Category: Community

Need for speed at the Wake County Speedway

by Tina Haver Currin photographs by Jill Knight Just fifteen minutes from downtown Raleigh lies a thunderous land of revving race cars, bologna sandwiches, and if you’re (un)lucky, maybe a few flips, fires, and crashes, too. A breezy April evening promises favorable…

Story of a marriage: How to build a house

In the lush garden they planted together after their children grew up sits a small table where, weather permitting, Steve and Betsy Levitas end nearly every day. Drinks in hand, they talk, laugh and love, watching the sun set behind…

Fueling the music: Raleigh’s Port Merch plays key backstage role

by Tracy Davis photographs by Nick Pironio Perhaps you’ve heard the joke about how bands are actually in the T-shirt business? It’s typically told by the musicians themselves – talented ones – and they’re only half-joking. Merchandise – “merch,” in…

James Marshall finds his element

by Liza Roberts photographs by Nick Pironio “I like to work in small spaces,” says the artist James Marshall, as he shows a visitor into his North Raleigh garage. At first it’s not clear where that space is, because a shining…

Spotlight: American Aquarium

1,600 people + 31 states + 3 countries + 1 city +1 record = 1 Raleigh weekend by Tracy Davis photograph by Joshua Black Wilkins Roots-rock band American Aquarium loves its Raleigh hometown, but the band is forever leaving it behind,…

For Alex: A family’s climb to honor a lost son

by J. Andrew Curliss photographs by Patrick Davison Chuck Stuber is standing halfway up Mount Fuji at a place where climbers begin their slogging treks to the summit of Japan’s tallest mountain. There is a pay toilet here and a…

Blood, sweat and jeers

by Billy Warden photographs by Travis Long “Is dad having an affair?” The teenager, finding her father absent on yet another weekday evening, plaintively put this question to her mom. And, yes. The father in question, Adam Cohen, was and…

Straight up: Connor Champion skates new terrain

by Andrew Kenney photographs by Geoff Wood Raleigh skateboard pro Connor Champion, like most skaters, is an urban cartographer. He knows the lines that connect downtown’s slopes and edges maybe as well as anyone. He’ll show me, he says. As…

Tony Tata: Writing thrillers by moonlight

by Liza Roberts photograph by Robert Willett After his workday, in a study filled with memor- arablia from a 28-year career in the U.S. Army, N.C. Secretary of Transportation Tony Tata writes thriller novels. He writes about special forces officers, combat missions,…

Father knows best

by Ann Brooke Raynal photographs by Eve Kakassy Hobgood “Sundays too my father got up early and put his clothes on in the blue-black cold then with cracked hands that ached from labor in the weekday weather made banked fires blaze. No…

Smedes York: Growing up with Raleigh

by Liza Roberts photographs by Tierney Farrell If anyone’s memoir could be accurately called Growing up with Raleigh, it would be Smedes York’s. His life and work – in business and in public service – have spanned, and often spurred,…

A teacher first: Lope Max Diaz

by Amber Nimocks photographs by Juli Leonard Bold, staring orbs, fractured picture frames, and bright geometric elements give the sculptural paintings of Raleigh’s own Lope Max Diaz a visceral presence. Through his signature use of shape and color, Diaz can…

Making music: Raleigh’s instrument restorers keep the town in tune

by Corbie Hill photographs by Lissa Gotwals Violins are made to be repaired. Their tops aren’t flush to their sides, like a guitar’s. Instead, those tops are designed to be removed, so violins can be tended to over multi-hundred-year lifespans….

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