:: Spring 2008 Class Registration at Art League Houston :: Even if you've given up on all your New Years Resolutions by now, there's still time to make something of the year by taking a class. You can't go wrong with bettering your brain. The Art League, besides having a very cool building, gallery and coffee shop, also happens to offer classes. Try your hand (or brush up on) drawing, painting, jewelry, watercolor or......

Calling themselves "Houston’s most unusual string ensemble performing all original music," Two Star Symphony is aiming for another Houston national first starting November 30: to be the only string quartet performing with a matched set of instruments created by luthier Anton Krutz of K.C. Strings. The Russia-born Krutz, who began making violins when he was 12 years old, actually crafted the instruments from the same batch of wood and put them through the same varnishing......

Houstonist noticed about a month ago that something was missing near the corner of Bissonnet and Mt. Vernon streets, just west of Montrose Blvd. The house didn't seem to fit in, but it sure caught our eye - unfortunately it was recently demolished by the current owners. The house was located at 1 Waverly Court and was designed by Glassman Shoemake Maldonado Architects and built in 1999 to replace a beaten-up 1950s contemporary home by......

Spent all your cash on girlie drinks and shattered dreams again this weekend, didn't you? No worries - Thriftster gives you the lowdown on cheap stuff to do until Paycheck Friday. Monday: Hit the East end tonight for coffee and Dia de Los Muertos art-perusing at Bohemeos (708 Telephone Rd). They've got free wifi so you can catch up with all your weekend MySpace alerts over a kick-your-face-in cup of Guatemalan coffee or a cold......

So maybe you’re the kind of person who has Adidas wet dreams and buys $500 pristine condish sneakers to put on display. We are so down with that, although admittedly slightly ashamed of the scuffed up All Stars currently ‘showcased’ on our feet. Club Fame (4704 Montrose Blvd.) is hosting the semi-annual H-Town Sneaker Summit to cater to sneaker snobs of all sizes and styles. Join the shoe head crowd to buy, trade, sell and......

While running along Montrose Ave this morning, discovering the sidewalks (and subsequent ankle-twisting cracks) of a neighborhood we have often admired, but of recent become a resident, we got an upclose look at many of the establishment we have visited many a time, yet on foot were allowed to explore a bit more. In the effort of being visionaries, we've decided to name this strip of road SoMo (or South Montrose, for you slow pokes.)......

As part of the The Jung Center's summer movie series, Three Conversations on Film, tonight features the 2nd film in the series with a following lecture by Diana Heritage. Last week featured the smash hit (are films smash hits?), Little Mis Sunshine, with lecture led by Gretchen Heyer, MDiv, LPC, Jungian analyst. TONIGHT'S FEATURE: Pan's Labyrinth: The Creative Resilience of the Psyche Lecture by Diana Heritage, LCSW, Jungian analyst The human psyche responds to trauma......

Interested in getting in touch with your most animal nature? This will probably be the healthiest avenue to do so: Tuesday evening, the Jung Center of Houston kicks off its Student/Member Lecture Series with a presentation entitled, Creature Comforts: Animals, Nature and Healing. If you've got nature on the brain after thinking about the Top 10ist topic of the week, then this may be the perfect satiating experience. According to the Jung website, "[a]nimal-assisted......

Oh, but it's good. Perspectives 156: Impulse! at the Contemporary Arts Museum has a note of urgency to it, a compelling one, and you may find yourself spending more time at the show than you expected. Excitation, the show's theme, is tapped into from so many different angles, making for a truly dynamic exhibition. Juried by Houston artist Francesca Fuchs, the show unites work from 26 area high school students. High school??! Gulp --......

Opening Reception: Surviving Katrina and Rita in Houston - Who We Are Art League Houston is pleased to announce the opening of its first micro exhibit, Surviving Katrina and Rita in Houston: Who We Are, an installation of photographs and stories featuring Houston-based evacuees and survivors of the hurricanes, with photographs by Alice McNamara, April 30 – June 15, 2007. Surviving Katrina and Rita in Houston: Who We Are is part of a much larger......

We heard. We went. We saw. We loved. Inversion Coffee House (1953 Montrose Blvd ), a relatively new installment to the Montrose art scene, is an independent, locally owned coffee joint. And we heart independent coffee joints. Located on the former site of the mind-boggling Inversion House created by artists Dan Havel and Dean Ruck, this java dwelling resides in the new home of the Art League of Houston. Art lovers and independent thinkers are......

Houstonist makes the “long” pilgrimage to the outer-outer loop on Bellaire for our Vietnamese fix, so a hot spot in Montrose would rock our world. At first glance, Hollywood Restaurant (2409 Montrose Blvd) may seem like a video store by the same name, but keep reading the sign and you’ll see that it’s a Vietnamese restaurant…and a Chinese restaurant…oh, and as an afterthought, it’s also a French restaurant. The florescent, multicolored neon sign gave the......

Today, Houstonist submits to you a Tex Mex thought experiment: What if you were to take a decent Tex Mex restaurant, say, Spanish Flower, dim the lights to 15% of their original brightness, spiffy up the wait staff, add a valet service, and stock the restaurant with pretty patrons? Here are but a few of the curious results: your otherwise humdrum Saltillo tile takes on the mysterious hue of an exotic Italian slate. Usually......

The 1929 Robinson Public Warehouse (Nimmons, Carr, and Wright, architects), at the corner of Allen Parkway and Montrose Blvd, is on its way to the building afterlife. It was originally a Sears, Roebuck, and Co. store, and was also the first (and temporary) home of Baylor College of Medicine in the mid to late forties. Demolition is about to begin, and we've been watching for the wrecking ball which is due to make an......

Houstonist is the first to admit that Houstonians are wimps when it comes to cold weather. You disagree? We present for your consideration the first day in the fall when the temperature drops below 70 and you see people walking around in parkas. When it gets below 60, we start covering exposed skin. Hey, better safe than sorry. So this week, the first legitimate cold snap we've had this year (shouldn't this have happened......