The Little Orange

Commuting by bus or rapid or foot is my daydreaming time, and my favorite daydreaming topic is Cleveland and how to make it better.  I’m a geek for the city’s potential.

One of my bus stops faces what looks like a completely empty four-story building.  The bottom floor is titled “Barbara Anne Bridal Shoppe,” but it looks like the last dress it made is probably no longer in style:

So while I stand there waiting for the bus, I daydream about what the building could become.  As it’s on Ontario just south of Prospect, the location is fantastic for foot traffic around Tower City and to the Q and Progressive Field.  I can’t imagine it was taking maximum advantage of its location as a bridal shop.

Then I think, wow, that’s a nice font:

And I think, whatever the building becomes, it should use at least some of the letters from “Barbara Anne.”  But the only thing I’ve been able to come up with is “Bane bar.”  I’m not sure what a kind of bar the “Bane bar” would be, or, more importantly, whether anyone would go in.

I’m not certain the building’s abandoned, but if it is, it’s hard to believe it’s sitting a block away from Public Square.  Then again, that’s Cleveland.  It’s sort of in an awkward spot, facing the side of Tower City (and the Lebron poster, which alone says prime real estate to me).  It’s a neighborhood of parking garages, which some might think is the lot’s best possible function.  Then again, Fat Fish Blue anchors the parking garage just on the other side of Prospect.

The other day I surfed over to the website of North East Ohio’s Coalition for the Homeless and read some of their Homeless Grapevine archives.  I saw several mentions of both the organization’s and homeless people’s desire for an alternative to shelters — something more permanent, more private, and possibly pay-to-stay.

That reminded me of a blurb I’d read in O Magazine (where else) a while ago about Rosanne Haggerty, a woman who bought a failing “homeless hotel” in New York City and turned it into supportive housing.

It seems like a building like the Barbara Anne Bridal Shoppe, given its size and location and assuming it’s in okay shape, would be a good starting point for such a project.  But when it comes to putting an idea like that into action, I’m lost.  Money, people, laws, etc. — I have no frame of reference, and it intimidates me.  I don’t feel “prepared.”

Those are the thoughts that any of us have to overcome if we are to move from daydreams to doing.  Still, maybe I’ll practice on something smaller.

(The best use of “Barbara Anne” I can come up with for supportive housing involves turning one of the N’s upside down: “urban area.”  Descriptive, yes; inspiring…)