Archives: Media Room

Celebrating the Boston area’s abundance of Irish, Scottish, Cape Breton and other Celtic-related music and dance traditions, BCMFest (Boston’s Celtic Music Fest) begins its second decade on January 10 and 11, 2014. A program of Passim, the Eleventh Annual BCMFest will bring together dozens of the best local musicians, singers and dancers to three locations for dozens of performances as well as participatory music and dance events right in the heart of Harvard Square.

January/February 2014
For the last days of June we’re going to share our favorite stories and pictures from Scout’s decade of local reporting. We need you to share those stories alongside your favorites. And then we need you to stand for Scout by becoming a member. Here’s one from January 2014! Every neighborhood worth its zip code has at least one place that feels eternal—the mom-and-pop drugstore that seems to get its stock straight from the ‘50s; the barbershop that’s on its ninth or tenth presidential administration; the corner pub where the only things that seem to change are the taps. These quintessential local fixtures are equal parts convenient directional landmark and vital component of communal history—the kinds of places that were around long before you got there, and will probably be still selling lozenges, buzzing cuts and tending bar long after you’re gone.

On a typical summer day in Cambridge, a steady stream of guided tour groups will pass by Harvard’s architecturally unusual Science Center building.  The stories these tourists are told are not always the same. Some guides say the structure is modeled after a Polaroid camera, while others insist that the architecture represents a stairway to heaven.

Harvard Square is gearing up to usher in the holiday season with a unique take on the Black Friday tradition. The Harvard Square Business Association is planning to use the days following Thanksgiving to promote local businesses and authors, as well as to benefit charitable causes.

After being roped off for over two years, the weathered statue Omphalos in the pedestrian peninsula by the Harvard Square T stop will be relocated to Rockport, Mass. The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, which owns the statue created by the late Harvard professor Dimitri Hadzi in the 1980s, had originally planned to tear it down due to structural damage and the high cost of repairs.

Cold temperatures and strong winds failed to deter visitors to Harvard Square from attending the third annual National Food Day celebration in Brattle Plaza. The event is held each year to promote sustainability practices in the food industry and the community and includes free tastings from restaurants in the Square.

After more than three decades serving the Cambridge community and visitors with its famously flamboyant flair, UpStairs on the Square is set to close its doors on Dec. 31, co-founders and co-owners Mary-Catherine Deibel and Deborah Hughes announced in an email to subscribers over the weekend.  In an interview with The Crimson Monday, Deibel and Hughes elaborated that the building was up for sale by the landlord. Deibel said that the sale of the building presented a logical time to end the long-running business, and she and Hughes decided not to sell it.

As much as every Harvard student loves the dining services, sometimes it’s nice—okay, necessary—to venture beyond the cafeterias and enjoy Cambridge’s culinary offerings. I certainly need breaks from my Annenberg meals and am always eager to go into the Square for food. Here are some of my recommendations and favorite spots for quick meals beyond HUDS:

Roughly 9,000 rowers will pour into Cambridge this weekend to compete in the 49th annual Head of the Charles Regatta. But the athletes will be far from the only visitors along the Charles this weekend, as upwards of 400,000 spectators are expected to be in attendance during the two-day event.  With so many individuals flocking to the river, the Regatta will require 1,400 volunteers alone, and the event has developed into an economic coup for the city of Cambridge.

An elderly Russian chess player who charges two dollars per game often sets up shop on the patio outside the Au Bon Pain in Harvard Square. A consistent crowd of tourists wanders in and out of the adjacent Holyoke Center, but this Mass. Ave. hotspot has recently developed a musical dimension: a public piano now graces the street corner, one of many pianos installed by Luke Jerram’s international “Play Me, I’m Yours” project. In celebration of the 75th anniversary of the Celebrity Series of Boston which features local performances by internationally recognized musicians, the project has installed 75 pianos on the streets of Boston from September 27 to October 14.