We’re a city without an art museum–the Las Vegas Art Museum closed three years ago. The LVAM collection is set to be exhibited at various locations around the UNLV campus. But there are no plans in the near future for a single venue to display the collection.

The Smith Center for the Performing Arts is set to open on March 10th and is billing itself as the “heart of the arts.” While this amazing new addition to the culture of Las Vegas will feature public works of art by prominent local artists such as Tim Bavington, it will not really serve as a focal point for visual arts and artists in Las Vegas.

While we are a city with a vibrant, growing art scene, there is no single physical center of gravity for that scene. With the completion its visitor center set for early summer, The Neon Museum is poised to fill that void.

The museum, located Downtown, is currently rehabilitating the La Concha Motel lobby which will serve as the museum’s visitor center, but in addition to that space, there will also be space for events which will engage the art community and the community as a whole. The museum’s CEO and Executive Director Danielle Kelly says that programming is still in development. Nevertheless, she says, “I’m so excited for this to be a meeting place, not just for private parties, but for things like lectures,” she says. Kelly also says the museum is considering programming such as artist and writer residencies, performance, partnering with schools. “It’s not going to be a huge facility, but because we’re a project that celebrates a native art form, it is such an incredible opportunity to a place of pride for the local creative community. I think it’s important for us to be that. I hope to see us make that happen.”

Bill Marion, who is Chair of the museum’s Board, also sees the future as full of possibility for the community as the new center opens. He explains that the museum really functions in three ways: as an art gallery where people can learn about the history of neon as an artform, a museum about the history of architecture, and a museum about the history of Las Vegas. “However you want to view it–that becomes its priority. This museum will be a lot of things to a lot of people. Therefore, it will truly be a drawing point for people to come together for discussion, reflection, remembering, and for creating,” he says.

The simple fact of having a physical structure for people to visit without previously making reservations online, as visitors to the Neon Boneyard must do now, will also make it more accessible to the local public. Of the current visitorship level of approximately 1,000 visitors per month (although some months see as many as 1,700 visitors) only about 15% are from the state of Nevada. That number is approximately equal to those who visit from places outside the United States.

Says Marion, “The Neon Museum for a long time has been recognized as the best kept secret in Las Vegas. Lots of people have heard about it, but don’t know where it is…I think we’re going to see out of town visitorship skyrocket. Along with the Mob Museum and the rejuvenation of Downtown, we’re going to be bringing people from The Strip who wouldn’t otherwise come. We’re going to be a draw and an attraction. I think that will have the corollary affect of alerting residents to the fact that we’re here. I’m hoping that longtime residents who remember growing up with the Stardust and growing up with the Desert Inn will want to go there to remember their childhood. And for newer residents, I’m hoping that it will be the kind of museum that will allow them to recognize, ‘Wow! Las Vegas really does have a history that I can be proud of.’”

The organizers and builders of Lucky Lady Lucy 2.0, a 20 foot tall wooden show girl that will be burned on the corner of South 3rd Street and East Colorado Avenue. The original Lucky Lady Lucy was constructed here last summer and transported to Burning Man where she was set aflame as part of the annual gathering in the Black Rock Desert.

To make this community art project happen, the builders need your help in the form of donations–but they aren’t just asking for a handout. Your donations won’t merely make this amazing event happen; they’ll can put you right in the center of the evening’s activities.

For more info on how you can get involved, about Lucky Lady Lucy 2.0, visit indiegogo.com.

And check out this video to get you fired up for the Burn.

Andy White is Executive Director of BoomStartup, a Utah-based accelerator that mentors and invests in tech startups. White was introduced to the Vegas Tech scene when he attended the first LaunchUp event here. Through that introduction to our burgeoning entrepreneurial ecosystem, White has become involved locally making regular visits to Downtown and attending a variety of Vegas Tech events. In addition to his local interactions, White was also kind enough to host several Las Vegas entrepreneurs in his home for Startup Weekend Salt Lake City. “I think there is fantastic opportunity here with the community that exists,” he says and is eager to lend a hand and share his knowledge and experience. “I’m an entrepreneur at heart, but I’m most passionate about startup ecosystems and startup communities.”

What’s your passion?
I’m most passionate about helping entrepreneurs discover ways to overcome the obstacles they have before them. There’s no better moment than after struggling with an issue, they first realize what they need to do next. That ah-ha moment creates an amount of energy and enthusiasm that’s difficult to recreate in any other situation.

How does your passion build community?
Every time I help create a new job, instead of just filling one, the community grows.

What was your previous perception of Las Vegas?
Most of my time in Las Vegas had been spent out on The Strip. I’d come into town, attend a convention, see a show or two, and eat at great restaurants. It was just a temporary destination that was fun for a limited amount of time. I always wondered how strange it must be for kids to grow up in a town of such excess.

How has that changed after spending time Downtown?
I now realize there’s much more to the area than just the hotels and casinos. Much like everywhere else in the world, the locals never even go near the attractions that bring people to town. There are real people living in many different areas with opportunities to grow with the new economy.

What inspires you about what is happening in the revitalization of Downtown?
It’s the most exciting urban revitalization project since the New Deal. A bit ironic that the region will have gained benefits from both programs. I love the fact that everything is being done from a grassroots community effort that’s supported by organizations and government. Here you have the right people leading and the right organizations feeding their needs. The opportunity to build this much new infrastructure based on the modern needs of the community is unprecedented in this country.

For more about BoomStartup, check out their website.

Urban revitalization is a serious business. The ideas that influence such a massive and important undertaking require contemplation, consideration, collaboration.

But thinking about the importance of community and human connectedness amidst the tumult of 21st century isn’t merely the purview of people working on large-scale projects. Case in point: Mike Fenchel, Alex Connelly, and Sam Lundsten, collectively known as 7 Cees.

These three lifelong friends (they met playing soccer when they were small children) have spent the last few months traveling the country thinking about the big picture and what it looks like to them—and hoping to inspire others to do the same. The 7 Cees they’ve been considering while taking this epic journey are community, consciousness, creativity, culture, collaboration, cooperation, and connection, concepts most people give little or no thought to in their daily lives. But those concepts are key to human endeavor.

Fenchel, Connelly, and Lundsten grew up in Madison, Wisconsin, but went their separate ways for college. Fenchel studied Physics at the University of Michigan. That scientific interest in “how things work” fuels his desire to better understand human consciousness, an interest which began for him as a young child. “When I was a kid, I always felt that there were a lot more subtle things going on than people were talking about. I remember thinking about the big picture for a long time, but a couple of years ago I started putting words to it. I’m all about how,” he explains.

That desire coupled with an interest in art, culture, and community sparked the idea for the journey that the three friends now find themselves on. Connelly, who studied Studio Art at the University of Vermont, explains that while the friends’ physical journey may have begun just months ago, it began for them mentally long ago. “We would sneak out at night of our parents’ houses and go walk around the neighborhood and just talk,” he says.

Setting out to share their ideas and learn from others has only served to reinforce that there are many people who share their interests in evolving culture and community. “This trip has been very empowering because I feel like we’re finally able to get out and see places where we can make an impact, where people are making an impact, and get to the heart of what’s going on all around the country,” says Connelly. Lundsten concurs: “The community I grew up in was nice, it was pleasant. It wasn’t until I started moving around that I realized that there was a lot of room for growth.”

7 Cees describes their mission as learning to be themselves for a living by traveling in their bus-studio and sharing their creative passion with people they meet. And for a week they parked their bus-studio, which was once a home for an Arkansas family of seven, Downtown and shared ideas with us and learned about the work going on to make Las Vegas the most community-focused large city in the world.

“I think experiential art is really what we’re about. A lot of the art we’re creating on this trip is really about creating a space where people can come and create. That’s art. I don’t know how a sculpture could do that any better,” says Lundsten, a painter/sculptor who studied at Pacific Northwest College of Art.

Perhaps most importantly, the journey is about just that: the journey. It’s an opportunity for Fenchel, Connelly, and Lundsten to explore what they really want out of life and to inspire other people to also consider such big questions. “You don’t have to find some predefined path,” says Fenchel. “Take time to let yourself think and decide what you want. Don’t keep doing things our of habit or insecurity.”

To learn more, to read their blog, to support their efforts, or to see photos of their time spent in Las Vegas, visit 7cees.org.

This mobile phone application that enables ordering beyond the counter is appropriately named Counterless and grew from Shepherd’s idea to an innovation by a group of eight entrepreneurs and developers during Startup Weekend Las Vegas. Counterless’ premise is simple: customers place an order for food and drink via their iPhone, bypass long lines at the bar, and avoid the general frustration that accompanies waiting. “Counterless makes lines more efficient and the ordering process simpler,” says developer Mark Cicoria. “You can order when you’re walking to The Beat. You can order before you get there, or you can sit in the /usr/lib, and they’ll bring your food or drink to you.”

Now, on any given Thursday in the Emergency Arts building, tech entrepreneurs and freelancers participating in the Jelly stream in and out of the /usr/lib. They catch up with friends and discuss their latest projects, and when they want a Slap-and-Tickle or a PBR, they can pull out their phones and order from The Beat coffee shop downstairs without needing to leave the co-working space.

It was not a seamless transition to get Counterless to this point, however.

On November 18th during Startup Weekend Las Vegas, Swanson pitched the idea for Counterless under a different name. “It was originally called BarFly,” he says with an amused laugh. “We thought it sounded too much like Barf…ly. Mark [Johnson] came up with the name Counterless.”

The Counterless team was relatively large and comprised of eight founding members: Mark Cicoria, Mark Johnson, Hammed Kohistani, Mike Manzano, George Moncrief, Christopher Shepherd, Shaun Swanson, and Brenden Soares, who eventually left to pursue other endeavors.

As soon as the team was assembled, they went into the hallway for a brainstorming session. “We just left,” says Cicoria. “We wanted to brainstorm ideas, divvy up tasks, and figure out what technology we were going to use to turn our idea into a functioning product.”

Converting the idea for Counterless into a working application was no easy task to complete in the span of a weekend. “Not everyone knew everyone’s background,” Shepherd admits. Chimes in Swanson, “We had to switch up positions as needed.” At the beginning of the weekend, Swanson, Shepherd and Soares divided their time between making phone calls to local distilleries for donated alcohol and talking to the owners of different venues to host a demo spot on Fremont East later that weekend. Christopher LaPorte, owner of Insert Coin(s), was most receptive to their idea. “He was the one who really came through for us,” says Swanson.

As the team secured Insert Coin(s) as the location for demoing Counterless, Cicoria and Moncrief worked on the back-end development for the application, which included coding. Manzano handled the iOS development. Johnson and Kohistani designed the graphics, user interface, and the iPad application for vendors. The goal was to get Counterless built, installed, and generating revenue by the end of the night. Pressed for time, the team relied on what they knew. “There wasn’t time to learn a new technology; we just went for it,” says Cicoria.

As expected when developers build an application in only 54 hours, the Counterless team had to overcome some challenges. The group struggled toward the end of the night since the iPad app, which processes the transactions from the iPhone, wasn’t working. If that wasn’t enough of a headache, the demo for Counterless didn’t begin until around 11 that night. “A lot of people had already left, but we eventually got two solid transactions!” exclaims Shepherd.

And although the Counterless team did not win Startup Weekend, they are still working on the application and have added a new member, Jason Craig, who is also the current COO. As Cicoria explains, “We’ve iterated on the iPhone and iPad app. We’ve demoed it at the Jelly at least six times, and I’ve also rewritten the iPad app so it functions better.”

So what does a small startup company like Counterless mean for the Vegas Tech scene as a whole? According to Swanson, Counterless “is embodying the notion of action-based, experiential learning.” The Vegas Tech scene is burgeoning rapidly because of gatherings like Startup Weekend and informal spots to cowork like The Beat and the /usr/lib. These places and events promote collaboration and camaraderie between developers and entrepreneurs. People can iterate more quickly to produce an application that has a necessary basis in a community that relies heavily on technology. “It’s more of a ‘get up and go’ mentality,” Swanson concludes.

The future looks even brighter for the Counterless team. Cicoria continues, “We’re now incorporated. We have three advisors who are great. We are thinking about taking funding, and we’ve been talking to several investors. Our goal is to get Counterless’ minimum viable product into the app store sometime in February.”

It’s my job to think and learn and write about Downtown Las Vegas. I wonder how many times each day I speak, hear, or write the word Downtown. It’s become a word that I use as much (if not more) than my own name.

And then there’s that song. You know the one made so famous by Petula Clark that urges us to forget all our troubles, forget all our cares, and go (where else?) Downtown. Yesterday, as I started my car to drive (where else?) Downtown, I happened upon a rebroadcast of a 2008 episode of Radiolab playing on KNPR, my local National Public Radio station.

The episode, called “Songs that Cross Borders,” featured a story about that (in)famous tune and how it’s meaning changed over time. As Petula Clark continued to sing it and other artists reinterpreted the song, for some the song morphed from one filled with positive connotations to negative ones. You can listen to the episode here (the story about “Downtown” begins at 6:15).

Of course, the story got me thinking about our Downtown and how it’s changing. As we revitalize the area, we aren’t just changing it physically. We are changing the perceptions that people have about it. For so long, Downtown Las Vegas has been a place that didn’t signify home or community or culture to most of the people who live here. For many who do call our city home, those meanings aren’t yet part of their perceptions of Downtown. But they will be; of that, I am certain–as certain as I am that in this brief post I have used the word “Downtown” ten times. And as certain as I am that we aren’t just changing our city, we’re changing the meaning of what it means to live here.

Photo by Bryan Schnitzer

Alicia Berg is Vice President of Campus Environment at Columbia College Chicago. In that role, Berg works to create a cohesive campus from over twenty buildings dispersed throughout the South Loop. To that end, she has overseen the completion and implementation of a campus master plan including a 20% increase in the college’s footprint and the development of its first purpose-built building, the award-winning Media Production Center. She is also responsible for the college’s facilities, security operations, real estate transactions, managing construction and design, and “greening” and directing the look of the campus.

Prior to joining Columbia College, Berg spent a number of years at the Chicago Department of Planning and Development focusing on downtown and historic preservation which culminated in her appointment as the City’s top planning and economic development official. She is President of NeighborSpace and a board member of Landmarks Illinois, the Civic Federation, ULI-Chicago, the Chicago Community Land Trust, and BOMA/Chicago.

Berg recently visited Downtown Las Vegas to learn more about the revitalization efforts taking place. Here she shares her thoughts about those efforts and on building community.

What’s your passion?
My passion is creating vibrant, walkable, liveable, economically viable, interesting, visually appealing, distinctive downtowns.

How does your passion build community?
Jane Jacobs once told me “Don’t let your city get boring” because a place where you can work, go to school, live, go shopping for whatever you need or want, see a performance, bring your kids to day care, check out an exhibit, walk your dog in a park, get a bite to eat or drink, go to the dentist, or bump into a friend on the sidewalk is a community where people want to be. Believe it or not, my neighborhood in downtown Chicago feels like a small town–I know the clerks at the grocery store, the dry cleaner, all the dog walkers…

What was your previous perception of Las Vegas?
The Strip, shows, fabulous restaurants, high-end shopping, and tourists

How has that perception changed after spending time Downtown?
I realized that Las Vegas is a real place with real people and real challenges.

What inspires you about the revitalization efforts that are taking place here?
More than anything, I am impressed that a private individual who is moving a company downtown is so committed to making that a success for its employees that he is personally financing and supporting the organic creation of a neighborhood there for them.

Danish architectural firm Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) doesn’t merely create mind-blowing designs that expand the perception of what architecture can be. Their ideas can also expand the ways we look at urban development and revitalization.

Founded twelve years ago, BIG has designed projects around the world in such far-flung locales as Dubai, China, New York City, and Azerbaijan. Closer to home, they have been instrumental in the redevelopment of an area of Copenhagen, Ørestad, that has been taking place over the last decade. Their VM Houses and Mountain Dwellings, located there, are examples of how BIG uses architecture to create interaction points for people, to attract people to the urban core while maintaining a connection to the outdoors that many previously associated with suburbia.

BIG Partner and Business Development Director Kai-Uwe Bergmann recently visited us and shared some of the firm’s ideas ideas that can certainly inform our efforts to revitalize the urban heart of Las Vegas. Bergmann emphasizes the firm’s commitment to “encourage people to do certain things, to connect with one another in new ways” while utilizing their “positive” approach to architecture. He explains that positive approach is crucial when faced with the many challenges—economic, political, municipal—that are certain to be factors when pushing the architectural envelope. For a brilliant example of how BIG does that, check this out.

Here are some BIG ideas that can help us to revitalize our big city:

Use an Evolutionary Approach

BIG’s ideas are informed by the work of Charles Darwin and his principle that “It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.” BIG extrapolates that idea to the creative process, saying in their book Yes Is More: “Like Darwin describes creation as a process of excess and selection, we propose to let the forces of society, the multiple interests of everyone, decide which of our ideas can live, and which must die.”

In urban redevelopment, how can this principle be applied? Rather than creating “build to suit” structures that serve a single purpose, we can design buildings that can adapt over time. We can create buildings that enable people to utilize them for multiple purposes, like a coworking space for the theater, music, improv community that doubles as a performance space. We can create parks that are self-sustaining by anchoring them with businesses that attract users and generate revenue that can maintain the park itself. We can create adaptable spaces that will survive the test of time.

As Bergmann explains it, “we look for ways for buildings to live longer.” BIG strives to create buildings that will outlast their initial intended purposes, buildings that can find new uses over time as well as playing multiple roles in the lives of the cities in which they are built. The firm’s work on the SJakket Community Building is an excellent example of not only adaptive reuse, but also of creating a space that can change over time to reflect the needs of its users.

This is a striking contrast to the way we’ve done things in Las Vegas. We’re a city where many of our iconic structures are built with pre-planned blast points in the framework—we plan for the implosion, the demise of the building. Rather than celebrating preservation and adaptive reuse, we’ve literally celebrated demolition (see The Dunes).

At this juncture in our city’s history, it’s important to take a different tack as we revitalize Downtown and create a new heart of Las Vegas. Let’s instead create something that’s built to last. And let’s allow that idea to inform what we do we as we create a new kind of neighborhood, community, culture, economy, city. Let’s create a city that can withstand the buffeting forces of economic downturns, our desert climate, and social disconnection.

Pragmatic Utopianism

In Yes is More, Ingels explains that for too long, the views of those in the field of architecture have been divided between two opposing extremes. “Either naively utopian or petrifyingly pragmatic. Rather than choosing one over the other, BIG operates in the fertile overlap of the two opposites,” he writes.

Surely we must consider occupying that same space as we revitalize our city. We’ve learned the hard way over the last several years that our high-flying, living-large mentality and single industry focus cannot sustain us as a community or an economy as we move forward. And perhaps it may be pragmatic to simply throw up our hands and admit that the problems we face are too large. A pragmatist might simply turn and run.

Rather than choose either view, we can dream big and couple it with hard work. We can grow new businesses and build new places that draw us closer together. And most importantly, we can be open to all ideas creating a social architecture that follows Ingels assertion in favor of “An inclusive rather than an exclusive architecture. An architecture unburdened by the conceptual monogamy of commitment to a single idea or interest.”

Create a Place

“Create a place, not a building,” says Bergmann. For the better part of the last 20 years, Las Vegas has done an excellent job of doing just the opposite. The center of our town is populated by buildings that teem with life, but that life is not ours. The iconic structures of our city are primarily the playground of people who don’t call our city home.

Outside of that city center, we’ve built miles and miles of soulless strip malls, many of which are figuratively and literally vacant.

What if we reimagined that development and created a place where people want to gather? Not more chain stores devoid of soul. If we did that, wouldn’t we be diversifying our economy and creating jobs for our friends and neighbors?

What Las Vegas needs are hang-out places, things for our kids to do, and events that we can experience together. We certainly don’t need more sprawl; we’ve plenty of that. Instead, live/work spaces can make the frustrating and lonely morning commute obsolete. We need to build things that attract us to come together and serve as amenities for us (like this), not just for the millions who fly in and out of McCarran every year.

Even if our succeses are small, surely we will have made a big impact on the future of our community.

Want to learn more about Bjarke Ingels and the work of BIG? Click here. Or view Bjarke’s TED Talk.

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