When Juana Mancera graduated from the University of Michigan in December 2025, she decided that if she was going to face the daily grind, she might as well be the one choosing the beans. Sick of working for other people, sick of climbing a corporate ladder, Mancera opened Kultura, a mobile coffee-music pop-up, or as she explained it, “coffee, culture, and speakers on wheels.” The hottest thing in town isn’t just the caffeine, it’s the electric blue cart and the heavy bass vibrating through the steam of your new favorite cuppa joe. Meet the coffee experience that’s treating the local caffeine scene less like a transaction and more like a pop-up party.
Posts filed under Local
Crazy Wisdom Kids: Experiencing Spring Through the Senses
Before the calendar changes, before the jackets disappear, before adults agree that winter is finally over, kids start pointing things out. The light looks different. The sidewalk feels warmer. The air smells like wet dirt, not cold metal. Something has shifted, even if no one can quite name it yet. In Ann Arbor and surrounding areas, spring reveals itself in small, almost secret ways—and those clues teach kids something important about the world and about themselves.
Annie G’s: A Dairy Farm for the Future
Let me introduce you to Annie G’s, a small herd dairy cow farm run by Kat and her husband David Mageean. This dynamic duo, along with their two young children, Annie and Angus, whom the Dairy is named after, have a dream of their own to share. Their dream is to make the “100 cow dairy farm” viable again and they are working to revolutionize the dairy industry to help encourage others to do the same.
Being Ken Kozora
Ann Arbor musician, composer, and educator, Ken Kozora, is a one-of-a-kind gem. I asked him on a quiet afternoon at the Interfaith Center for Spiritual Growth, a favorite music venue and hang out, what was the pathway that led to receiving the Love Award from the Artist Advocacy Foundation in Detroit this past September. Our conversation was delightful as he spoke with energy, expression, and conviction.
Kindred Conversations with Hilary Nichols-- The Poet and the Philosopher:The marriage of Erin Zindle and Ross Huff
When two of the most talented and prolific musicians in Ann Arbor come together, the synergy of sound and sentiment is too beautiful to miss. “We’ve been writing words and melodies to express our love story in all of its depth and magic, with the goal of sharing it with you, our dearest ones, as we celebrate our union together.”
Ann Arbor’s Zen Buddhist Temple Prepares for a New Era
As we enter the late 2020s, the American Zen community is preparing for a changing of the guard. With many of today’s Western Zen teachers trained during the 1960s and 1970s, temples and teaching centers across the country are preparing to hand leadership to a new generation of students and enter a new era of American Zen Buddhism. For the first time, the leaders will be largely Western people who were taught by other Westerners in the late 20th century--not Westerners who were taught directly by Zen teachers from Asia.
Jeff Parness and the Sanctuary at Hope Farms— How to Transform Loss into Hope and Healing
Jeff Parness is full of stories; entertaining, detailed, and animated. But this story is about Parness and his newly built home in Ann Arbor. “This property saved my life. It was the clouds,” he told me. “I found this property as I was storm chasing.”
Ojibwe Speaks: Stacie Sheldon and the Revitalization of Anishinaabemowin
Twenty years ago, Stacie Sheldon and Margaret Noodin founded the website ojibwe.net in Ann Arbor, beginning the hard work of revitalizing Anishinaabemowin language, speakers, and culture. Their work is part of greater regional shift, which in 2025 saw Detroit’s first pow wow in thirty years, a major exhibit open at the Detroit Institute of Arts, and the arrival of Ann Arbor District Library’s mascot, Akako G. Shins (“little groundhog” in Ojibwe).
Kindred Conversations with Hilary Nichols--featuring Jamall Bufford
As the Director of Washtenaw My Brother’s Keeper (WMBK), Jamall Bufford makes a powerful impression of warmth and conviction. “Everyone sees his heart,” his colleague Justin Harper said. “Jamall is a great person. It is easy to work with him because he is a good listener, a team player, and completely true to his convictions. When someone has those qualities, a lot of great things can happen.”
What's New in the Community: fall 2025
What’s New in the Community: New books from local authors, new businesses, new offerings and practitioners and upcoming events for fall 2025.
Molly Ging: Owner of Ann Arbor's The Little Seedling
As a mother, entrepreneur, and community figure, Molly Ging provides local families with what they need most—support, and the best baby gear available. We sat down to chat about motherhood, philosophy, Ann Arbor, and the tenuous future of small businesses.
Anthropocentric Sound and the Search for Serenity
They are shooting over at the Washtenaw Sportsman’s Club this morning. It’s a half mile away, but it sounds like I’m in the middle of a firefight. Though a mile off, the din of Interstate 94 is ever present like the constant flow of a rushing river with none of the charm. At first periodically, then steadily, cars pass the house. I can hear them coming from well down the two-lane road on which the speed limit is 45 mph but on which many drive much faster. A car passes, then there is a momentary lull, then another goes by. Think of the inexorable splashing of waves against the shore of one of the Great Lakes and you’ll get the rhythm.
Ode to the Arb
When you step through the wrought iron gates along Geddes Boulevard into the hushed shady entrance of Nichols Arboretum, between a wide pea-stone path to the left and a thin deer trail to the right, sits the first bench to welcome you. Benches are placed along the river side, on overlooks, in meadows, along trails, in the Peony gardens, and in countless shaded areas throughout this 128-acre preserve, inviting anyone to rest and take in the grand expanse of nature.
Kindred Conversations with Hilary Nichols--featuring Jonathan Buckman
What does normal even mean?” Jonathan Buckman asked. Buckman is not normal—he is unique and extraordinary by any measure, and that is what makes him such a great therapist, social worker, practitioner, neighbor, and friend. “Jonathan has attained master level accomplishments in so many domains, but you would never guess it if you were meeting him for the first time,” his bandmate, neighbor, and co-conspirator Jeff Gladchun told me. “You couldn’t ask for a better friend than Jonathan. He is one of a kind.”
A Look at Great Lakes Performing Artists Associates: A Champion for Human Connection Through Music
As arts funding dwindles and screens pull audiences away from live experiences, one Ann Arbor nonprofit is quietly transforming the cultural landscape with soul and purpose. For nearly five decades, Great Lakes Performing Artist Associates (GLPAA) has championed real human connection through music.
Cottage Food Businesses in Michigan: Creative Connections and Community
Michigan’s Cottage Food Law allows small businesses to make and sell homemade foods from their home kitchens without cumbersome and expensive commercial licensing or inspections. Goodies like breads, jams, cookies, candies, granola, and more can be sold directly to consumers at farmers’ markets, roadside stands, and fairs. It can be a wonderful way to connect with the community.
Dzanc House ~ You’re in the Right Place
Within a beautiful historic house, nestled in the southside historic district of Ypsilanti, you will find a space for creatives where there are regular events, activities, and gallery exhibitions. Upon approaching the house, one will see writing on the window: Dzanc House, you’re in the right place. This is not only an indicator of having found the correct house, but also a way of communicating to the community at large that there’s a place where they belong. Whether it is for reading, writing, drawing, printmaking, knitting, crocheting, embroidering, performing, or simply absorbing the art—you’re in the right place.
A Traditional Yoga School Hiding in Plain Sight on Main Street: An Interview with Angela Jamison
For the last 15 years, in the early morning between five and eight, the 200 block of South Main Street has filled with yoga practitioners who come and go before the town comes to life. It’s a diverse group, ranging from those in their teens to those in their 80s, across all sorts of life situations and physical capacities. The yoga they practice is tailored to the individual. Depending on the person, the practice might include various physical asanas, breathing techniques, and meditations. What they all have in common is that they’re all part of a school, and a community organization, called Ashtanga Yoga Ann Arbor.
No Matter Where You Go, You Are in a Watershed!
Our Southeast Michigan watersheds are the Huron River, Rouge River, Clinton River, River Raisin, and Ecorse Creek Watersheds. All of these nets of nomadic water empty into the Detroit River (which has its own watershed). Detroit River waters flow into Lake Erie, then travel through the Niagara River merging into Lake Ontario, narrowing again into the St. Lawrence River, and releasing finally into the Atlantic Ocean.
Kindred Conversations with Hilary Nichols: Singer, Bandleader, and Performer Dani Darling
Last summer, as she has every summer since 2018, Dani Darling performed at the Ann Arbor Summer Fest. This time she took to the main stage with her identical triplet sisters as guests to drop into an electrifying harmony like it was their first language—maybe because it was.
