Backstory Café is OPEN!
The long-awaited opening of Backstory Café has at last arrived!
Come and check out their inviting space, their slow-drip brewed Metropolis coffees and variety of teas, their ever-so-moist and delicious pastries and lunchtime soups and sandwiches (turkey, corned beef, hummus and veggie, and more!). Backstory also offers free Wifi. Hours are Monday-Saturday 8am-8pm.
Backstory Café is located at the Experimental Station, on the Blackstone Avenue (east) side of the building.
Backstory's mission is to be a small coffee/tea house and cafe and neighborhood meeting place, a site for social engagement. For more information about Backstory's mission and goals, continue reading...
61st Street Farmers Market: July 19 Highlights
The 61st Street Farmers Market continues to grow and ripen with the season! This Saturday, you can expect Mint Creek Farm (which will be offering a TASTE OF GRILLED SPRING LAMB!), Growing Power (fresh organic produce), Windy City Harvest (fresh organic produce), Bruno's Organics (organic meats, bakery items, eggs, Amish cheese), Tomato Mountain (organic tomato products), Brett Stamper Cheese Company (a variety of locally produced cheeses), Medici Bakery (breads, croissants, pastries), Abbey Brown Soaps (a variety of hand-made olive oil soaps), Aqua Farm herbs (hydroponically grown herbs), and Hillside Orchards (RASPBERRIES, SWEET CHERRIES, BLUEBERRIES, APRICOTS, PEACHES, AND APPLES! ). Read on for info about this week's events...
Blackstone Bikes on Chicago Tonight!
Blackstone Bicycle Works was recently featured on Chicago Tonight in a piece by video journalist Jay Shefsky. We highly recommend you take a look..
Summer bike mechanic classes
We are offering a series of beginning bike mechanic classes that will take place in our shop on 4 consecutive Wednesday evenings. Each class will cover a different focus of repair and maintenance:
1) Basic adjustments, flats, tubes and tires
2) Hubs, headsets, bottom brackets
3) Wheels and brakes
4) Drive train: chain, derailleurs, shifters and cables
Fee: $120 for the four class series
$35 for an individual class (if space is available)
Chicago Short Film Brigade
Short film lovers join us at the Experimental Station this Friday at 7:30pm for a screening presented by the Chicago Short Film Brigade. The screening will feature bicycles, ship wrecks, hip-hop, phrenology and MORE! $5 suggested donation. Blackstone Bicycle Works will be providing secure and monitored bicycle parking, so ride your bike!
Details about the films are available at www.filmbrigade.com.
All Things Must Fight to Live: Stories of War and Deliverance in Congo
On Wednesday, June 18, at 7:00 pm, Bryon Mealer, the author of All Things Must Fight to Live: Stories of War and Deliverance in Congo, will give a reading at the Experimental Station (home of the Invisible Institute), 6100 S. Blackstone. (For a description of the book: http://www.bryanmealer.com) Refreshments will be served. I hope you will join us.
Kool Herc at ES
When he first arrived in the U.S. with his immigrant parents in 1967 at the age of twelve, Jamaican-born Clive Campbell, aka DJ Kool Herc, carried with him the seeds of a cultural movement.
Michael R. Malec McKenna Memorial Fund
If you would like to donate to the Michael R. Malec McKenna Memorial Fund online, please use our PayPal Donation button on the right. When you make your donation, please type "Memorial Fund" in the space provided.
If you prefer to send a check, please make it payable to "Experimental Station" and note "Memorial Fund" on the Memo line. Mail it to: Experimental Station, 6100 S. Blackstone Avenue, Chicago, IL 60637.
Your donations will help to support Blackstone Bicycle Works, our youth education program, which serves boys and girls from the Woodlawn neighborhood. We thank you in advance for your kind generosity.
Downtime at the Experimental Station
Downtime at the Experimental Station: A conversation with Dan Peterman, By Dan S. Wang - September, 2004
Dan S. Wang interviewed Dan Peterman about a range of topics: Peterman's art practice, the community that inhabited the building at 61st Street and Dorchester, the fire that destroyed the building, the struggle against the city to rebuild, and the rebirth of the building as the Experimental Station.
The complete text is available as a free PDF download from Temporary Services.
Green Roof Garden
Thanks to a $5000 grant award from the City of Chicago Department of the Environment, the Experimental Station has installed the first portion of its roof top garden this past September. Some 400 square feet of our 10,000 square foot roof now grows eight varieties of sedum, planted in 2' x 2' x 4" containers called "Green Roof Blocks" and 3' x 2' sacks called "Green Paks". Both products were purchased from St. Louis Metalworks.
