Today's Businesses
Amaranth Bakery & Cafe
Amaranth Bakery & Cafe was established in 2005 by life partners Dave Boucher and Stephanie Shipley, who live in the Washington Park community and cast a civic presence there. Amaranth and its founders support neighborhood efforts to promote constructive activities that do justice for the residents. They also publish a print-only monthly newspaper called The Washington Park Beat, which, for Milwaukee's concentric easterly neighbors, circulates at Whole Foods.
The fare at Amaranth keeps a "buy local" ethic, with many ingredients produced locally or regionally. Amaranth Bakery works closely with the community to bolster the neighborhood pride through art displays in the restaurant and through articles in the paper which focus on positive improvements and activities taking place in the surrounding communities. Dave and Stephanie were kind enough to answer some questions about the Washington Park area. The first question was directed at Dave about the church on N. 36th Street. He said that it was the first church in the Washington Park area, and it also served as the primary school before it was expanded to make Westside Academy II. The Catholic parish was there for about 100 years until conflict between certain individuals caused a separation within the church. The separation of the church resulted in the development of two new parishes: All Saints Catholic and St. Sebastian's. Unfortunately, these two parishes moved, leaving the church in Washington Park empty. Mayor John Norquist saved the church from being demolished, declaring it a piece of the neighborhood's history. The church has not been touched in approximately 30 years. Dave bought the building that is now his cafe and started renovating in 2000. He said the building was about 100 years old; it was a vacant and boarded-up building that dated back to 1912. Dave was able to open his building after renovations in 2006. He also said that Nicky Jenson, who was a teacher at Westside Academy II, ran an after-school program called Family Leadership Academy. This after-school organization introduced kids from Westside Academy II to poetry and music. Jenson was so motivated by the program that she opened Express Yourself Milwaukee right next to Amaranth Bakery. Both of these assets work together to have poetry nights in either one of their facilities and to construct an open lot across the street to create a pop-up gallery. This pop-up gallery displays art produced by the students at Westside and brings the community together. |
Learning Topics
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Disguised Meaning in Mundane UsesDiane
Reynolds "Some of these daycares don't look legitmate," a student reported during a discussion about the Washington Park neighborhood. The student was referring to a number of daycares that had been inserted into vacant storefronts or hosted out of homes. Another student concluded that most of these "illegitimate" daycares were, in truth, fronts for the sale of drugs. All of this speculation led to the exploration of how this deduction was made and the influences the neighborhood has on outsiders to believe otherwise.
Washington Park has many examples of buildings being refashioned in unexpected ways. Primarily, there is a high amount of "DIY" churches being placed into anything from garages to storefronts and even houses. One conclusion about this is that the function was to help preserve perhaps the most precious aspect of Washington Park: the community. At a quick glance, the churches may not appear "legitimate," but it is the objectification of what a church should look like that keeps people from seeing what the church is actually doing. A shift in context reframes otherwise shabby environments, so that appearance as an organizing criteria gives way to use at its core. Use, however, is not easily defined, especially in the case of Washington Park. The area is host to a great number of vacant retail and industrial spaces. Rather than making the assumption that industry, commerce, and business is all totally absent from the neighborhood, the house-run daycares and churches lead the observer to conclude otherwise. Could it be true that, in this community-reliant environment, transactions were taking place outside of the typical commercial landscape of regulated places such as the East Side? A man dragging a salvaged metal frame to the scrapyard uses the money to pay a neighbor to fix his car out of his garage. These types of exchanges are not easily noticed but are a legitimate part of the local economy of Washington Park. It is easy to move into unfamiliar areas with the same cultural expectations as one has in his or her own neighborhood, but, in fact, this attitude may have been how many people failed to recognize the implications of the daycares and other property uses outside the norm of their experiences. In the case of such a drastic shift of landscape, it is imperative that visitors take a moment to allow a shift in perspective. From a new vantage point emerges a people that are skilled, resourceful, and syndicated. |
Learning Topics
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