All posts tagged: Carrboro

Election Day 2021

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By Monica Chen It was a beautiful, sunny Autumnal day on Tuesday as voters in the Triangle headed to the polls to cast their ballots. After 2020, this year was decidedly less intense, but for many, it was still an important election. In Orange County, the school board and the town council were up for re-election, as was the mayor. Durham had a less complicated election, with three seats on the city council and the mayor’s position open that, as it turned out, became an uncontested race. On Tuesday, candidates and volunteers made a last-minute push to get out the vote, camping out at polling places with booths and flyers. Meanwhile, voters headed to polls with major concerns about their communities and their governments. Growth and development were the biggest issue for voters in both counties. Here was the scene at four polling places in Durham and Orange. Carrboro Town Hall, 11 a.m. In sunny Carrboro, candidates and volunteers alike flocked to the parking lot to appeal to voters, who arrived in a steady stream …

Grata Café, built on gratitude, filling void left by Elmo’s

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By Monica Chen CARRBORO – Inside Carr Mill Mall on Tuesday, Jay Radford was busy getting his new restaurant ready. Full of energy and optimism, Radford walked here and there in the former Elmo’s Diner space, gathering materials, telling construction workers what he wants done, enlisting the help of one of his sons. Other business owners in Carr Mill and employees stop by to chat with him. Grata Café can open as soon as in the next couple of weeks, Radford said, as soon as the permits are approved. Would he like to sit down for this interview? “Oh, no. If I sit down, I’ll fall asleep,” Radford said. Radford is a man who likes to keep moving. Over the course of his life so far, the 52-year-old has built a multitude of experiences and skills. They are all informing his approach to Grata Café. His work style is rooted in the ‘80s and ‘90s. A native of Washington, D.C., he worked as a page at the Capitol Building when he was young. (“When I …

Blog post: New restaurant for Elmo’s space in Carrboro

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When Elmo’s Diner closed during COVID-19 last March, Carrboro residents wondered when the restaurant would reopen. The months passed, lockdown orders came and went, and still the restaurant remained closed.   Then came word in September that they had decided to close permanently, although Elmo’s ownership seemed to leave the possibility open that they would return. “We have not sold to anyone, so we do not know the future of the space,” the last post on their Facebook page said. But since then, that prime spot in Carr Mill Mall has changed hands. There is definitely a new tenant now. Grata Café, which will focus on Italian cuisine, is currently sprucing it up and getting ready to open. “Eat with gratitude,” is the slogan displayed on its web site (www.gratacafe.com), which also states that “grata” is Italian for “gratitude.” The owner is Jay Radford, founder of the Not So Normal 5K races in Carrboro some years back that raised money for a variety of causes. Radford is also the man who is behind the “Mom …

The Fragrance Shop, a family journey of timeless scents

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Among the thousands of perfumes lining the shelves at The Fragrance Shop in Carrboro are a perfume that is more than 200 years old, a perfume worn by the empress of France, and an oil that smells exactly like a well-loved lotion of a popular brand. That first perfume, which smells of citrus with a cool, medicinal undertone – or is it overtone, intended to mask body odor in the 18th Century — is called “4711.” The perfume worn by the empress of France in 1860 is called, fittingly, “Imperiale.” It was created by the perfume house Guerlain to soothe her migraines. “Burt’s Bees, we have a scent,” says long-time manager Jenny Mann during a recent visit to the store. And Mann pulls out, as she does, a bottle from tucked behind other bottles that only she remembers. “Someone told me they used to work at Burt’s Bees, right here in Carr Mill Mall,” she says. The bottle smells exactly like Burt’s Bees’ milk and honey lotion. Mann is The Fragrance Shop’s expert “nose,” the …

Seafood in the summer

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By Matt Goad A door slams shut behind a satisfied customer and another door opens with a new customer not far behind. This happens all day long, three days a week in the small, cinder-block shack that houses Tom Robinson’s Carolina Seafood of Carrboro. With a small staff, the business manages to get to the North Carolina coast every Wednesday to get fish and shellfish to sell in the Piedmont on the weekend. It brings in salmon from Nova Scotia, and some oysters from Virginia, depending on the season, but almost everything comes from North Carolina. Manager Salvador Bonilla generally travels to Morehead City, Swansboro and Beaufort to deal with the local anglers there. Tom Robinson started the business in Chapel Hill in 1975, selling from the back of a truck parked at Pantana Bob’s bar on Rosemary Street. Bonilla has managed the business for the last 16 years. He didn’t know much about the fish business at the time. He worked as a chef at Vespa, the defunct Italian restaurant on Franklin Street, and …

Fears, stress as Asian restaurants focus on survival during coronavirus

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At Gourmet Kingdom in Carrboro during a recent lunch hour, the restaurant is empty. A statewide shutdown on restaurants is in place because of the coronavirus. Outside on Main Street, the air is still and baking hot. People wander, beleaguered and stressed. Inside the restaurant, the air is cool – there is still some normalcy. David Yu, owner of Gourmet Kingdom, is rushing from phone to kitchen with takeout orders and back to the phone, stopping to grab containers of soups. “Business has slowed,” he admits, taking down the mask he’s been wearing to speak with a reporter. When asked if people have been nice to the restaurant, he replies, “I know what you mean.” “There are some regular customers. They’re all pretty understandable. They don’t have any hostility toward us. They understand business,” Yu said. “It’s definitely worrying,” he added. “It’s more worrying than for people who don’t own businesses. Everybody worries about their health, to not catch the virus. I’m worried for this business to survive.” Yu hopes the Paycheck Protection Program will …

Artist profile: Ginna Earl and her creative journey after Vespertine

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Ginna Earl greets me at her house in Sanford, some miles south of Pittsboro. It’s dusk, the sun sets behind the house, giving it a nice glow, and Earl comes out gently, to welcome me on the winding path that leads to her front door. Inside, a picture of Oscar Wilde hangs by the door, a painting in the Art Nouveau style hangs across the way, and then you see paintings by her mom, artworks she found on Etsy over the years, and many other patterns, colors, fabrics, plants, and all the tools and equipment of an artist. On her dining table is a book she’s reading: “Waterlog,” about the adventures of a man who swims throughout the British Isles. It’s fitting that an interview with Earl occurs in the early hours of the evening. “Vespertine” means exactly that – flourishing in the evening, like a star. Sitting down at her dining table, Earl talks about what led to the closing of Vespertine, the store in Carrboro that she owned and operated 2011 to 2017, …

Piedmont Health provides care to uninsured, part-timers

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CARRBORO – Kallie Norton moved to Carrboro from northern Illinois last fall to work at Youth Works, a nonprofit. She’s currently part-time, which means she’s not on the organization’s health insurance. But recently, through a program by Carrboro-based Piedmont Health Services and the Chapel Hill-Carrboro Chamber of Commerce, she paid just $60 out of pocket for a primary care physician appointment plus lab work, at Piedmont. “In previous companies where I was paying health insurance and out of pocket with a deductible, it wasn’t unusual to pay a few hundred for comprehensive bloodwork. I would’ve anticipated paying more,” Norton said on Tuesday. Piedmont’s program provides an alternative, and a safety net for people like Norton, who are part-time, new to the area, or plain uninsured. The program is offered to both full-time and part-time employees of chamber members, as well as their families. It’s also offered regardless of whether the patient has health insurance or is currently on another plan, and there is no extra fee to the chamber or the business. It’s a flat …