This light-tasting spiked tea is a perfect mate for taking it slow. Sip on it in the afternoon haze and let the glass sweat through golden hour.
Arts + Culture
How A. Hays Town continues to shape Lafayette’s vision of home
This ideal of a family home is at the core of Town’s designs, whether it was a vision he gave us or something he tapped into that was there all along.
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5 min read
Complicated Cocktails: Cantaloupe Calypso
A spin on the drive-thru favorite that you can blend up in the comfort of your own kitchen, without the chemical junk. Grab a summer cantaloupe and let your Vitamix fly.
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1 min read
Red, White and Blue Sangria
Cool your jets, yankee doodle dandies, with this American take on the classic Spanish refreshment. Serve over ice and free yourself from the oppressive Louisiana heat.
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1 min read
Sawbriar Brewery and craft beer’s next wave
More and more brewers are choosing to take the microbrewery route, avoiding the pricey startup costs and permitting minefields that plague conventional production breweries. Starting this fall, Sawbriar Brewery will bring the microbrewery concept to Lafayette. The focus is craft, not production.
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5 min read
A loving documentary memorializes makeup artist Kevyn Aucoin
A Louisiana-born makeup guru, Kevyn Aucoin worked with pop celebrities such as Cher, Cindy Crawford, Christy Turlington and Sharon Stone. A new documentary film celebrates the Lafayette legend.
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3 min read
Complicated Cocktails Friday: The Golden Fig
What good is fig season when you don’t like figs? This cool and fruity vodka sipper makes summer figs something everyone can look forward to.
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1 min read
Complicated Cocktails Friday: The Kaleidoscope
The secret to an electric colored cocktail without the curaçao? Butterfly pea tea. A complicated cocktail from Porch, Wine & Gravy.
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1 min read
Tax incentives, CREATE lure three film companies to Lafayette
Film industry workers have been settling into Lafayette recently, lured largely by state tax incentives, city assistance and the rich cultural and artistic milieu of Lafayette.
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6 min read
Cast Iron Chef: Jolie Meaux
Jolie Meaux of the Cajun food blog Porch, Wine & Gravy has proven she can take the heat — and she’ll never get out of the kitchen.
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10 min read
The low down on summer wine tastings
Summer wine tastings serve up a great opportunity to get acquainted with the fruit of the vine in friendly atmospheres.
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3 min read
And just like that, the moratorium lifts: Artmosphere is now a bar
▸ The gist: It’s been a long and strange journey, but Artmosphere’s regulatory limbo is now over. The council voted to allow the popular Downtown venue to operate as a bar rather than a restaurant.
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1 min read
▸ Some background: Artmosphere, in a sense, is the poster child for Downtown’s tribulations associated with a 15-year-old moratorium on new bars in the district. The venue has operated for years on a restaurant’s liquor license, running afoul of regulations that require a restaurant’s food to make up more than 50 percent of its sales. Recently, Downtown officials and advocates have lobbied for an end to the moratorium, which they say created a monopoly for existing bars and grossly distorted the real estate market.
▸ “Have we now lifted the moratorium on bars Downtown?” Councilman William Theriot asked Mayor Joel Robideaux from across the council’s crescent desk. “Certainly, I would say the moratorium was lifted at a previous council meeting,” the mayor replied, indicating the official end of the practice was the creation of the conditional use permit itself.
▸ Can you spell C-U-P? In his interrogative with the mayor, Theriot referred to the new permit class as a “cup,” as in something you drink out of. Opening a new bar Downtown? Now you need to go to the city and get a cup.
▸ What to watch for: Yes, this is the visible end of the moratorium, but it’s hardly an opening of the flood gates. Artmosphere’s case continues to illustrate the effort required to crack the still-standing limitations on new bar licenses Downtown. Councilman Pat Lewis, who in May voted against putting the permit up for a final vote, amended the permit to stipulate that, among other things, Artmosphere must serve food when operating and must operate five days a week.
“I congratulate her for being persistent. She was very persistent,” Lewis said at the meeting. “You can ask the owner. I made it very difficult for her. It’s not just a rubber stamp.”