Taking The Power Back
Reclaiming Your City from Berlin, Mexico to Paris and Amsterdam, Merch and Cocktails!
Morning Comrades!
A little housekeeping and preparation to start off with. If you are not interested in the Merch Department, skip this part, the usual content is continued below.
As mentioned earlier in the week I have been playing with the idea of doing a mutual aid drop for my birthday on Monday, and yes, that is happening. The merch department is not ending its break but I figured I should try and do something for people less fortunate than I am to celebrate another round around the sun. Thanks to everyone that got in touch regarding what I should do - and yo!? Riot, again?? I mean by a vast majority, easily 50 of you asked for a return of that retired design. Fine, but, of course there has to be a but, there were other suggestions that I hadn’t thought about for some time, so in addition to bringing the riot design back, I want your input on the below as well. I will also run a poll of this over in our telegram channel and IG, but please do feel free to get involved here as well.
Speaking of drops, everything outstanding has been shipped, I just haven’t gotten around to clicking the “shipped” button in the online store, I will get to that, thank you for your patience in that regard. It’s been a bit of a logistical nightmare lately. Also, on request from Branca Studio, we have re-opened the charity shirt for the Ukrainian Refugee Help that you can still pick up below.
The Future Is The City
By 2050 the world’s population is expected to reach 9.8 billion. Nearly 70 percent of this booming population—6.7 billion people— is projected to live in urban areas, so it comes to no surprise that huge amounts of resources are being put into not only facing that reality, and a reality it will be, but also how to profit from this. Initially, I had planned to write about what the future of a city could look like, indulge in a little utopianism myself but two discoveries got in the way of writing some epic science fiction today. Whilst researching this, the total majority of work I found being done in regards to the development of our future is being doing by massive companies like McKinsey and co - it’s staggering how much money and effort they clearly have invested in “dreaming” up our collective futures. I know it shouldn’t be, these companies are the ones profiting from the reality that “space” is a commodity and they are clearly solidifying that and their control over this. Which is criminal if you ask me and secondly, hardly and of the research I found dealt with the human element in these potential futures. I found that interesting only because it is exactly these humans that make cities, not the infrastructure that allows humans to be “in” cities. Obviously, there is research on this but it is hard to find and relatively obscure to be honest but it had me thinking on this segment today. If we want to talk about the future of the city, why not look at the people that organize against the total commodification of cities, as well as actions being taken that are predominately pro-human and not pro-capital. I do think that before we can dream up alternatives to the sci-fi dystopias from McKinsey, Elon Musk and co - we need to learn how to re-take the humanity out of these capital accumulating concrete swabs. So here are a few examples, past and present.
Deutsche Wohnen Enteignen
Deutsche Wohnen is a massive German Property Company that owns so many apartments to defy believe, and to make matters worse, of course they are awful landlords as expected and consider their role to be predominately captial accumulators, as in, they trade this “worth” on various stock markets. In September 2021, a public referendum named after the company, took place asking the residents of Berlin if large corporate landlords should be expropriated of their residential apartments. 56.2% of voters agreed and the decision has been put in front of the newly elected local government, which in genuine Social Democratic tradition is absolutely ignoring. Linked in the above picture is an interview with Jenny Stupka and Nina Scholz- full disclosure: Nina is a friend - about how they organized and manage to convince half of the city of Berlin to expropriated this giant property company.
In addition to the above interview, the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation also has a great dossier on the subject of reclaiming cities and how to do so.
The Mexican Tenants’ Strike of 1923
It shouldn’t come to anyones surprise that the struggle for affordable housing isn’t something “new” to our generations, on the contrary. “The 1922 tenants’ strike remains one of the most forgotten episodes of the struggle for rights in Mexican cities. From the edge of memory, this movement has inspired different urban movements in Mexico over the past 40 years. Its ideals remain valid. The slogan posted on thousands of front doors in Mexico 100 years ago read “I won’t pay rent, I’m on strike”. Perhaps because the tenants’ movement was linked with the Communist parties of the time and because it challenged the privileges of the landlords, it was banished from discourse. It was practically buried in history for over 50 years until the beginning of the 1970s, when different urban movements revived it as an example.”
The New Paris
If you have ever been to Paris and gotten over the (positive) culture shock you will have realized, especially if your visit was in the last 20 years or so, that many aspects of the city didn’t work - and no, I am not talking about the proverbial face slaps when you order anything in anything other than French. No, the cities infrastructure, similar to most European cities had been sold off and made more “effective” - something that always stands for a few rich bastards getting rich whilst the standard of living declines. That’s changing, a lightning speed and here is a little overview of what is going on:
Infrastructure and The Netherlands
I’ve always enjoyed my time in The Netherlands, aside from the absurdly dry and forward humour of its residence, getting around the place without a car is so incredibly enjoyable and effective that it not only reduces your own stress levels but everyone else too. Cars are a thing of the past in cites and that is coming from a car fan.
The Red Hook
Again, wrapping up the week with another wonderful contribution from our comrade Tatjana in Copenhagen, this time with the Red Hook cocktail!
RED HOOK is yet another Manhattan spin, which I've mentioned before has spawned about a million or so various off springs since it's creation back in the late-1800's. This specific twist however didn't come about until 2003. REED HOOK was invented by bartender Vincenzo Errico at the famed Milk & Honey and the cocktail has moved onto become modern classic. It was located in NYC, and owned and operated by bartender Sasha Petraske, who passed away in 2015. Milk & Honey opened back in 1999, but had to close for good in 2020 due to the financial consequences of the corona virus in USA. However, Milk & Honey not only managed to revive the speak easy style of bars, but also put out some amazing bartenders trained by Sasha Petraske himself. A 'speak easy' refers to a style of bars that all have the common theme of being 'hidden'. From the outside it will not look like a bar, but either just a random door or something completely different like a shop or restaurant. Some speakeasies will be located in the back of a restaurant behind the phone booth or a hidden doorway of some sort, while others will be a bar only, but from the outside it just looks like another anonymous door. Most big cities with a good bar scene will have a couple of speakeasies with various degrees of 'being hidden' now. Speak easy bars were developed during the American Prohibition as a way of having a covert bar, but also have the ability to clear it out in case law enforcement came by. NYC has a lot of tunnels and walkways between buildings and walls, which used to serve as delivery ways, stock rooms and escape routes. A lot of things changed during this time. Another important one was that women moved in behind the bar. Some women even came to operate their own speakeasy! The history of women, saloons and bartending is for another time though. Almost every American mafia movie taking place between 1920-1933 will feature a speak easy. Even the Harry Potter universe has one, and I think Peaky Blinders has featured one or two as well. Back to the cocktail. RED HOOK is a boozy, bittersweet and dry cocktail with some slight fruity notes. If you like whiskey and booze forward drinks, but are not into the super herbal stuff, this might be one for you. I've scaled down the recipe a tiny bit yet again since this is one of those 'big American drinks'.
WHAT YOU NEED:
- Rye whiskey (taste it for good measure)
- Maraschino liqueur
- Punt e Mes
- Maraschino cherries (those in a glass jar, stored in syrup most likely)
- Jigger
- Boston shaker
- Barspoon
- Coupette style cocktail glass
- Ice
HOW YOU DO IT:
- First things first: put your glass in the fridge or the freezer.
- Pour 5cl rye whiskey, 0,75-1cl of Punte Mes and 0,75-1cl of Maraschino liqueur into your shaker.
- Prep your garnish by taking a maraschino cherry, give a little wash to get the leftover syrup off it and either stick a skewer (or toothpick depending on how fancy you want to go) through it or let it be on the bottom of the glass as is. But remember to wash it first. Really.
- Take out your glass o the fridge/freezer.
- Put ice in your shaker and stir it for 7-12 seconds. Like most booze forward drinks be careful when you stir it. Last thing you want is an over-diluted drink, but at the same time we also want a cold drink. Keep an eye on temperature vs dilution here and work fast. The moment ice goes it, the dilution starts – and it does not stop until the liquid is not in ice anymore.
- Take your beautiful and washed cherry and either let the skewer lie on the rim with the cherry in the middle, or let it lie at the bottom of the glass as a snack in the end.
- Drink!
That’s it for the week! Keep an exe out for additional messages in our telegram channel and whatever social media currently in play in regards to next week’s drop and so on. Also, if you enjoy these emails, please feel free to forward this to them:
As always, thank you for your time, attention and interest. See you all next week. Until then, I remain yours and without compromise,
V.