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Handmade Holiday: Brewing Beer

Amaze your friends and brew your ownFeatured Store: Home Sweet Homebrew 2008 Sansom St.
Philadelphia's first brewery was erected in 1683, and by 1793, Philadelphia was producing more beer than all the other seaports in the country. That tradition lives on today in our award-winning local breweries and a growing number of enterprising homebrewers doing it

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1 min read
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Profile: Folk Fight

Philadelphia’s Joshua Marcus—and his banjo—campaign for environmental justiceby Lee Stabert
They say use what you got. For Philadelphia’s Joshua Marcus, that happens to be a banjo and a connection to the socially-conscious folk music of another era. Armed with those tools, he has completed This Land, a collection of seven songs and oral histories recounting the

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2 mins read
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Profile: A Man for All Seasons

Marvin Dixon takes lessons learned on a farm to the luxury hotel businessby Char Vandermeer
If the typical luxury hotel is a gaping hole of conspicuous consumption, then Philadelphia’s Four Seasons Hotel is anything but. With its hugely successful composting program, a commitment to reusing cooking oil, an aggressive commingled recycling program and a brand-new cogeneration

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Jobs: A Matter of Degrees

The old Frankford Arsenal is now home to solar panel installation trainingby Tim McCullough
A warehouse sits along the banks of Old Frankford Creek, in the Bridesburg section of Northeast Philadelphia. For a century and a half it was part of the Frankford Arsenal, manufacturing ammunition and weapons parts for the military. Opened in 1816, the

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4 mins read
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Recycling Challenge: Your Holiday

What to do with your trees, lights and wrapping paperWhen I was young, my family had a semi-official competition for the prize-winning bow each year at Christmas. The contenders would tirelessly toil away on their masterpieces, and the winner would be appropriately admired, photographed and stored away until the next year, when it would be

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4 mins read
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Energy: Season of Lights

Boathouse Row’s signature style goes green…red and goldby Lee Stabert
The lights of boathouse row are iconic Philadelphia—they get top postcard billing alongside the Liberty Bell and the Art Museum steps. So, you can imagine the fuss a few years ago when they decided to change them, replacing every bulb with an energy-efficient, long-lasting LED.

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New Business: Honest Tom’s Taco Shop

A young restaurateur provides a moveable feast
The latest trend in Philadelphia’s food scene doesn’t involve fancy menus, ambience or flashy table service. It’s all about inventive, concise options, convenience and parking—though not for the customers. Food trucks are taking the city by storm, and we’re not talking about your average hot dog cart.

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1 min read
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News: Harvest Time

With help from a USDA grant, PHS Launches the Community Grower’s Allianceby Lee Stabert
The Pennsylvania Horticultural Society has been awarded a $300,000 grant from the USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture. Over the three-year lifespan of the grant, PHS will use the money to expand City Harvest, its expansive urban food growing program, through

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From the Editor: A Hands-On Holiday

When I was a kid, the holiday season was all about the gifts. I remember them well: baseball gloves, bikes, electronic games. As the publisher of Grid, I wish I could tell you that all of that stuff didn’t make me happy—but that would be a big fat lie. Each year, my favorite gift and

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