Sandra the do-it-yourselfer fixin' up the future Pink Flamenco. September 26, 2003 6:43pm
A little more than four years ago, my friend Sandra had this idea of setting up a sort of arts center at this house in Chevy Chase, Maryland. Artistic people would live there and be responsible for setting up arts-related events: house concerts, dance workshops, arts-themed parties, painting and photo exhibitions. I already had a comfortable place to live at the time and it never crossed my mind that I would eventually become one of the artists-in-residence. But as luck would have it, in the summer of 2005, I needed to find a new place to live just when Sandra was looking for a new tenant for the house, which at the time she called the Pink Flea. Being a flamenco dancer herself, she was thrilled with the idea of having one of the DC area's most well-known flamencos (that's ME!) living there, so she renamed it the Pink Flamenco.
As silly as the name sounds, it stuck. Mention Pink Flamenco to anyone who's been actively involved in the DC flamenco scene the past few years and they'll know exactly what you're talking about and can probably tell you about a number of funny stories from one of the many fun nights we've had there over the years.
This building used to be a dental office and in fact each of the rooms on the ground floor had a dental chair complete with all the drills and lights etc. I can remember having a Halloween party there in 2003, and my dancer friend, Tamara, came dressed as a sexy scientist...
She's a little messy but it's OK, she's still in medical school. October 31, 2003 10:57pm
So just for fun, we had her pretend to do some dental work on one of the party guests. The house in its messy state of being halfway remodeled was perfect for the Halloween haunted house look. I brought colored lights, strobes and a fog machine to complete the scary effect. We partied until 4:00am of course. Good times!
Miguelito and Ginette at the first dance rehearsal in what would later become the Pink Flamenco. November 13, 2003 6:41pm
A few weeks later, the house was starting to shape up and my dancer friend Ginette wanted to rehearse somewhere so I thought I'd we would go checkout the condition of the future Pink Flamenco studio. Although it was a bit messy, it had just about everything we needed: wood floor, mirrors and plenty of space to dance!
This place became our regular practice space since it was pretty much available whenever we needed it. A few years later though they started having yoga classes here (taught by another dancer friend of mine) and they decided to paint the floor and give it a more serene clean look. Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to dance on the studio floor cuz they didn't want us to mess up the beautiful paint job which I totally understand. But now we had no place to dance. Pffft! So one time, we had no other studios available and the only way they'd allow flamenco here was if the dancers took off their shoes and danced in their socks. Ugh.
The recently painted floor. July 16, 2005 3:27pm
A few months later, I moved in to the Pink Flamenco...
Door to my room via the dance studio. September 4, 2005 7:18pm
Here's an excerpt from a blog I wrote my second night there:
...I spent last night in my new place at the Pink Flamenco (a group house for artists near Bambule).
The place is furnished with a very eclectic mish-mash of mostly old furniture. I've rehearsed here a number of times with various dancers over the years--just never thought I'd actually be living here.
When it came to choosing a room, I selected the one by the dance studio. It's kind of like my dream home. Remember in Carlos Saura's Carmen? Where Antonio Gades walks out of his bedroom straight into his enormous studio, presses a remote control and the curtains slowly open letting in the morning sunlight...
OK, well it wasn't like that in reality. But it was still very cool having a dance studio next to my room!
My computer desk where I wrote blogs and updated my website for two years here at the Pink Flamenco. September 13, 2005 1:13am
Here's another blog entry I wrote after living there a few months...
Got up like an hour ago when I heard my housemates talking in the kitchen. (One of them came to my show last night at Cafe Bonaparte, yay!)
Life is good here in the Pink Flamenco House. I live with artistically-minded people: Russ does his painting and Ivana does her art curator stuff (whatever that entails). We respect each other's personal space and lifestyle and we're all quiet (when we want to be) and clean (without being neat freaks). One of my friends joked that we should be on one of those reality shows, but I don't think so. The show would be soooo boring cuz there's no drama here--at least not between us housemates.
Anywayz, during the two years I lived there, I celebrated the 10th anniversary of my website, hosted an acoustic rock night (see pic below) and had lots of flamenco parties, some planned, like the many sala rocieras and some spontaneous usually late at night with the cooperation of my very tolerant housemates who were late night owls anyway.
Sandra, Russ and Craig at acoustic rock night. January 21, 2006 11:28pm
One of many flamenco parties. April 29, 2006 12:39am
Life in the house was pretty awesome. Besides, Russ and I who were the long term residents there, it so happened we always had beautiful female housemates (not that we discriminated against guys) living upstairs who all happened to be dancers. First we had this girl from Bolivia named Ivana who was an art curator and a tango dancer. Then local flamenco dance student Emily moved in for a few months. Then Vicky, a serious mambo dancer lived here awhile. And our last housemate to move in was Bethany, a swing dancer who usually came to the flamenco parties and taught some of us the basic steps of swing.
Our dance studio was really put to good use. In addition to my regular rehearsals here with my favorite dancers there were dance classes too. Read this excerpt from a previous blog...
...but what was interesting was when I came home at 10:30pm (early for me). As I approached the Pink Flamenco I could barely make out through the blinds a couple dancing in the studio. Then it dawned upon me that a private Argentine tango lesson was in progress. There's a weekly class earlier in the evening but this was another tango instructor (who has worked with Shakira and Madonna!) who gives private lessons here occasionally. So instead of lugging my sound equipment through da studio and disrupting the lesson I went through the back and pulled all 100 pounds of music gear up the stairs one step at a time. Cue the sound effects: clunk, clunk, cluk, ow!, clunk. ow! :-)
I planted myself at the computer in the back and basically surfed the Net until the lesson was over. I was a little annoyed that I couldn't go to my room--actually I could have but that would've interrupted the lesson. I decided to pass the time browsing friendster and myspace for people interested in flamenco so I could add more friends to my profile. La de da de da.
Anyhoo, little by little I was seduced by the sound of tango music. It was playing on a tiny boombox with low-quality speakers that actually enhanced the tango experience. I could hear the crackle and pop that's typical of vinyl records giving the recording a nostalgic kind of feeling.
Although this was a private lesson, I was surprised to hear very little teaching going on. Must've been an advanced student cuz I imagine he had the basics down cold and was just focusing on subtle style improvements as the teacher made non-verbal corrections. No foot stomping of course, but I could hear the creak of the floor as they tango'd around the studio.
Occasionally the teacher would mutter some instruction but I didn't try to listen. It was followed immediately by some laughter. They were having a good time. Nice. I love living here. There's always something artistic going on...from my mambo dancer roommate upstairs practicing to my artist roommate working on his latest painting.
Practicin' at the Pink Flamenco. May 3, 2006 12:45pm
Usually during the day, I had the place all to myself while my housemates who were either college students with classes to go to or had day jobs to fund their artistic pursuits.
Fast forward to the summer of 2007. My brother and his wife who were living in our family-owned condo in Rosslyn, moved out and so I took advantage of the opportunity to move in.
Shortly after that, Russ bought himself a condo near Dupont Circle. And Bethany became the head of the Pink Flamenco household. Another girl, that I never got to meet, moved in to Russ' old room. My room remained vacant since I moved out.
In December, building inspectors representing Montgomery County condemned the Pink Flamenco as uninhabitable and Bethany and the new girl had 24 hours to move out or else.
Here's Bethany's account originally published in her MySpace blog and republished here with her permission:
I find myself in a new and interesting predicament: homeless, and in the middle of winter. As of yesterday, my house was declared condemned and I was given 24 hours to get out, or else. The strong-willed side of me chooses the "else" option, knowing my living arrangement is actually very clean and comfortable and this is mostly a game of politics. But, the realistic side of me knows I need to find some storage space and a new living arrangement pronto. Then theres the gray in-between time, where I will most likely try to get away with staying at my condemned house regardless of the notice. Afterall, as I was told, the people who condemned it dont actually have jurisdiction over the interior of a technically commercially licensed building. The problem, however, is that if I make these guys mad, they can easily call the fire marshall and have me forcibly removed. I figure that might take a little time, though, which might buy me a little time, which might be all I need. It is, afterall, the weekend, a prime time to house-hunt.
I've been offered couches and floors around the MD/VA area, but not really by anyone who I feel wouldnt be wholly inconvenienced by my presence, or they are just too far away. I cant even begin to express my feelings on the situation just yet. Yesterday was a lot of crying, today will be a lot of foot work. And then I have to be at work tonight with a fake smile to give seats to uppity people, some of whom have never experienced a single hardship in their lives save that the wrong toppings were placed on their pizza. It will not be easy to hold it together and keep my compsure if anyone even so much as complains about something petty. I might just tell them to stuff it.
I dont really know why this stuff keeps happening to me, but Ive had just about enough of this victim crap. I think maybe its time to bag all of this and move on to something else. I dont really even know how to do that, though. Maybe I dont need to know...
It's official: the Pink Flamenco has been condemned! January 5, 2008 5:30pm
There's nobody living in the Pink Flamenco now. And since we're not legally allowed to enter the house, we can't even host any more parties there. Had lots of good times (many of which are documented here in numerous blog entries over the years, thank you very much!), so the Pink Flamenco will still live on in our hearts and minds. It wasn't fancy or luxurious, but it was comfortable and it had lots of character, not to mention the fact that we had our own very convenient private parking lot--a definite plus for when we have parties and dance classes! More importantly, we had nothing but the coolest artistic housemates living there and fun and interesting friends partying with us all the time. But we know that all good things come to an end sooner or later. So please join me in saying it: "Goodbye Pink Flamenco!"
Read some of the comments in the MySpace version of this blog. Feel free to leave comments of your own memories of the Pink Flamenco in the comment form below.
Tamara Sol informs me that the Tuesday night flamenco show is back again at Red Maple in Baltimore.
