Neal Piper watched his son Noah trying to play with his twin sister and thought there had to be a better way. Noah was diagnosed with cancer when he was 3 years old. His treatment required him to go on enteral nutrition, often called tube feeding. The feeding devices available were an IV pole or […]
Sally Rose is a fighter. As a musician, they front the defiant rock band Shagwüf. As an activist, they’re a vocal supporter of marginalized communities. They’re also, like, an actual fighter. In 2019, Rose fused their love of martial arts and feminism into Fight Like a Grrrl Club, a nonprofit organization offering free self-defense workshops […]
Timbre is an elusive sonic attribute. UVA professor Leah Reid has devoted her career to pinning it down. Reid, who’ll host a meet-the-composer event at the Staunton Music Festival, says timbre is “the combination of how sounds are built up … and how they evolve and interact over time.” But as she notes in a […]
The Barton Springs Pool in Austin, Texas, attracted more visitors last year than it had during any year in the previous decade. The storied natural swimming area with a view of downtown Austin drew nearly 1 million aquaphiles in 2025, up from the shallows of 2020, when 300,000 or so defied the pandemic to take […]
Birdwood Mansion opened its doors as a boutique, seven-room hotel on June 11. It was the culmination of a project nearly 18 months in the making for a property with history dating back to the early 1800s. The mansion was built between 1819 and 1830 and reflected Jeffersonian ideals: a four-over-four brick structure fronted by […]
The Glass Building on the railroad tracks downtown was home to breakfast joints for more than two decades, most notably during Bluegrass Grill & Bakery’s storied 19-year run. In early May, the folks behind Aster unveiled the former greasy spoon as a modern, upscale dining room and kitchen. Aster bills itself as a “restaurant designed […]
Susannah Vierra and her family didn’t have a small kitchen. Some might’ve called it a large kitchen. But the space wasn’t as functional as it could have been, and just behind the wall across from the sink was an unnecessarily expansive laundry room. Vierra is the first to admit she didn’t have all the answers […]
The Hark family started having folks over to try their award-winning wines in the fall of 2019. The only problem was, they couldn’t invite anyone inside. At the time, Hark Vineyards was growing grapes on a 70-acre parcel and making its estate wines out of an 8,500-square-foot production facility. Aaron and Candi Hark, working with […]
Jason Pollock sits down for an interview in clothes that wouldn’t have looked out of place when he was the lead guitarist for ’90s rock band Seven Mary Three–gray graphic tee, layered with a worn black hoodie and a flannel. It’s easy to forget that Pollock left the spotlight of that platinum-selling quartet more than […]
Speakers at the 2026 Tom Tom Festival have had six months to mull this year’s aspirational central theme: Courage. And mull it they have. Ahead of the festival—which runs April 22 to April 26 and will draw more than 27,000 attendees to various downtown Charlottesville venues for talks, music, dancing, food, and more—contributors ranging from […]