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Public Markets Conference Wraps In Cleveland

September 27th, 2012 by Larry Posted in Blog

The 8th International Public Market Conference wrapped up its 3-day gathering last weekend and, once again, it was jam-packed with presentations, workshops, receptions, and tours of some local markets, farms, and other North-Eastern Ohio locales of interest to this fascinating bunch of participants.

The host hotel, The Renaissance Cleveland

The conference is produced by the fine folks at the Project for Public Spaces (www.pps.org) which manages to gather together two or three hundred market managers, urban planners, food advocates, municipal leaders, architects, consultants, and various other hangers-on (such as yours-truly!). There were participants from all over the country and from several countries outside the U.S. as well, including a contingent from Hong Kong. The conference only happens about every three years which adds up to a 25 year run, at this point.

A plenary gathering

Deputy Secretary of Ag for the USDA, Kathleen Merrigan

 

Participants needed to make tough choices about which sessions to attend throughout the conference. Many great topics from which to pick, like “Connecting a Market to its Community,” “Food Hubs,” “The Professionalization of Farmers Markets,” “Creating and Operating Market Districts,” “Expanding Your Market,” etc.

The initial plenary included a informative presentation by Kathleen Merrigan, the Deputy Secretary of Agriculture from the USDA. It was great of her to stick around for hours afterward, visiting with attendees and answering questions.

I’m going to list some names of people who were highlights of my experience at the conference, people who made great presentations or had a strong, potent presence on tours or running meetings, but I worry about who I might leave out. Please remember that any individual person could only take in about a third of what went on over the course of the event. For every session I attended there were three others that I had to skip. Of the four different tours offered I was only able to take one and probably missed some visits to places and people I would have liked to see.

Steve Davies and David O’Neil are the two PPS people who anchor the experience of the whole event. As hosts and MCs they provide some continuity to the whole affair, and David’s enthusiasm and knowledge of the subject matter is perpetually evident. Big kudos to those guys.

An intimate little luncheon

Some great stories and experiences were shared by Laura Avery from the Santa Monica Farmers Market, Ben Franz-Knight from Pike Place, Ben Vitale from the Syracuse Regional Market (and the NAPMM), Dan Carmody and Randy Fogleman from the Eastern Market in Detroit, Cheryl Eagleson and Karen Kahle from Findlay Market in Cincinnati, Ewen Wallace from the Halifax Market, Journalist Nicola Twilley from New York, and Myron Ng from the Tai Yuen Market (and others) in Hong Kong. Great to hear from Antoine Harris from Tulsa, Paul Steinke and Sarah Levitsky from Philly, James Farr from Rochester, Darlene Wolnik and Jen O’Brien from the Farmers Market Coalition, Kira Dixon-Weinstein from Tucson, Gary Holloway from Vineland, NJ, Odysseas & Sandra Gounalakis from Toronto, Kathleen O’Malley from Portlandia, Brian Geraghty from New York (OK, from PPS, too), Ted Spitzer and Hugh Boyd, frequent collaborators from opposite coasts, and, of course, Fred Kent, head honcho of PPS.

And it was exciting to see all the local enthusiasm from the likes of Councilman Joe Cimperman, Eric Wobser, Michael Ruhlman, Donita Anderson, Amanda Dempsey and Matt Orehek. Ohio City (a suburb to the West of Cleveland, but it’s a city unto itself) was an important host for the event particularly because that’s where the West Side Market is located, a truly fabulous Public Market that happens to be celebrating its 100th birthday this year. The timing of our conference fit right in to the various celebrations the city is having around the Market this year.

But never mind all this talk…let’s look around…

The Coit Road Market’s farm: EC Grows

Part of the great neighborhood of Ohio City

A version of ‘networking’

North Union Market in Shaker Square

The West Side Market (no one’s ever captured this particular view before) (no, really) (what, you don’t believe me?)

Yes, we really were there

PublicMarkets.com is up and running!

September 17th, 2012 by Larry Posted in Blog

Finally… PublicMarkets.com is up on the web-o-sphere, online-and-running! “Years in the making,” as they say. So it better be perfect, right? Well, let’s just say it’s a work in progress. As are all websites, blogs, apps, platforms and the like, when they’re new and raw.  Please be patient while we tweak the site, correct errors and build the essentials in to a true reference source.

And by “Years in the making” what I really mean is “years in the thinking-about.” Any actual making has only been going on for a few months. Except for the photography…

I’ve been travelling the world and visiting Markets for decades. I’m a commercial photographer and photojournalist who’s been lucky enough to get assignments in some fascinating parts of the globe. And whenever I’ve traveled, I’ve tried to make time for visiting the Markets. I’m just drawn to these places, not completely sure why… comfortable in the atmosphere of nourishment? Surrounded by sustenance? It probably comes down to something as simple as the fond memories of being in my grandmother’s kitchen.

And I’m a foodie myself, always cooking the meals and playing in the kitchen. I like to experiment with new foods and attempt to reproduce some exotic fare I found in a foreign Market. So it makes some kind of sense that I like to hang out among the merchants, purveyors, and shoppers in the Public Markets.

LA’s Grand Central Market in the 50s

 

…and as it looks in the 21st century.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’m originally from the Los Angeles area so the two Markets from my childhood were The Grand Central Market in Downtown L.A. and Farmers Market in the Hollywood area. The Grand Central is very much the same as it was in those days but a big shopping complex called The Grove has now seemingly swallowed up Farmers Market. But the old Market is still there, still a great, eccentric landmark in a big, eccentric city.

 

Farmers Market in the old days (no, I’m not THAT old).

A view I shot more recently.

 

 

 

 

 

I didn’t set out to create a collection of photographs of these places, but I shot photos as a way to keep track of where I’d been, a kind of visual journal. It took others to point out that there was a body of work here, a compilation of images that brought together a bunch of unique and special places from all over the world.

In the early years I thought I might be documenting a vanishing phenomenon, a kind of multi-vendor Marketplace that was diminishing in relevance and weakening in the face of more efficient competition, but I’m happy to say I was wrong. Great Public Markets are being recognized for their special value around the USA and experiencing the revitalization and resurgence needed for long-term survival. In most of the rest of the world they never were in trouble, but I didn’t know that until I started spending more time in that world.

So PublicMarkets.com seemed like a great way to share and exchange information about these wonderful places. Whether you love travel, or food, or multi-cultural experiences, I hope you find the site a pleasant entertainment and that you might even look there some time to track down a Market or plan a stop on a trip somewhere.