Providence | The Creative Capital

As year two of the Buy Art Providence campaign hits the streets, when you make an art purchase - whether $5 or $500, a painting from a gallery or a pair of earrings from an artist’s studio – your gift is going to support the work of local talent, like those of painter-sculptor-tattooist, Angel Quiñonez.

On any given evening one might find the Steel Yard filled with grandly restored classic cars, or ablaze with the cascading sparks, music and craftsmanship-meets-showmanship of an after-dark iron pour. Other nights, the Yard is filled students hard at work during “open studios” or attending workshops on blacksmithing and bicycle repair.

Even the most ardent sun seeker can find reasons to celebrate this winter, especially if they have children. The holiday season is a family-friendly time, and there's an abundance of events and activities geared towards kids.

Spend an evening talking with Brian Chippendale and you’ll hear a lot of self-deprecating laughter, repeated invocations of the word “fun,” and quite a few conversational tangents (from a brief history of his studio space’s square footage to the comparative merits of the current Captain America and Green Lantern comic books). What you won’t hear is any horn-tooting over Chippendale’s place at the forefront of America’s artistic avant-garde.

Since horror is so much about the unknown, it’s fitting that Rhode Island’s greatest horror writer isn’t well known outside of genre circles. But Providence grew from its ocean-salted soil a horror titan. Providence was the home of Howard Phillips Lovecraft.

Since 1998, lovers of baseball and history in Providence have played baseball by the 1880s and 1890s rules and have revived the name of the historically successful Providence Grays.

Providence's professional and college teams have offered passionate competition for decades, but it's two other, more eccentric sports – kickball and roller derby - that are now captivating a wider audience.

EpiVax is a bioinformatics and vaccine design company dedicated to the development and implementation of computational immunology tools to benefit the biotechnology industry.

The Narrangansett Creamery backstory wends through Maine, New York, and most fittingly, Italy. But it really picks up speed in 2006, when Louella Hill, a local food advocate and cheesemaker, sensed that the time was right for Rhode Islanders to have a cheese they could call their own.

Providence is renowned for its great restaurants, and Restaurant Weeks is the perfect way to discover the city's culinary offerings. The annual event, expanded to two weeks due to popular demand, offers curious diners a chance to enjoy lunch and dinner at participating restaurants.

Imagine a party hosted by a DJ who has spent months developing a playlist designed to get people dancing, delight audiophiles, and bring strangers at the party together in celebration. Now imagine that the party lasts for seven days, the venue is the entire city of Providence, the music is live, and everyone is invited. That’s Sound Session.

Times are challenging right now, there’s no denying it. But that’s not stopping Providence from forging a new vision for the future — and if you have an idea for a startup, you’re invited along for the ride.