Woodworking techniques combined with the latest trends and custom graphics is what created the DIY Board & Brush Creative Studio concept. Now with a location in Ames, Board & Brush wants to turn you into a DIY master by educating you to understand and appreciate the beauty of raw materials—the wood, the knots, the color variations, and the simple imperfections that will make your project unique. If you’re not handy with a hammer, sand paper, or power tools, don’t worry. No experience is necessary to learn how to distress wood. Owner Amy Weber and her team will teach you all the skills required to make a personalized wood sign that you’ll be proud to hang in your house. The DIY wood sign workshops started as a “Girl’s Night Out” with wine and crafts concept that quickly evolved into a business idea. Make it girl’s night or family-fun night this winter at Board & Brush. Board & Brush is located at 3326 Lincoln Way Suite 102. www.BoardAndBrush.com/Ames
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Have you ever wanted to learn how to make French macarons, Vietnamese egg rolls, artisanal sourdough, or a delicious apple tart? Consider taking a class at The Recipe, a new culinary venue in Downtown Ames. The venue is owned and operated by Patrick and Mindy Bergstrom, proprietors of other Downtown Ames businesses such as Nook & Nest, Z.W. Mercantile, and Cooks’ Emporium, where they previously taught classes. Teaching cooking classes at Cooks’ dates back to 1981 with the original owner. In 2018, when the Bergstom’s took over, they continued the tradition and remodeled the business to accommodate. “One of the first things we did was figure out how to make the demo kitchen a little bigger,” said Patrick, noting that they immediately got requests for hands-on classes. By 2021, the classes had been regularly selling out and they explored the idea of a dedicated space. That idea turned into The Recipe that opened this fall. Their most popular classes include Pasta 101 and 201, knife skills, and food prep, but their course offerings are wide-ranging. They sprinkle in sushi classes, those on Mediterranean cuisine, shrimp curry, or a course specifically on kids snacks and dips. Both Mindy and Patrick come from entrepreneurial families, but their career background is in the corporate world. Mindy started working for a web design and advertising company when she was 19, and Patrick most recently worked as a technology executive. For Patrick, his love of cooking dates to childhood. When the opportunity to buy Cooks’ was available to them in 2017, they jumped at the chance and each year added another business to the mix. Patrick hosts the majority of classes at The Recipe but brings in other chefs for some of the specialty classes. “The response has been great so far,” said Patrick. “People get excited to learn new skills, and they want to eat healthier and more inexpensively. We’ve heard from several people that coming to one or two classes has changed the way they eat at home.” With the new space, The Recipe is able to entertain more private events and they are renting their space for retirement and graduation parties, or to cooks who need access to a fully licensed, commercial kitchen. More information and a full list of classes can be found at: www.TheRecipeAmes.com The Recipe is located at 412 Burnett in Downtown Ames After twelve years of considering proposals for a new hotel or the extensive remodeling of one of the old existing hotels, a group of Ames business leaders organized the Ames Improvement Company to carry out the community's desire to have a hotel that would meet not only immediate needs but the future needs of a growing city. The result was the Sheldon Munn, considered one of the finest hotels between Chicago and Denver. Built in 1915, the hotel featured three floors of guest rooms, a large ballroom, meeting rooms, barber shop, coffee shop, dining room, and beautiful lobby. Parley Sheldon, a banker and perennial mayor of Ames at the time, partnered with lumberyard owners H. L. and A. H. Munn, to construct the hotel. The new Sheldon-Munn hotel cost $150,000 and represented the “final word know to modern hotel building and equipping,” as writing in the June 6, 1916 edition of the Ames Tribune. The building included seventy-two guest rooms, a banquet hall, dining room, grill room, and the “most beautiful lobby of any hotel in the middle west” in order to entertain the guests in “ease and comfort.” It also touted “A telephone, hot and cold water, and two lights,” are to be found in every room. The fourth story featured a ballroom and a large dining room stretching the entire length of the first floor. The hotel immediately became a social center for both the town and the college and was an instant success, prompting an expansion to the west in 1926. The $85,000 addition, a close match to the original structure, was completed in February of 1927. Hotel occupancy doubled and there was room for more commercial space on the ground floor. Today, the Sheldon-Munn building has been renovated into apartments, offices, and businesses such as Noir bar, Life Distilled and Nook & Nest. It continues to be a vital part of downtown Ames and is owned and operated by OEI, Inc. |