Organizers Steve Strongman and Tim Potocic hope to make this an annual event. Hamilton is a music-loving community, brimming with talented musicians and avid fans. The weekend of May 26 saw the birth of a monumental new music extravaganza – the first-ever Smokestack Festival. It was a weekend of…

Opponents of a 45-storey tower on the Hamilton waterfront say it’s too tall. The fact is, it’s not tall enough, argues architect Bill Curran. The Hancock Tower in Chicago was the world’s first high-rise home built in 1969, with 700 apartments stretching up 100 floors. It remains a…

Andrew F. Sullivan’s near-future horror story The Marigold tells of a city haunted by the dead. The Marigold is the story of a city eating itself.  Set in Toronto in the not-so-distant future, a sentient fungal mould, known as the Wet, has infiltrated the city’s infrastructure. Most cases…

After a three-year pandemic pause, one of Ontario's largest Canada Day celebrations makes its return to Gage Park. Returning to Gage Park after a three-year absence is the venerable It’s Your Festival. Presented by the Hamilton Folk Arts Heritage Council, the three-day event held over the Canada Day…

Textile artist Amanda Rataj is intrigued by the enduring quality of fabric, combined with how it inevitably changes over time. Amanda Rataj brings a thoughtful spirit and a keen eye for light and shadow to a self-taught weaving practice that she has now been pursuing for over a…

Ryan McGreal wants to know what, exactly, Metrolinx has been up to for the past two years. On May 13, 2021, the federal and Ontario governments jointly announced a $3.4-billion funding commitment to build and operate a new light rail transit (LRT) system in Hamilton. This milestone was…

Hamilton entrepreneurs create online platform for moms of all kinds to forge friendships, support networks and community. It takes a village to raise a child, the old adage goes, but where does one find a village these days? That’s where Mamaraderie (rhymes with camaraderie)…

Hamilton-based housing provider Indwell has grown from operating a single group home on Locke Street to building affordable housing across southern Ontario. It’s not often that people cheer the destruction of a local landmark. And yet, when workers began ripping apart the windowless – and derelict – Ottawa…