Dueminuti

Congrats to Dueminuti for being featured in Seattle Met as one of the "Best New Italian Restaurants in Seattle"!

---

“Healthy pasta” sounds like the saddest trombone of all fast-casual concepts. But this Capitol Hill newcomer from two Tuscany natives delivers legitimately superb pasta—and with fewer carbs too. Pick your shape from the day’s offerings, which may include spaghetti, rigatoni, or big spirals of campanelle, then select a sauce like Sicilian pesto made with mint and almonds or braised hen with pistachios and citrus zest. Nuclear scientist–turned–chef Filippo Fiori extrudes pasta made from a legion of flours: quinoa, rice, rye, corn, and bean among them, the combination of which adds more fiber, more protein, and more satisfying bite.

Photo By: Sarah Flotard

Cultural Ambassador Launches Today!

Marty, Chuck and I.

I FINALLY get to announce the project that I have been working on since the beginning of December. It all started at a dinner at Brunswick and Hunt with Marty Griswold (Publisher for Seattle Met) and Chuck Zimmerman (Principal - Director Client Services, Northwest Polite Society). That evening was the first time that I had a chance to sit down with them both and hear the story of how they met and how they each ended up doing what they do in their careers. Three hours later I was bubbling over feeling so incredibly happy that I got to have dinner with the two of them and just couldn't believe what a great time I had with them both.

Delicious grapes, grapes, grapes the kitchen had made us, paired perfectly with champagne. Are you beginning to see why it might just have been the start of something fabulous? 

At the end of the evening, Marty and Chuck gave me a ride home, and my heart was so very filled. I was just hoping that I would have the chance to work with them again in the future. I had gotten to hear their stories of their personal paths and to share all that I had been working on, trying to do things that were true to who I am yet disruptive and beneficial to the businesses I was working with. We talked about our passion for Seattle and the creative community, how we wanted to see it reach the next level. I went to sleep that night with a stomach full of delicious food and bubbling over with dreams for the future of our community.

Fast forward two weeks later, I got an email from Chuck sharing that he had been speaking with Hans Kehl (COO at Northwest Polite Society) and they were wondering if I would be interested in coming in to meet with them, so we could each learn about each other's businesses. I was intrigued and eagerly accepted. Next thing you know I am there and Hans is telling me their idea for the "Esther project" which was the beginning of us brainstorming Cultural Ambassador. We agreed to form a partnership to combine our powers to create experiences and empower influencers on a whole new level. I can't begin to tell you how incredible it was to have someone say we see what you are doing and we want to work with you. It was a massive validation of something I have been working very hard at and invested a lot of my heart, money, time, etc. into. Not to mention to be teaming up with Northwest Polite Society allows our combined strengths to shine. Hans challenges me to articulate business value more succinctly, Chuck knows the clients and is the biggest encourager ever, and the cultural institutions that Northwest Society is connected with could open some really awesome new doors (this just scraping the surface of the power of this partnership!).

In the following days I will be sharing more behind the scenes about the creative process, the people involved and how we see this as an opportunity to take Seattle to the next level. I hope that you will join the journey, because I have a sneaking suspicion it's going to be a good one.

Make sure to follow us on Instagram and sign up for our newsletter (bottom of page).

Top photo by:  The fabulous Lindsey Bolling!

Illuminate The Wonder

As I am writing this post I am listening to Pharrell Williams song Freedom, it is so perfect and the lyrics get me every time:

The atoms in the air Organisms in the sea The Sun, and yes, man Are made of the same things

An important role of artists is to illuminate the beauty and wonder of their world. As you are reading this you should know that I believe artists come in a variety of professions, a person does not have to go by the title "artist" there are engineers, physicists, and scientists who are incredibly creative in how they articulate the world which they see. Recently, as I was watching Madam Secretary there was a brilliant conversation which took place between the characters of a poet laureate and a physicist. The conversation begins with the physicist explaining about poetry, "sometimes it can be ever so slightly indulgent, unnecessarily convoluted, redundant, also pretentious, arrogant and not essential to the evolution of mankind.." to which the poet laureate responds "how do you live with such an unimaginative reductionist view of the world, how is life without the residence of beauty even worth the effort?" to which the physicist says:

Let me tell you a little something about beauty Mr. Hobbs, you seem to think I can't appreciate beauty because I study the intricacies of it's components. It was Richard Feynman, physicist/personal hero of mine, who put it best he said he could appreciate the beauty of a flower more than say uh you. He said he could see more than the average man sees, he could imagine it's cells, he could appreciate the flower evolved in order to make its colors more attractive to insects which means that insects see color. Maybe they share our aesthetic sense, recognizing the majesty of the quantum world only adds to the beauty of life, it does not subtract. So to answer your question Mr. Hobbs I don't just live in a beautiful world, I understand it.

One thing which really excited me about the above quote was that I actually knew who Richard Feynman was! A year or so ago I met his work online during a rabbit trail of sorts, I was reading an article about Bill Gates love of books which led to my discovery he also considers Feynman a hero and had worked to have his lectures brought online. Being able to know something so utterly outside of my profession, gave me the ability to appreciate another layer of the story being told by the writer of Madam Secretary and that is just a hint of the happiness one feels when equipped with information/knowledge from outside of your area of expertise.

Unfortunately, it has become quite popular for individuals, professions, and cultures to be siloed which kind of seems crazy considering globalization and the unprecedented access we have to information and ideas. But so many of these algorithms which give us the results of where we should eat, what book to purchase, etc. are driven by business goals:

Just like the food industry manipulates our innate biases for salt, sugar and fat with perfectly engineered combinations, the tech industry bulldozes our innate biases for Social Reciprocity (we’re built to get back to others), Social Approval (we’re built to care what others think of us), Social Comparison (how we’re doing with respect to our peers) and Novelty-seeking (we’re built to seek surprises over the predictable). - Tristan Harris, Tech Companies Design Your Life ... The more choices technology gives us in nearly every domain of our lives (information, events, places to go, friends, dating, jobs) — the more we assume that our phone is always the most empowering and useful menu to pick from.

We need our smartphones, notifications screens and web browsers to be exoskeletons for our minds and interpersonal relationships that put our values, not our impulses, first. - Tristan Harris, How Technology Hijacks People's Minds

With the latest election, a mirror was held up to the nation and many individuals realized the siloed lives that they were living, far too many had been in echo chambers. It seems the more life is spent online, the more narrow things become if we are not careful, which I know sounds absolutely crazy as I am writing this. A big part of my job is to be online, because of that I feel that in some ways I am way too plugged in or tied to technology. To balance this a bit, the last couple of weeks, I have been immersing myself in books about Natural History and Science, areas which are typically weak spots for me. These are not books which Google, Amazon, etc. would recommend to me, I have had to intentionally seek them out. Ask yourself when was the last time that you looked offline for inspiration (not to just immediately share online), to meet someone, to learn about something?

We grow less and less patient for reality as it is, especially when it’s boring or uncomfortable. We come to expect more from the world, more rapidly. And because reality can’t live up to our expectations, it reinforces how often we want to turn to our screens. A self-reinforcing feedback loop. ... When you could have sex with the person of your dreams, or fly through jungles in the Amazon rainforest while looking over at your best friend flying next to you, who would want to stick with reality? - Tristan Harris, Tech Companies Design Your Life

We need to learn how to illuminate the wonder of the world right here and now. I feel a key to how we will do this is by venturing outside of our echo chambers and comfort zones, going deeper in our research of areas where in the past we may have only scraped the surface or where we may have become so rigid in our beliefs that we no longer allow for curiosity and questioning.

Since the late Renaissance, on through the Enlightenment and into the Industrial era, we have witnessed this tendency to segregate disciplines. Why do we continue with it? Why should someone who wants to pursue a career as a physicist suddenly stop learning about music and art in their mid-teens and focus only on mathematics and the sciences? Is it not the case that certain poets and novelists have disseminated the wonders of scientific discovery to a broader audience than a scientist alone could reach? - Richard Martin, The Neo-Generalist, Interview with Scenario Magazine

Let's not let our professions or specialization limit us from a broader perspective on the world. Because I think now more than ever is a time for the unveiling of a new generation of renaissance men and women, who are "outstandingly versatile, well-rounded".

Ps: Seattle Art Museum is having a Three-Day Free Day weekend January 20-22, 2017 it would be the perfect time to do a little offline exploring.

Photography By: Palm Maison

The Uncommon: Daniel Shapiro, Photographer

Photography By: Daniel Shapiro

Last week, in my blog Together Everything Is Possible about the photo shoot and collaboration which took place at The RUINS I utilized images from Yunkin Keophomma. This week, I am sharing the images by photographer Daniel Shapiro. I love how you can have two talented photographers with utterly unique perspectives at one shoot.

Photography By: Daniel Shapiro

Daniel's shots remind me of the scenes in Pride and Prejudice where a beautiful house is being prepared to receive the people after their long stay elsewhere. It makes me think of the fact that many beautiful restaurants and institutions in the city do need to shake off a little bit of their dust in order to welcome in the new generation which has in recent years populated Seattle and begun to make the city their own.

Photography By: Daniel Shapiro

How will our city evolve and yet maintain what makes it so unique yet rid itself of its passive aggressive, slightly cold reputation? This poses a unique opportunity for the individuals who are helping these institutions to evolve and embrace a future that in many ways is already permeating the city. Daniel's photos showcase a new generation of sophistication and beauty which eagerly waits to be unveiled -- if only we will open our eyes to wonder hidden within the individuals who make up the fabric of this city.

Photography By: Daniel Shapiro       

Photography By: Daniel Shapiro

Keep an eye on the talented individuals raising the bar of sophistication in the city:

• Collaboration Producer: @uncommoncartography
• Photos: @danieljshapiro @yunkinkeophomma
• Behind The Scenes Photos: @greenteleaf
• Venue: @the_ruins
• Gowns: @belltown_bride @pmndesigner   , Justin Zachary Couture
• Event Design/Floral: @kalebnormanjames
• Makeup: @j0rdanr0ss @melissakornmakeupartist
• Hair: @makahmatt 
• Wardrobe Stylist: @julietandlou
• Jewelry: @shannonkoszyk / @namikoabloom 
• Food/Dessert: @the_ruins
• Champagne/Wine: @gruetwinery
• Stationery Suite: @greyandcake
• Models: @annavina10 @noellejohnsun @diana_jean_o @imsuzijane @rodasfeker, @_myfriendhanna