Lula Celebrates 15 Years By Selling Staff Artwork
As much as I love eating at Lula Cafe, one of the reasons things never get old there is the restaurant’s commitment to showing the rotating works of local artists. Owners Jason Hammel and Amalea Tschilds began their careers as artists, and while they may have morphed their job descriptions into cooks, they still have tons of friends in the artistic community always looking for new ways to sell their work. To celebrate the restaurant’s 15th anniversary, they’ve just launched www.ShopLulaCafe.com, an eclectic website showcasing and selling the creative works of the café’s notoriously colorful staff, both past and present. Through the site, the restaurant will provide a platform for the young painters, designers, poets, and musicians at the outset of their careers.
Lula’s walls have always hosted some of Chicago’s most exciting art by men and women disguised as cooks and servers, hostesses and bartenders. Boasting several different “Shops,” from clothing to accessories and music to periodicals, shoppers on the website will learn a bit about the background on each artist involved. On Tuesday, December 16th from 7 to 10 pm, the restaurant will celebrate the website launch with a bazaar-inspired event, showcasing featured website artists, including: Ogechi Anyanwu, Sarah Shikama and Kendal Kost, as well as brick-and-mortar shops in the neighborhood such as Eskell, Fleur, and Tusk.
To see some photos of some of the artists and their work, just click here.
