The Creative Coast’s blogspot is Savannah’s sounding board for local thinkers, innovators, wanderers and wonderers. Guest bloggers share their thoughts, opinions and creative noodling from all over the map. This week’s blog is from DaVena Jordan, Queen Bee and Executive Director of AWOL (All Walks of Life), one of the most successful youth outreach programs in the region.  Read on to learn about the gold DaVena and her husband Tony are mining right in our own backyards…..

Artwork by Lloyd “KidSyc” Harold

The most famous quote of the California Gold Rush was uttered by a local news publisher, Samuel Brannan, who ran through the streets of San Francisco shouting, “Gold! Gold! from the American River.”

So now that I have your attention, the truth is, there is no actual gold in the Savannah River, but there is something just as precious and very similar to gold lurking around every corner of our community. Gold is represented on the periodic table by the symbol Au and the atomic number 79. It is a dense, soft, malleable and ductile metal. Pure gold has a beautiful shiny yellow luster that has been considered attractive for thousands of years. So, by now you’re wondering just where I’m going with this and more important, where is this likewise precious item in Savannah?

The Creative Coast’s blogspot is Savannah’s sounding board for local thinkers, innovators, wanderers and wonderers. Guest bloggers share their thoughts, opinions and creative noodling from all over the map. This week’s blog is from Kayne Lanahan, CEO and founder of Savannah Stopover Music Festival.  Read on for Kayne’s notes on what it takes to create a mushrooming music scene…..

Photo by Matthew McCully

Just last week the manager of one of Savannah’s Broughton Street retail stores professed a profound desire to get involved in this year’s Savannah Stopover Music Festival because she was willing to do anything to help improve the “crappy” music scene in this town.

I hear this sentiment expressed over and over again in Savannah, primarily from the 18-34 year old demographic. Two years ago I would have stood there shaking my head and nodding “yes, yes, I hear you, I agree” but now I find myself asking the harder questions: What constitutes a “Music Scene” in a city? What if my scene is different than your scene? What if there is a “scene” and we just don’t do a very good job of promoting it across Savannah’s many microcosms of youth?

The Creative Coast’s blogspot is Savannah’s sounding board for local thinkers, innovators, wanderers and wonderers. Guest bloggers share their thoughts, opinions and creative noodling from all over the map. This week’s blog is from Harry Delorme, self-confessed tinkerer and Senior Curator of Education with the Telfair Museum of Art.  Read on for Harry’s preview of an upcoming tinkerer’s paradise….

Chippewa Square, 2011 by Shinji Murakami

In an earlier post I wrote about the value of tinkering and do-it-yourself creative activity. I firmly believe that creative doing and making are rewarding and empowering experiences that cut across societal boundaries. Many now think that learning to do things ourselves may even be essential to our future survival.

The DIY movement has been catching on, and has inspired a broad spectrum of people to try everything from backyard gardening to experimenting with all kinds of technology.

Many of us consume technology in the form of gadgets and the content and connectivity they offer, without understanding what’s behind the magic. Some of the creative tools that make the magic possible are easily accessible if one has either the time to explore them, access to computers and the internet, or just someone to open the door to the possibilities.

The Creative Coast’s blogspot is Savannah’s sounding board for local thinkers, innovators, wanderers and wonderers. Guest bloggers share their thoughts, opinions and creative noodling from all over the map. This week’s blog is from Drew Wade,  a radiologist, avid bicyclist and proponent of all things which make Savannah a better place to live.  Pedal along with Drew as he lays out a roadmap to cooler, hipper, healthier community…. 

The Savanasphere has been swirling with talk of what might become of the old Backus Cadillac dealership at the corner of Victory Drive and Truman Parkway. Most of the comments are centered around the likelihood (and I believe for many reasons they are right) that Whole Foods is redeveloping the site for one of their stores. While I think many of us will find some solace in that arrival, relieving our inferiority complexes about Charleston, will a one-stop big box carrying a greater variety of organic and otherwise expensive groceries really change Savannah?