January 2021

At-home work hit new highs in 2020 with many businesses reporting more than 50 percent of their employees telecommuting during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Even before that, the work-from-home movement had been slowly growing. The trend rapidly accelerated with lockdown orders in effect and nonessential workers encouraged to stay away. Now, some…

It’s a clear, November morning, a perfect day for admiring the view of the salt marsh from the fifth-grade classroom on Wrightsville Beach Elementary School’s new second floor. The $7 million renovation of the school’s original building and the addition of a second story, completed last summer, was the final project authorized by the 2014…

Standing in front of a Dorothy Gillespie piece brings to mind a wide variety of experiences, such as pulling the blade of a pair of scissors against a ribbon to create a loop, which magically seems to form the tendrils of a perfect bow. Or of rain parading down a steep brick wall, watching the…

Let’s face it: Wrightsville Beach has it pretty easy when it comes to winter. But when a nor’easter blows in 40-degree temperatures, the salty humidity can make it feel like we are aboard a fishing boat off the coast of Alaska. For those bone-chilling days — and the one actual snow day that occurs here…

The road trip is as American as apple pie, blue jeans and cheeseburgers. And with concerns about the pandemic still making air travel a risky proposition for many people, it is more important than ever. But who wants to spend all their free time in the car? Sure, some will say that it is more…

When I was a young man many, many years ago, my parents gave me a button that said “Don’t bother me, I’m watching baseball, basketball, football, boxing, hockey …” It was true. Back in the day I was a huge sports fan. When I was a teenager, I could name the starting lineup for just…

In Memory: Jeremy Poston Owens. August 11, 1978 – November 16, 2020 At the stroke of midnight each New Year’s Eve, lights flash, a shiny ball drops and horns blare, signifying a change — but nothing is really different except the time. For the world to change, it takes more than turning a calendar page.…

Floral artists will be drawing inspiration from paintings and other art objects, such as a wildly decorated Mardi Gras vase, for the fourth Art & The Bloom exhibition scheduled to take place at the Blockade Runner Beach Resort Jan. 7-10. The exhibition is a major fundraiser for the New Hanover Garden Club. The 30 or…

The hurricane of 2018 turned out to be one of those for us at Wrightsville Beach Magazine. We as a team launched our hurricane plan, which had each team member working remotely. Due to the lingering storm, we had a sustained power and internet outage in our office suite. When the storm passed and recovery…