Holiday House Tour – Page 11 – Preservation of Historic Winchester

Friday Roundup: Open House, Newsletter, and Events

We know: the holidays are pushed earlier and earlier every year. (There is not a month of the year we do not have something “Christmas” in the works at PHW, so we fully sympathize with all the eye-rolling and cries of “Not again!”) But we also know it takes artists time to handcraft their delightful goods for the Bough & Dough Shop. In that spirit, we are once again hosting an informal open house at the Hexagon House on Saturday, August 24, 1-4 PM. The downstairs will be partially laid out for a test run of tables and confirmed artist spots.

While the event is geared mostly to returning and new artists, anyone is welcome to attend. And if you’ve been procrastinating on filling out an application, we strongly urge you to do so—most of our spots are filled, but with some advance planning, we may be able to squeeze in a few more artists or keep you on hand if a last minute cancellation opens a spot. You can find a copy of the info packet for artists at www.phwi.org/events/Shopinfo.pdf. We anticipate this session to be very useful for artists looking to discover what display materials they need to bring or how their items might fit into the eccentric Hexagon House layout.

Our summer newsletter is complete and online. Check out the digital version online here. A hard copy should be mailed to our members next week. We did not want to keep the time sensitive events waiting. Inside is a copy of our Holiday House Tour booklet advertising sponsorship levels. We hope you will secure a spot to showcase your business!

Mark your calendars for September 15 for the next 275th event: “From Disaster to Redemption: George Washington and the Making of Winchester” at the George Washington Hotel Ballroom, 103 E. Piccadilly St. The French and Indian War Foundation together with the Winchester-Frederick County Historical Society is heading up this event with a dynamic speaker, Dr. Carl Ekberg. Dr. Carl J. Ekberg is a retired history professor from Illinois State University. Rutgers Un.; Ph.D. Author of several books, many awards, two outstanding; 2014 Medaille de Valeurs from the French Ambassador and 2015 Best Book Award from State Historical Society of Missouri. Carl resides in Winchester and serves on the board of the F&I War Foundation.

This is a free event to attend; however, you may wish to purchase food or drinks during the mingle. Menu: Fried chicken plate with greens and mashed potatoes and a biscuit for $15.00. Apple cobbler and coffee for $5.00. There will be a bar. The Hotel has asked that you pay with cash.

If you are out in the Gainesboro area, stop by the Gainesboro Tourist Park. A new sign has been erected commemorating the Stonewall Brigade’s encampment in the area during Jackson’s Bath-Romney Campaign. A small dedication is likely to take place the first weekend of September. PHW was delighted to help write and design the sign for the Gainesboro Ruritan Club to bring their idea to fruition. If you have not heard the story of the soldiers who took part of the expedition, you can learn more at the Bath-Romney Campaign Historical and Preservation Association. While this marker is not affiliated with the six Civil War Trails markers installed in Morgan County, it was written to mesh with them and mark one of the first camps the Confederate soldiers experienced after leaving Winchester.

Friday Roundup: Civil War Weekend and More!

The Winchester-Frederick-Clarke Civil War Weekend starts today! Most events are free or for a nominal charge. The events are too numerous to list here, so see what fits your fancy and time frame at the Visitor’s Center website.

The PHW library received a substantial donation this week from Ed Acker. We now have a complete set of Old House Journals from the inaugural issue of October 1973 through April 1998. If you need a how-to article from the timeless back catalog, we have you covered. You can see some of the other new additions to the PHW library at the top of our LibraryThing account.

Winchester Architectural Details — One of the cornice detail photos from the Loudoun Street Mall.

As teased a few weeks ago, we now have the images from the architectural details folder scanned. Sixty-six images (some very similar to each other) have been added to our Flickr account. Many of these images were part of a “find the building” activity produced by PHW. Challenge yourself to see how many of the details you recognize at the top of the photostream or the end of the Architectural Details album. Most buildings are on the walking mall, with a few outliers that may have been put in this folder by accident.

We were notified that a History Camp is coming to Virginia for the first time, and it’s close to us! The camp, which will be held at George Mason University in Fairfax, will take place on Saturday, November 16. More than 40 sessions on various aspects of history are expected. See the list as it continues to grow or register at historycamp.org/virginia.

Last but not least, our 2019 Holiday House Tour and Bough and Dough Shop is coming together. We are happy to report we have the full lineup of houses to represent the 18th through 21st centuries, and a an exclusive Preview Party house for Saturday evening. PHW representatives will be reaching out soon for advertising sponsorships. We are also looking forward to our informal Bough and Dough Shop open house at the Hexagon House on Saturday, August 24 between 1-4 p.m. If you have any questions about the Holiday House Tour or want to make sure your name is on our volunteer list to be called as a docent, stop by!

Friday Roundup: Photos, Lectures, and August Events

Old Frederick County Court House — You may have seen these photos before, but 15 digitized slides were added to our Flickr this week, with most being buildings on Loudoun Street. Find them at the top of our Flickr photostream!

We hope you have been enjoying the Godfrey Miller summer lecture series. The final two installments will be held next Tuesday and Thursday at the Godfrey Miller Historic Home and Fellowship Center, 28 S. Loudoun St., Winchester:

July 23: 1900s in Winchester – Trish Ridgeway on benefactors to the area; Judy Humbert on integration in the second half of the century

July 25: 2000s in Winchester – Kris Tierney, Frederick County administrator, and Eden E. Freeman, Winchester city manager, on the present state of the area and future goals

Cost is $10 (cash or check) for each evening, collected at the door. Door prizes will be given away each evening. Proceeds from the lectures benefit programming for seniors at the Godfrey Miller Historic Home and Fellowship Center. For more information, visit www.winchesterva.gov/275th-anniversary or call 540-247-0968.

The Civil War Weekend returns August 16-18, 2019. There are too many events to list here. See the full schedule of activities and events at visitwinchesterva.com/event/civil-war-weekend/

Are you an artist or volunteer curious about PHW’s Bough & Dough Shop? Stop by the Hexagon House at 530 Amherst Street on August 24 between 1-4 PM to see the space partially set up for the shop, pick up a vendor application, or chat for a bit at this informal session. While this event is aimed more at new or returning artists to get an idea of the space, anyone is welcome to stop by and the event is free. Vendor packets with more information about the Shop are available at www.phwi.org/events/Shopinfo.pdf.

Last, you may want to read the recent article posted by the National Trust for Historic Preservation: Heritage Conservation as a Civil Right. This is an interesting overview of the perceived issues of historic preservation and the similar environmental justice movement origins and their intersection with the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The two movements diverged in application over the years, and as the author John H. Sprinkle, Jr. concludes: “The question remains: In viewing both differential access and impacts to cultural resources from a civil rights perspective, how would our national system of heritage conservation fare? Perhaps it is high time to find out.”

Friday Roundup: Welcome to March

It might seem early, but artist applications for the 2019 Bough & Dough Shop are open! The Shop will be held at the Hexagon House between November 22 and December 15, 2019. With last year under our belt, we have a bit more information to share with potential artists in a small booklet with the application. Applications are also available online through Google Forms and printed copies will be available at the office. We will be reviewing applications for new artists starting at our March 11 board meeting. We do have one item to note for potential artists we may have spoken to last year at the shop but not had contact information to follow up – commission fees for 2019 have increased to 25%. We are still a no table fee and no application fee event, and admission to the shop is free for shoppers (or anyone curious to see the Hexagon House).

If you could not make it to the City Council work session to hear the discussion on the Conditional Use Permit for the old hospital site, the City Council meeting from February 26 is available for review on the Meeting Portal. The application is scheduled to return to City Council on March 12. You may also want to review HDP’s video of a 3D rendering of the proposed new construction. We hope HDP will continue to work with the neighbors and address their issues throughout this process, particularly exterior design and landscaping choices and addressing the uptick in traffic and parking.

For something a bit different, we have a link to a historic article on a topic that many people may not know about. We don’t talk much about Winchester Gas and Electric Co. in our history of Winchester despite its establishment here in 1853. By chance we came across an article this week that goes into some detail on the company’s history and its re-invigoration in 1922 after years of poor management and dilapidated equipment had taken its toll. Take a look at Reviving a Run-down Gas Plant in the September 16, 1922 Gas Age-Record for both a glimpse at an underappreciated piece of Winchester’s vanished history, along with numerous photographic illustrations of the town and the plant. Happy reading!

The Winchester Gas and Electric Co. buildings were located on the corner of Kent and Boscawen Streets where the Court Square Autopark is today. The stone wall still exists at the Joint Judicial Center’s Boscawen Street side. The wall was part of the fence of the Conrad House property.

Friday Roundup: Magazines, Editing, Grants, and House Tour and Shop

First, are you looking for some new reading material? Through January 31, 2019, AmazonSmile will donate 15% the purchase price of new print magazine subscriptions to the charity of your choice. Visit https://smile.amazon.com/b?node=18541223011 for details. Check it out and select PHW as your charity to give us a little boost at no extra cost to you!

Second, we are zipping along on the Limestone book faster than anticipated. We will probably have the first chapter ready for the proofing team the week of January 21. Let us know if you would like to join the editing team at phwinc.org@gmail.com or 540-667-3577. Copies of the previous Limestone book can be provided to volunteer editors for text and image comparisons.

Third, are you looking to expand your grant writing skills in 2019? The Foundant for GrantSeekers is sponsoring a free webinar “Planning Your Own Pathway to Grant Guru” on Thursday, January 31, 12pm Eastern. Learn more and register here. Related, you may also want to check out the recent Q&A post at the National Trust for their various grant programs. You can also find a link to the recording of the recent webinar that served as the catalyst for this round of questions.

Fourth, we are working behind the scenes for Holiday House Tour 2019 (tentative dates Dec. 7 & 8, 2019). This year’s event will coincide with the 275th anniversary of Winchester, and we are hoping to find houses to open from each century to showcase Winchester’s variety of architectural expression and history. We have two possibilities for homes from the 1790s and 1890s in the West Cork and Clifford neighborhood. If you have a home or building that is near this area, especially if you are in a home from the early 1900s through the current day, please let us know at 540-667-3577 or phwinc.org@gmail.com. Our preference is for buildings within relatively easy walking distance, so a neighborhood we have never visited like Lee, Stonewall, Joist Hite, Shirley, etc. could be a possibility. We have readers and members in this area, so if you or someone you know might be interested in opening your building for tours, speak up!

Of course, we are also working on Bough and Dough 2019. We had overwhelmingly positive feedback for the changes in 2018. We are in the process now of dotting i’s and crossing t’s for an expanded format with a tentative date range of Nov. 15 to Dec. 15, to be held again at the Hexagon House. We hope to have our application and information forms together in early February, and we will be sure to post here and on our website when those are live. If you are an artist hoping to jump in this year, our feedback indicated shoppers would like more pottery, ornaments, jewelry, and food items like fruit cake and mulled cider spices. We have discussed food trucks and artist demonstrations/workshops but logistics for these may be tricky (especially indoor setup). We will most likely have a few open house days again this spring and summer for prospective artists to stop in and see the space and planned setup to determine if we’d be a good fit. Keep an eye out!

Friday Roundup: Curated Reading

We didn’t get to do too much exploration of our news feed over November and December, so it was a pleasant relief to find many of our favorite sites compiled “best of 2018” stories to browse. Here’s a small sampling of things we enjoyed reading over the past week.

What’s Up with All Those Empty Commercial Storefronts in New Mixed-Use Developments?
Rachel Quednau applies what is happening in Milwaukee with mixed-use development and takes a quick look at some other locations facing the same issues. Be sure to read to the end for examples from locations that are thinking outside the cookie-cutter box to provide storefronts that are reasonable for small businesses to rent and thrive.

Fifteen Opportunity Zone Resources Available Right Now
The National Trust for Historic Preservation rounds up what we know so far about Opportunity Zones and how they impact historic preservation. They will be hosting a webinar on January 17, so be sure to click through to the article and find out how to sign up.

11,000 Digitized Books From 1923 Are Now Available Online at the Internet Archive
Researchers rejoice! Open Culture reports on the watershed of art, literature, photography, and more entering public domain for the first time in twenty years. If you’d like a little more background on the topic, also check out For the First Time in More Than 20 Years, Copyrighted Works Will Enter the Public Domain at Smithsonian.com.

Baumgartner Restoration YouTube channel
Not quite in the normal historic preservation wheelhouse but certainly an adjacent field is art conservation. If you would like to watch and listen to art conservation, there are a number of channels dedicated to this fine art. We especially enjoyed the narrated conservation of an especially challenging painting, “The Assassination of Archimedes.”

We know people are also probably very curious about Holiday House Tour. We estimate about 300 people enjoyed the event despite the rainy Saturday. The new format for the Bough and Dough Shop was also a success, finally surpassing the all time high sales numbers reached in 2000. This was the year the Shop was set up at the former location of the A&P grocery store, 525 Amherst St., and boasted over 35 vendors. That year was by far the largest space and the most vendors the Shop ever had in its 40+ year history, so topping that figure is truly a benchmark moment for us. We would like to extend our thanks to all our guests, homeowners, volunteers, artisan vendors, and sponsors who helped us make our holiday fundraising a success. We literally could not do it without all of you. We will be going through our internal debriefing on January 14, so if you have not turned in feedback yet, there’s still time! You can find the Shop survey and the Tour survey on SurveyMonkey.

Friday Photos: Bough & Dough Shop 2018

Happy Friday! For our last post of 2018, we are happy to share 180 photos taken during the Bough and Dough Shop at the Hexagon House. You may have seen a number of these on Facebook throughout the event as we posted updates and new arrivals, but about half were taken for our internal documentation on the setup to keep in mind for next year. You can now find them all in one place at the Bough and Dough Shop 2018 album on Flickr. (Fair warning, the sweet treats from Homestead Farm are at the top of the album…viewing on an empty stomach might make you hungry!)

This update is an extra special treat for us, as it put us over the 10,000 public images mark. It is amazing to think we have this many images in our collection alone, and we are extremely grateful to Flickr for helping us continue to share our digitized images as we have for the past five years. You can drop by our Flickr photostream to view all our online collections to date. Happy viewing!

Merry Christmas from PHW!

Since this is our last Friday blog before Christmas, we want to wish you a happy holiday. It has been a year of ups and downs, but we are happy to report we ended the year on a positive note with the early feedback from the Holiday House Tour and Bough and Dough Shop. If you are looking for a last minute gift or two from our 2018 lineup of Bough and Dough Shop artists, we still have those with a website or Etsy store listed on our Featured Artisans page. The artists would be delighted to hear from you – let them know you found them through the Bough and Dough Shop, too! The page will likely stay up as-is until the summer or fall of 2019 as we begin to nail down the next artist lineup.

We also still have the two feedback surveys open, the Shop and Artisan specific survey and the Holiday House Tour and Shop survey. Remember to be specific in your written comments, particularly in asking for types of items you would like to see at the Shop in 2019 (i.e., instead of saying “jewelry,” let us know what type of jewelry – metalworking, polymer clay, beaded, etc.). We will be reviewing the feedback in January of 2019.

As always, the invitation for you to join the Holiday House Tour 2019 team stands so you can make the event more of what you want to see. The drastic improvement to the Shop in 2018 was due entirely to rethinking event from the ground up by one person from January to August after watching the process for two to three years. The same can absolutely be done for the Tour itself from anyone familiar with its goals and ambitions. We strongly encourage anyone who feels that the House Tour is not meeting their expectations to take your written feedback a step further and give back to this community tradition through action. Make this your New Year’s Resolution, become involved as one of the volunteer leaders, and make the Holiday House Tour your dream event. Doing so will probably even give you more personal benefits than just producing a better event.

You may leave your information as a volunteer by stating specifically you want to take on improving some specific part (some feedback included allusions to writing and submitting press releases, running an Instagram, being a house decorator to make sure it meets your level of “festive,” etc. – all are very welcome tasks for volunteer leaders) for the Holiday House Tour at phwinc.org@gmail.com, by phone at 540-667-3577, or by snail mail addressed to PHW, 530 Amherst St., Winchester, VA 22601. You do not need to be a member of PHW or join the board of directors to be a volunteer leader, but attending meetings to make reports, take suggestions, and give directions to PHW staff is critical, particularly in the final preparation stages of September-November.

And just for fun, you might relive your childhood a bit with a short YouTube video of Andy Davis at the Johnson County Museum exploring aluminum Christmas trees in the era of America’s space race and futuristic fascination. We hope you were able to experience one in person if you went to the Patsy Cline Historic House during the Holiday House Tour weekend. While they may be a kitschy throwback, they remain highly evocative of the late 1950s to 1960s holidays. While they don’t work for all homes, if you have a “newly historic” home from the 1960s, you might want to think about trying an aluminum tree for some properly retro vibes!

Holiday House Tour and Bough and Dough Shop Feedback

We are almost back to normal at PHW after the Holiday House Tour and Bough and Dough Shop. Along with the end of the event come feedback surveys. If you only visited the Shop, please take the survey specific to the Shop and artisan vendors. If you partook in the Holiday House Tour and Shop this year, please take the slightly longer Holiday House Tour feedback survey.

We will review your feedback from both surveys in our wrap up meeting and initial planning for the House Tour in January 2019. Thank you for your honest feedback!

Last Weekend for the Bough & Dough Shop

Happy Friday! It has been a busy week for us at PHW wrapping up the Holiday House Tour, working behind the scenes on the website (this will be our first new blog post since updating to the latest version of WordPress, which has been a learning experience all its own), and winding down the Bough and Dough Shop.

If you haven’t made it to the Hexagon House yet to see the shop, you are missing out! Be sure to drop in Friday or Saturday between 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., or Sunday between noon to 5 p.m. After that, the over twenty fabulous artists and their goods will be gone until next year!

If you already made it to the Shop, we would love your feedback on the different format and hours this year. If you didn’t get a paper survey at checkout, you can find the online version at Survey Monkey. It is a quick four questions specific to the Shop (not the Holiday House Tour). Feedback from this survey will be used for our internal planning for the Shop as well as in finding, selecting, and directing artisans for the types of items they should bring in 2019.

Thank you all, and we hope to see you one more time this weekend at the Hexagon House for the Bough and Dough Shop. Keep this survey in mind when you visit!