Every community has its empty places, faded and overgrown. Some of these, when there had been no design or charm to begin with, become a blight on the landscape. But others have personality and become a part of the character of a place, in their decline adding a patina of charm and history. How do the well-intentioned and civic-minded learn to tell the difference,…
This store display screams “Love! Buy me love!” and to avoid confusion the t-shirts on the mannequins say “my boyfriend” and “my girlfriend” with a big red heart. So come on, just buy me some clothes, buy me love! Now here in the Caribbean — once you get away from the big stores — the style is a little different. On the gallery (porch…
Some of the best steel pan music in the world can be heard from the large orchestras that compete at Carnival time on the island of Trinidad in the southern Caribbean. This seems appropriate since Trinidad is the birthplace of the instrument. While perhaps not the best in the world, we are fortunate on St. Croix to have several steel pan orchestras of our…
There is a new shopping mall near the airport in Orlando, Florida. It is called Mall at Millenia and is a part of a much larger mixed use (retail-residential) development called simply, and somewhat ominously, Millenia. These images are from the mall’s interior public spaces dedicated to the further glory of upscale consumption. For a moment I had a vision of this magnificent public…
The cruise ships have returned to St. Croix. They arrive in the morning and disgorge their living cargo for a few hours ashore. Priorities are rearranged. New businesses spring up in an attempt to pry a few dollars from wallets. The ships are welcomed as a needed lift for the island economy, even though some activities threaten to destroy the local culture and natural…
The two old Danish forts on St. Croix — one in Christiansted and the other in Frederiksted — were defended by cannons aimed seaward. The irony is that the real threat to the planter’s culture of that era came from the land in the form of the changing economics of the sugar trade, the end of slavery, and rebellions by workers against the oppressive…