Montclair Historical District and Bloomfield Avenue Improvement

Wellmont Theatre, Bloomfield Avenue
circa 1922

For those who may be curious about the Historical Districts in Montclair, the best way to know if you happen to be in one is to look for the brown street signs.

One major historical district runs along the Bloomfield Avenue Corridor, however, there is no official map linked to the Historical Preservation Commission designation report. I asked the HPC for a map and/or parameters for the district about two weeks ago but haven't had a response to date.

I wish I could say more about the Montclair Historical Society, but I've been trying to reach them for two years (this is true). I initially reached out to them in order to secure an internship during graduate school and proceeded to do so on five occasions but they never responded, which would have been a professional courtesy, even if they weren't looking for free help. They also do not have an email address on their website. I then tried to reach out to the society for different reasons correlating with my studies and projects I worked on, but was again unsuccessful.

In light of these issues, I still feel that knowing about the history of Montclair is important and will add information to this site that will help improve the Bloomfield Avenue Corridor by using Historical Preservation as a subtext to the overall improvement.

Link: Montclair Historical Preservation Commission

Link: Design Guidelines for Montclair Town Center Historic District

Planters made from reclaimed wood by Local artisan

In my ongoing attempt to reinvent the Bloomfield Corridor creatively through art and plants, I just cam across  a local woodworker who is making amazing wood planters from reclaimed wood.

This is a perfect example of Sustainability that can be infused into a community at a reasonable price and produced from a local artisan.

He lives in Clifton and I hope business owners and residents along the Bloomfield Corridor will consider buying at least one planter to help improve our community through agricultural creativity!

Please contact Robin at: borisbuckets@gmail.com

Size: 27" long / 13" wide / 12" high 
Unstained, reclaimed pine
$50

Round wooden planters made from natural pine 1.5"thick 
Unstained / 5 different sizes: 
10 high 15 diameter $ 18 
12 high 16 diameter $ 20 
15 high 20 diameter $ 25 
18 high 24 diameter $ 35 
20 high 28 diameter $ 45 

Montclair Business Owners: Changing Window Displays and Adding Plants helps!!

I have a plea to business owners along the Bloomfield Corridor to improve business immediately.

Changing your window displays on a more frequent basis, adding color and adding low interior lighting in the evening will improve your business!

Stale window displays mean your business will be overlooked by customers who have seen the same thing for along period of time, even if you're inventory has changed inside. While we struggle to get through the economic downturn, I am offering ideas that will have little cost to each business owner.

Suggestions:
1) Change window displays at least once a month, even if you rearrange what you already have (cost $0)

2) ADD COLOR to your windows! Its spring time and people love to see color (cost $0)

3) Add flowing fabric backgrounds, especially in corners, to add a feeling of a filled window. Its a psychological metaphor for having a "full shop". (cost $100 max, depending on qualify of fabric and amount)

4) If you can't afford adding fabric, try colored tissue paper to use as a base to place your products on. (cost $5)

5) Add a planter with hardy and colorful plants. Cheap plastic planters are not suggested. Spend the extra money to buy something that will look classy and last for several years. Ceramic, cedar and metal planters are highly suggested. Your business represents the Bloomfield Corridor collectively - upgrade your planters to upgrade your business. (Cost $200 -500, including planter box and plants)

Overfilling a planter looks terrific: adding both plants the hang downward and grow upward in the same planter add visual excitement.

If you happen to add fragrant flowers, your business will do better. Sense of smell is the most powerful memory humans have. People will always remember that walking into your store "smelled good". Try adding Lavender plants, hyacinths, jasmine, mint, Sage, gardenias, etc.)

Check out this website for some great ideas: The Helpful Gardener

Ideally, adding a bench with planters on either side of the bench will dramatically help your business, and will invite people to stay longer.

6) Statically, businesses on the North side of any street will automatically do better than businesses on the south side of the street. The reason is because the sun shines on them longer throughout the day, making them more visible.

For instance, Hip Chic (at the corner of Park and Bloomfield) is on the North Side of the Street. Dunkin Donuts is on the South Side of the street

Consider this before you select plants for your planter. If you are on the south side, select plants that will do well with little sunlight. If your business is on the North, select hardy plants that can withstand long periods of sunlight.

7) Add low interior lighting at night so people can see what your store offers after they're done eating dinner at a local restaurant. The best example of this is Creative Endeavors, at 575 Bloomfield Avenue. 

8) Visual aesthetics are proven to calm traffic, which means people driving by will spend more time seeing your business. It also improves safety along Bloomfield Avenue.

Let make Bloomfield Avenue BLOOM this spring!

Medical Marijuana Germinates in Montclair

After lawmakers passed medical marijuana last year, little mention of it was heard until this week when the approved labs were announced. Out of 35 applications submitted, 6 were approved and one of them happens to be in Montclair.

For people who may believe its not a good idea to legalize medical marijuana, consider the pills everyone is taking these days. This blog entry is not for or against drugs - its merely pointing out the societal implications of pharmaceutical medications.

We have kids on pills because they're acting like kids or can't focus in school. Neither could I when I was a kid because I was to busy thinking about all of the fun stuff I could be doing with my friends. But I went on to graduate with honors from NYU and now have a Masters Degree, both of which I struggled through drug-free and distracted by life in general. We didn't have pills for kids when I was growing up and we shouldn't have them now. We had detention, getting grounded and having other privileges cut off in order to behave. Maybe if you can't control your children, your children need new parents who can handle the job.

Moms are too stressed out from being Moms, so they have pills. Driving in Montclair between the hours of 2-5 pm has become dangerous because most of the people driving their minivans are high on pharmaceuticals. Before you get upset about this comment, remember that the Rolling Stones were aware of this long ago when the penned the lyrics to "Mothers Little Helper" in 1966

"What a drag is is getting older

Things are different today

I hear ev'ry mother say
Mother needs something today to calm her down

And though she's not really ill, there's a little yellow pill
She goes running for the shelter of a mother's little helper

And it helps her on her way, gets her through her busy day"

College students are conjuring up medical reasons for doctors in order to get Adderoll, a combination of  dextroamphetamine and amphetatime, or buying it on the street  (referencing the recent drug bust at Columbia University) so they can stay up all night to get work done the day before its due. In the 1980's we called it cocaine and black mollies, but the pharmaceutical industry made it legal when they turned it into a pill and said it would help people with ADHD.

Red Bull? That's just liquid cocaine. I had less than half of a can and thought I was going to be rushed to the hospital because I was so high and my heart was beating so rapidly to the point that it began to hurt. Kids should not be drinking this. However, someone approved it, and combined with obsessions for coffee, prescribed pills to calm people down are being chewed on like tic-tacs to offset amped up consumers stuck in a schizophrenic pattern of highs and lows.

Adults are being prescribed pain killers for back pain, when basic massage therapy and cannabis would be a much healthier combination and would alleviate addiction and toxicity. This is the thesis of this entry: Holistic health leads to a better community. Montclair has long been recognized as a community that embraces holistic health through massage therapy, yoga, acupuncture, meditation workshops, parks, public programming and eastern philosophies that permeate some of the subcultures within our township.

California embraced the idea long ago and still remains a state with a positive reputation, a relaxed environment and a state that many people from the east coast travel to for vacations.

If you would like to know more about the 15 states who have realized pot is important from a holistic medicinal perspective, check out this link with all the details you need to know. Medical Marijuana details