Field Guide: The neighborhood library that feels like church

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Thank you to this week’s sponsor, Carrboro Film Fest: Showcasing new Southern films from diverse filmmakers across the South, Carrboro Film Fest provides a welcoming space to both celebrate and interrogate Southern culture. Join us January 24–26 for a dynamic lineup of features and shorts, narratives and documentaries, plus filmmaker Q&As and more!

Hi! Happy weekend.

Every time it snows in North Carolina, one infamous photo circulates: the 2014 Glenwood Avenue snowpocalypse photo—a chaotic visual that seems like it could be AI-generated. It’s not, though; real life always delivers the goods. Here’s a great look at the photo and the snowstorm that turned everything upside down.

Our first issue of the year dropped on Wednesday and there’s a lot to go through. Below: find a rundown of Raleigh’s THC drink options, a profile of prolific artist Gabriel Eng-Goetz, news about a new PBS North Carolina show, and more. 

Thanks so much for reading the INDY.

elsewhere in the culture section

This year, I’m planning to explore our local library systems in a 12-part INDY series. You can read my earnest introduction to that series and its first installation, a deep dive into the Stanford L. Warren Library in Durham’s Hayti neighborhood. The library, which reopened in December after a three-year closure, has a rich history as the first library in Durham accessible to Black residents. It’s a beautiful space representative of what a library can be for a community: after-school zone, community meetings locus, literary hub, symbol of resilience. 

We also ran a profile of Durham artist Gabriel Eng-Goetz, by Chase Pellegrini de Paur, that dovetails nicely: Eng-Goetz’s latest work is a rainbow-tiled installation in Stanford L. Warren that tells the story of the neighborhood: 

“The whole design is based on a Fitzgerald brick,” he explains. “The great-uncle of Pauli Murray had a brick factory that was super successful, and he’d imprint all these bricks with this bull’s-eye, concentric-circle design. We can still see a lot of these bricks around town telling the story of Black entrepreneurism back in the era of Black Wall Street in Durham.” 

The story continues: “The iconography serves as a mini-tour of Hayti and Durham history as he points out the different centerpieces of each rainbow “brick”: The logo of the Lincoln Community Health Center (“which Stanford L. Warren, who the library is named after, helped get off the ground”), the finial atop the steeple of the Hayti Heritage Center (“which is a Haitian voodoo symbol”), the letter X, for Malcolm X’s civil rights legacy.” 

Dry January crowd, listen up: Writer Elliott Harrell has the down-low on all the Raleigh spots (and there are many!) that are serving special THC drinks. No booze…..some buzz. 

I spoke to actress and UNC-Chapel Hill alumna Sharon Lawrence, who plays Washington Post publisher Katharine Graham in a new PlayMakers production. Graham was thrust into sudden leadership at the Post in 1963 and saw the paper through a seminal chapter in the paper’s history—Watergate and the Pentagon Papers. (Remember when the Washington Post had a backbone and stood up against political wrongdoing?). Read the interview here. 

Finally, a new PBS North Carolina show, Shaped by Sound (great name), premieres on February 6. The 13-episode series will introduce viewers to some of the state’s musical movers and shakers, including Alice Gerrard, Shirlette Ammons, Reuben Vincent, Fancy Gap, and Superchunk. Learn more here. 

out and about in the triangle

A few quick hits: Here’s a helpful Axios rundown of restaurants opening in 2025. Giorgios Bakatsias has opened his 20th restaurant, Naōs Hellenic Cuisine. It is located in Cary. Raleigh is getting a bar in the former Garland space — I’d have to see it first to know if I’d describe it as a dive bar, but it is called Le Dive. In Hillsborough, Chapelboro reports that a new bar is opening in the former Hot Tin Roof space. 

Raleigh’s House of Art was destroyed in a fire this week. A UNC graduate student discovered the “youngest transiting planet — one passing between its star and its observer — ever identified.” The annual Crook’s Corner Book Prize announced a winner. 

— Sarah Edwards —
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