Tattered elegance: Sweet vintage shopping on $20 and a half-tank of gas

By Norene Smith

Published: 6/16/2010

Types: Culture, Shopping

Are you lucky enough to have a few finsters to spare, to blow on inexpensive "luxury" items for your place that'll actually help get your soul singin'? You know, like, something beautiful? Well, here's a day's worth of ace vintage shopping in the best stores that mostly stock objects from ...[MORE]

Pucker up: The best and latest affordable new pigment brighteners for stink bombs, couture fops, dreamers and beyond

By Norene Smith

Published: 3/17/2010

Types: Culture, Shopping

When I was a kid, I remember my mom taking me to a Wonka-ish shop that sold fake pill bottles filled with candy.  It wasn't the sugary contents that made me decide I had to have one. It was the packaging. After all, who could resist candy "pills" labeled super rich, beautiful and brainy? ...[MORE]

Kiss me: Painless pointers for the perfect power-pout

By Norene Smith

Published: 2/10/2010

Types: Arts, Fashion

If your Valentine's Day plans include romance and seduction, or just plain seduction, you want to get your lips in top condition. Here are a few products that promise to prime your pout.   Kiss Me Exfoliating Lip Scrub  Philosophy The beginning of a true lip-pampering ritual, this scrub moi...[MORE]

'I began writing in mystery': A few words with Philip Levine

By Norene Smith

Published: 11/25/2009

Types: Arts, Literature, Poetry

For Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and poet Philip Levine, the small details of everyday life have always been newsworthy. From the awkward stumble of coming of age in a blue-collar town to the dirt-under-your-fingernails reality of factory labor, he's paying attention to lackluster circumstances and...[MORE]

Gutsy art : Would you want to explain that you're a 'weirdo' who plays with sausage casings?

By Norene Smith

Published: 3/4/2009

Types: Arts, Visual arts

Cristin Richard's art studio takes up the entire living room and dining room in her Victorian home in Hubbard Farms on Detroit's southwest side. Life-size bras, panties, corsets, dresses and spiked pumps made of pig gut (or sausage casings) fill the space. They are the color of yellowed newspr...[MORE]

Eating from the skull of the fallen angel: Music, myth and the spiritual in the poetry of Kim Hunter

By Norene Smith

Published: 1/28/2009

Types: Arts, Literature, Poetry

Detroiter Kim Hunter's new collection of poems, edge of the time zone, is a winding road lined with imagery, political thought and courageous dreaming. That beautiful stretch of imagination parallels a real-life journey. As much as it represents his own growth as a poet and an advocate of poet...[MORE]