitalization: Albany, New York

Another great article in yesterday's Times Union was Chris Churchill's "Downtown homesteading," which describes seven planned, in progress, or recently completed large scale downtown housing projects in Albany, along with the efforts of several smaller scale residential improvement projects. Among the large scale projects are:

• Amos at Quackenbush Square - A $40 million, 11-story tower with at least 100 apartments proposed by Queri Development of Syracuse, New York;

• 733 Broadway - A $35 million, 9-story tower with 122 units proposed by Norstar Development USA of Buffalo, New York;

• Wellington Row - A $62 million, 14-story office tower with 15 condominiums proposed by Columbia Development Cos., Albany, New York;

• 33 N. Pearl Street - A $600,000 conversion and renovation with six apartments recently completed by Mike Urgo (upper floors above Jonathan's pizza parlor), Albany, New York;

• 109 State Street - $650,000 renovation with nine apartments currently under construction by AR Building & Construction, Albany, New York;

• 111-113 State Street, $630,000 renovation with 11 apartments recently completed by AR Building & Construction, Albany, New York; and

• 889 Broadway, undisclosed cost, conversion of four-story building and construction of four-story building with 44 condominiums.

The article reports that a market study commissioned by the Downtown Albany Business Improvement District and recently completed by Zimmerman/Volk Associates Inc. of Clifton, N.J., found that a market exists for about 2,400 housing units. As is true in many places where downtown housing is being constructed or renovated, it is hoped that increased choice and better quality of housing will help bring more people downtown.

The target markets are "empty nesters" and young professionals. Among the latter category is Matt Baumgartner, proprietor of Albany's popular Bomber's Burritos Bar (158 Lark Street) and Noche Lounge (895 Broadway) -- one of many young entrepreneurs creating notable arts, music, dining, and retail establishments in the Capital District's historic downtowns. He recently paid $225,000 for an old industrial building on Learned Street and plans to rehabilitate the building into two apartments, one of which he will occupy himself.

The article compares the Albany housing activity to similar situations in Denver, Colorado (Lower Downtown neighborhood), Boston, Massachusetts (Fort Point Channel area), Hartford, Connecticut, and Providence, Rhode Island. It also states that in "the Capital Region, Albany has fallen behind cities such as Saratoga Springs, where hundreds of new apartments and condos have been constructed, and Troy, which has seen significant rehabilitation of older apartment units." The article continues:

Some say the Albany lag results from redevelopment decisions that brought Empire State Plaza and ubiquitous highway ramps.

"What you see there now is a consequence of years of tragic decisions," said James Howard Kunstler, the Saratoga Springs-based author of "Geography of Nowhere" and other books on the urban environment.

Added Saratoga Springs developer Jeffrey Pfeil, who is converting a former department store in Troy [the former Stanley (Gay) building at 3rd and State Streets] into apartments [to be called The Conservatory because of its proximity to the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall]:

"the incentive (for developing housing) in Troy is that it's got a wealth of fabulous architecture, and, unlike in Albany, most of the architecture wasn't torn down over the years."

The J.W. Pfeil Company also recently completed a project involving adaptive reuse of a former textile factory into the Powers Park Lofts condominiums (387 Third Avenue) in the Lansingburgh section of Troy. Available units sold out quickly.

Historic Preservation, History, and Heritage in the News

It took forever to read the Sunday editions of New York Times and Albany Times Union yesterday. There were numerous lengthy articles relating to history, heritage, authenticity and visitor or shopping experience, and historic preservation. Some of the articles may be a bit of a stretch for this blog, but all are interesting, worth reading, and related in some way to the preservation of history, arts, and culture.

A sampling of the more relevant articles in the New York Times includes (login may be required):

• A Room for the Night (Not 40 to Life) (Alison Gregor, 3/18/07) - describes the conversion of the former Charles Street Prison (near Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston's Beacon Hill) into the somewhat humorously named Liberty Hotel. The $110 million reconstruction project includes a new 16-story tower adjacent to the former jail, which began operating in 1851, and the demolition of a daunting wall that separated the institution from the community since around 1940. The hotel will have 298 rooms, of which 20 will be in the old jail building, which had been vacant for 12 years. The project's developer, Carpenter & Company, became interested in the site because of its architectural significance and prime location with views of downtown Boston and the Charles River. The old jail is a "cruciform with four wings, [and] the structure has thick granite walls that enclose a soaring 90-foot atrium at its center — once used as an exercise yard — which is topped by a cupola. Soon, four huge chandeliers, 10 feet in diameter, will hang from winches over entrances leading to two upscale restaurants — one to be called Bread and Water — along with a 3,000-square-foot ballroom off the atrium." The architects are Cambridge Seven Associates and Ann Beha Architects. The project will likely receive $17 million in federal and state historic preservation tax credits and will include interpretive exhibits about the former prison's history. In addition to describing the Boston project, the article also indicates that adaptive reuse of former prison and jails is increasingly popular, referencing jail to bed-and-breakfast and youth hostel conversions; conversion of the Bexar County Jail (constructed in 1878) into San Antonio, Texas' Comfort Inn Alamo Riverwalk, conversion of Sultanahmet Prison in Turkey (contructed in 1918) into the 65-room Four Seasons Istanbul, depicted in the 1978 film "Midnight Express;" and conversion of Her Majesty's Prison Oxford into the Malmaison Oxford Hotel [England].
  

• A Chinese Village Struggles to Save the Dying Language of a Once Powerful Dynasty (David Lague, 3/18/07) - Noting that the decline of the Manchu language has become a serious obstacle for historians studying the Qing dynasty, this article describes the efforts of a small group of village residents, including 18 that are over 80 years old, to preserve the Manchu language. As the article notes, the residents are "descendants of seminomadic tribesmen who conquered China in the 17th century, they are the last living link to a language that for more than two and a half centuries was the official voice of the Qing dynasty, the final imperial house to rule from Beijing and one of the richest and most powerful empires the world has known. With the passing of these villagers, Manchu will also die, experts say. All that will be left will be millions of documents and files -- about 60 tons of Manchu-language documents are in the provincial archive in Harbin alone -- along with inscriptions on monuments and important buildings in China, unitelligible to all but a handful of specialists." An earlier article, Manchu Language Lives Mostly in Archives (David Lague, 3/17/07) and a video in which an elderly resident speaks and sings in Manchu are also available.

• Another article, In Aisle Three, Couch Potatoes Trying the MP3s (Michael Barbaro, 3/18/07), discusses retailers' growing use of a newish concept called "experience marketing," to sell more products to customers. Experience marketing can and should be a key aspect of downtown/Main Street revitalization programs rooted, of course, in older and historic downtown buildings and neighborhoods. The article notes that the experience marketing concept harkens back to the frequently changing themed displays at department stores in past years, and focuses on recent stores opened by Samsung, AT&T, Verizon, and Maytag (where customers can bake cookies in Maytag convection ovens, put pants through the gentle cycle of a washing machine, or put their best china through a dishwasher). Although Apple [computer] gets only a passing mention, it was perhaps the first company to use the concept in its retail stores and Starbucks and Barnes & Noble have also used the concept for years. For additional information about how Starbucks uses experience marketing, read The Starbucks Aesthetic (Susan Dominus, New York Times, October 22, 2006).
  

• Chasing the Ultimate Waterfall (Michael Joseph Gross) - the author relates how he began each day in the summer of 2005 by reading the books of explorer David Livingstone and then traced Livingstone's route to Victoria Falls in November of that year to celebrate the 150th anniversary of his discovery of the falls.
  

And, for fun, a great article about Ina Garten, a k a "The Barefoot Contessa," who like "The Naked Chef," Jamie Oliver -- and other chefs, farmers, and foodies -- long ago recognized the importance of fresh, locally produced food and the importance of place:

• The Barefoot Impresario (Micheline Maynard, 3/18/07)
  

The Times Union included "French aristocrat tale hides in Albany archives," Paul Grondahl's very interesting review of Sheila Kohler's forthcoming historical novel "Bluebird, or the Invention of Happiness." The book describes aristocrat Henriette Lucy Dillon's February 1794 flight from the angry mobs and guillotines of Paris and subsequent resettlement in Albany. The author will be talking about her research and will read from the book on Thursday, March 22nd at 8 p.m. as part of the Visiting Writers Series of the New York State Writers Institute at the University of Albany. The free public event will take place at Assembly Hall, Campus Center, University at Albany uptown campus, 1400 Washington Avenue. An informal seminar for writers will also be held at 4:15 p.m. in Assembly Hall. For more information, call 442-5620 or visit http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/.