February 27, 2009
Bohemia hits the skids, but there’s still fun to be had.
Tags: fun, gentrification, sacramentoA story in the New York Times reports on hard times for boutique, gentrified neighborhoods. According to the article, business is down, foot traffic is down, and little shops that sell stuff the owner thinks is cool is on the downswing. The article didn’t exactly report on that last bit, but that’s my conclusion based on the picture and description of the business owner profiled at the beginning of the article.
I’m not a big fan of Kotkin, but I have no reason to disagree with his observation that:
“Neighborhoods go through what you call a sweet spot,” said Joel Kotkin, author of “The City: A Global History,” who is a critic of some forms of gentrification. “It’s safe, it’s a nice place to live, it still has unique shops and hangouts.”
But this mix rarely lasts forever. “The ecosystems of these neighborhoods are very fragile,” Mr. Kotkin said. “Over-stimulation, and, in a recession, under-stimulation, and you have dangers.”
This is the problem at the center of what I think is the most common form of urban gentrification (it takes other forms in different types of communities), the kind where the old guard are forced out by rising prices and by a so-called “artistic” class with enough cash to set up funky, off-beat retail and service businesses, catering primarily to other members of their class. In some sense, this is a good thing, because the old guard can be a high-crime area, or an area with significant blight that, after a few years and a few million gallons of sweat and paint, becomes a nice place to live again. But not for the people who were cornerstones of the neighborhood and who know the neighborhood’s history (I would argue that knowing a place’s history is an important part of really living there, which is why I’ve always felt more at home in Sacramento, even though I spent the first 15 years of my adult life in Portland.)
In Sacramento, the symbol of this kind of gentrification is the gallery. In article after article about urban renewal you will see phrases like “galleries, restaurants, and retail.” People seem to forget that galleries are not museums, they are retail establishments, and, like any retail establishment, they need customers. Art galleries have a very small customer base to begin with and, in a recession, the people who want to patronize art because it’s the cool thing to do no longer have money to do so. I’m afraid we’re going to see some closures, unless all of the galleries are owned by people with trust funds. Now that would be interesting.
This kind of gentrification is ephemeral because it is based on the whims of a relatively mobile class of person (young, generally childless, urban professionals with higher than median incomes and/or assets) and a class that is very sensitive to recessionary pressures. A job that paid high-five figures a few years ago may well be going for a lot less today, and there will be a line out the door of people wanting it. So these people do one of two things: they retreat to their homes and seek entertainment from Netflix and food from grandma’s cookbook, or they move. Neither is good for the funky businesses that depended on their funky clientelle.
Which leads me to a plug for what I think might be a new (renewed?) model for face-to-face social interaction. Today’s Bee had an article about the Sacramento Institute of Fun, which has events about once a month based on the idea that people can get together, have fun, and learn something (and drink). The price tag may seem high at first, around $25-$30/person for each event, but when you consider that a typical night out at a nightclub, which is a lousy place to be social anyway, will cost easily twice as much (the cab ride home will cost as much), it’s a good deal.
And it’s different. Maybe my impression is colored by the fact that the instigators are my friends. Maybe it’s because I don’t think of them as bourgeois hipsters (though they are certainly hip). Or maybe it’s because it’s something that hasn’t really been tried before, at least not in this laid-back, non-institutional format (the name notwithstanding). In some sense what the IOF is trying to do is reinvigorate the idea of the salon, but in a much more accessible way. It’s a lecture series for the masses.
RSS Feed
Gallery closings! That’s a great a great story idea. I mean that’s a terrible way to put it. I don’t any galleries to close, but if they start to close, some one should cover it on the blogs or in sn&r or midtown monthly or even the bee.
Anyway, your observation that the galleries are the cornerstone of midtown’s recent gentrification is astute.
February 28, 2009 @ 8:14 am
Really, I don’t want any galleries to close either, but they will. Hopefully someone will cover it.
February 28, 2009 @ 1:48 pm
The big push of Galleries occured in the late 1980′s, and was tied to other cultural events (Poetry, avant garde films, theater) which brought in more diverse clientele, and more single event money. There were several scandals involving gallery owners stealing from artists and performers when this began.
It looked to me like the core of what became “Second Saturday” was engineered by the Art Supply store owners, who knew the artists and business. They put up seed money, shmoozed city council and real estate moguls. You could still rent many spaces for 3 or 4 hundred a month, so a few events that made a couple hundred was actually profitable. The downturn for me at least occured when Ron Kerth and a bunch of other NS landowners tried to redevelop North Sacramento, and a bunch of Gallery Owners got enormous chunks of money to hang there inventories in derilict mechanic shops and abandoned store fronts up there. Cafe Montreal moved up there, and died. There were too many incidents with street people, and once the redevelopment money stopped flowing in, the gallery owners went back to their Art Supply stores and Com. College teaching gigs. None of them showed any profit on the books. N Sac looks just as aweful as it did before the revamping.
Now the Art Gallery thing is a cliche; every coffeehouse and bistro hangs art and stays open late, only on Second Saturday. Downtown is mostly dead, Mid-Town is dominated by the Gay scene, and once a month a bunch of bored, and mostly drunk people wander about, buy coffee, food, and pretend to look at art. I don’t think it does much for Art, as you are as likely to see repros from some NY or LA artist as anything local. It is more toys and furniture now.
February 28, 2009 @ 3:31 pm
Mal, thanks for the characterization of Second Saturday in your last paragraph. I didn’t write it, but I was thinking it!
March 01, 2009 @ 9:16 pm
I notice a distinct uptick in boutique openings lately: not necessarily upscale art galleries or high-end clothing stores, but funky little shops that fit into nooks and crannies, primarily featuring either resale items or the work of local artisans. In the past year or so we have seen Bows and Arrows, Thunderhorse, Buff Castle, Atelier and more open their doors.
Many of these folks aren’t necessarily in the “folks with enough cash” category (at least not the ones I know) but rather folks who can live cheaply enough to work paying jobs part-time and spend the rest of their time following more creative pursuits. That used to be easier when Midtown rents were a lot cheaper, but it is still possible now. And because there is more of a market for the goods and services (art and performance) provided by those artisans these days, it means more funky shops. And sure, many of them will open and close over a period o years, as most are the product of a single individual who may have dramatic life changes or move on to bigger, better things, or just reposition within the neighborhood due to good or bad fortune (Olipom/Bows & Arrows is a good example of this.) Sometimes technology or cultural shifts make changes, like the decreased viability of record stores and used bookstores (thanks to digital media and Internet sales) but other trends can shift those stores back (like small stores selling via the Internet in addition to brick & mortar business.)
Gentrification doesn’t necessarily have to mean an economic upheaval in the neighborhood. Midtown is actually a really good example of a community where the effects of gentrification have been slow and gradual, with the exception of the middle part of this decade–and due to the recession, that phase may be over for a while. Especially when the people doing the “gentrifying” are actively interested in being part of a diverse creative community, that fragile stability can be maintained.
March 05, 2009 @ 1:02 pm
Interesting take on the turn over of neighborhoods…the change in the economy will certainly challenge businesses to think twice about any expansions. Survival is key now and any encouragement we can give to support small business owners will help keep the neighborhood alive. I’ve made it my mission to stay away from the big box stores unless absolutely necessary. Shopping at your local businesses keeps them open so they can pay their mortgage and in turn keeps your house value up. I’d rather see my neighbors lights on and am willing to pay a little more at the local pizza place rather than save $5 at Costco.
Beth Mergens
June 11, 2009 @ 9:48 pm
Last post in Feb? I thought my RSS feed was missing something. Are you posting to this blog any longer?
June 16, 2009 @ 1:43 pm
I haven’t been active for a while, but I don’t consider the blog closed. Sooner or later I’ll get back to it.
June 16, 2009 @ 2:15 pm