My Creative Friends Pt. 1

For a while I’ve been wanting to do a periodic blog highlite on some creative friends of mine. I’m lucky enough to know a lot of talented people who are doing their own thing in one form or another that it would be a shame not to use this space to hype their stuff.

Josh Goldstein and Rachel Hefter are two very good friends of mine who live in NYC with their daughter Tally. Both of them hold part-time day jobs in addition to pampering Tally, but have persued a variety of personal projects that I think are great.

For a while, Josh was providing culinary bike tours of his neighborhood. Those interested would rent a bike and josh would take them for a tour of Brooklyn’s neighborhood dining establishments, focusing on ethnic niches and small mom and pop shops.

Both Rachel and Josh, with their friend Jon, started Shoytz. Shoytz is a Yiddish centric t-shirt company featuring Yiddish slogans and whatnot.

My personal favorite project of theirs is Josh’s Bodega Art. Josh has spent years taking pictures of various Bodegas (Mexican grocery stores) around the New York metropolitan area and creating high-contrast cropped squares mounted on wood. These pieces really take shape when a number (I suggest 3) of squares (or bars) are combined into a montage of colors and type. Even people from LA can appreciate the aesthetic and I’d love to get Josh to do a Los Angeles edition of our own breed of Hispanic signage.

I write this post without giving either Rachel or Josh the heads up or without fact checking the particulars, I'll leave it to Rachel and Josh to post any additions/revisions in the comments section.