It gets my heart in such joy with each point of contact and story told of our #Pittsburgh based micro-enterprise seeds are sprouting in the wild; places like #SanDiego #AsburyPark #Cincinnati #Chicago!

I’ll be divulging more on these experiences in the near future.

However, a recent post from Americans for the Arts sobers me back up and is also shining a very real light on the threat to the Arts in San Diego. I have reached out the their CEO because I can attest from a recent month long visit to the area it seems in a similar state to where I call home Pittsburgh, Pa.

A larger part of my travel mission in 2025 to was gather more information from other main street districts and cultural environments on bridging our voices from respective cities to create a larger voice in those of us continuing to feel unheard.

But respectively I have been utilizing my newest role as a creative contributing writer (MacKid Pittsburgh—City and Steel Wool Art Salon) to lean into new spaces and learn more about the world that was passing me by while fighting from the inside of my brick-n-mortar since the Pandemic.

So, late in April I had a rad opportunity of being the guest, as contributor to , of Christopher Bevel for the American Marketing Association (AMA) Pittsburgh — inaugural Marketing Momentum 2026 Conference. It underscored a share passion I hold in the collective importance to stay human-centered in solution integrating into a new world. This article will inspire the little artistic people in your life to have more of a mindset on what a creative career can aspire to in the future!

Support www . spruce & adorn ™ . com for #positiveaffirmationapparel derived of one girl’s graphics llc passion for print design, typography and the joy in witnessing and wearing inspiring mantras. #seededbychangeandgoodvibes #hugatree #heartonsleeve

My art school days were full with walks through Market Square. It was my college campus. It had a certain draw. Each noon the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s colonial dressed town-crier proclaiming the mornings headlines from an antiqued scroll.

I’d crash through pigeons, business-suits, tourists and buses. Making my way towards Fifth Avenue Place where next door I’d climb nine flights stairs to keep my soccer legs in shape or wait for the freight elevator—run by a mother & son—elevating us to the fumes of a dozen art studios.

After studio, I would peruse back through Market Square, maybe stop at National Record Mart and rummage my fingers through the latest LPs, dine with acting majors, dancers and journalists at Point Park (College). Some nights kicking a soccer ball at Point State Park, shoot hoops at the YMCA or walk across Blvd of the Allies to Froggy’s on Market Street to hostess. I would live my best life gazing at the tv’s from the hostess stand watching college basketball. Other nights I would jeer Xavier Universities rival coaches sitting round table with Steve Froggy Morris himself. It was a vibe.

Truthfully, it is here I learned how small Pittsburgh is. Hilariously, watching people try to hail a cab, unbeknownst to them, Pittsburgh doesn’t operate like New York City.

OVER EXTENSION

Like any city around the globe, being steeped in creative talent, is a lifeline. Pittsburgh being a petite/mid-sized that has incredible incentives and gut wrenching realities. It feels like the confusion right now is that we are wrestling with interior and exterior factors... reaching outside for whose acceptance exactly in desperation of a growth spurt. It really hurts you aren’

One of the reasons I was so attracted to the energy here was because of the unique nature of the mom-n-pop businesses lining the streets.

My intimate experience as a city-mouse vs. suburbanite felt so grande for a young mid- west girl. A deeper love would unfold by an all in-center Three River Arts Festival spanning every ounce of the Golden Triangle.

This festival held worldy appeal, vendors and epic free concerts, like legend Keb Mo! Every year I would commit to a $15 budget for one item. So proud to own a one-of-a-kind piece I would return to Cincinnati each summer with something to uphold my stylish reputation.

Getting to know the city so closely has enriched my career as a visual storyteller of Pittsburgh, as a titan in industry to the arts, scientific discovery, and innovation.

Beginning my career at a globally-diverse boutique design firm, specializing in visual corporate & nonprofit communications. I’d design publications like The Corporation a history book for U. S. Steel celebrating their Centennial anniversary to nonprofits like the Drake Well Museum and exhibition art for The Carnegie Museums including the booklet to the 2001 International.

This span of experience provided a foundation that evolved my capabilities from freelancer to entrepreneur as a visual presentation specialist focusing on industries in art, oil, steel, medicine, business services, hospitality, editorial, luxury fashion, beauty & personal care industries.

In 2001, I’d launch one girl’s graphics (ogg) combining all of these services to create embodied sensory evoking brands/environments/events.

Maybe you have smudged your space from a hand-rolled blessing kit, saved a page with hand-cut bookmark, or practiced self-care with a signature sensory lotion candle through my most notable living portfolio piece to date; spruce & adorn™.

MINDFULNESS BY DESIGN

We are in an era of breaking generational patterns. It always begins with us.

spruce & adorn™ encourages “learning how to organize the things we love to collect in life, in turn, learning how to mindfully collect things that function for us.” There is a lot of intention packed into this mission and we recognize the things through patterns. So, it is easy as a multi-faceted entrepreneur to recognize another pattern that needs some light.

The time is now to reconnect micro-enterprise support practices to the greater economic landscape. Somehow disconnected from the large enterprise as dental and eye insurance are from whole body health insurance... why? Let’s dive in.

EVERYONE’S CALL TO RISE UP FOR MAIN STREETS IS CRUCIAL.

Mindfulness is not a movement lending itself to be a tool for just our mind-body experience, but also communities, urban developers and the enterprises brushing their corridors.

spruce & adorn™ advocates for accessibility to home decor for your mental health. Home improvement is a core project put on the back burner. Recognizing people need more information why any environment needs to be prioritized. We exemplify how to achieve these goals affordably, with sustainable solutions and at their core, also exposing design by nature.

Jenifer is accepting donations in kind to support her in her advocacy work.
Send a message on how to help!

UNDERSTANDING FOOT-TRAFFIC DEPENDENT EXPERIENTIAL DESIGN

Our bodies being designed by nature subject matter #1. Sensory, functional and so inherently genius. When we feel good in them, we are capable to act in incredibly individualized elevated versions of ourselves and authentically overflow into society.

As the body responds to stress, it engages in conflict with our brain—doing what the brain does—to compete being the principal provider of safety and problem solving.

This is logic, rumination, post trauma processing vs. intuition, trust and faith.

The mind is dependent on seeking information and solving problems. That is literally the brains job. But when we don’t allow the body to catch and release occurrences, they somatically store in the body, the brain deeply embeds the information and buries itself into our musculature.

Our sensory centers are wired for stimulation and experiential design. These activate our senses of smell, touch, sight, hearing and taste prompting our joy, emotional processing and mental bandwidths—these help categorize core memories.

However, there are two more very important sensory experiences based on internal senses of balance & spatial awareness.

This is where sensory driven, foot-traffic dependent, storefronts & environmental design presentation contribute to how we receive storytelling, quality and agency of brands—it is so imperative.

Experiencing textiles, smelling aromas, feeling the warm quenching glide of a lotion candle and realizing the scale of a furnishing piece turning every corner into a visual whimsy with daring color dynamics all encompass your experience inside spruce & adorn™

A June 10, 2024, article in LIVESCIENCE, Humans Have More than Five Senses that Help us Navigate the World reads “Touch is essential for our survival: allowing us to explore and interact with our environment. Touch is also very important to our well-being. For example, research has shown that touch can convey compassion from one person to another. ...touch can also influence how humans make decisions. Texture can be associated with abstract concepts, and touching something with a texture has been shown to be able to influence the decisions a person makes.”

“Those tactile sensations are not just changing general orientation or putting people in a good mood,” said Joshua Ackerman, who was an assistant professor of marketing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). “They have a specific tie to certain abstract meanings.”

At this time hard-wired machines aren’t able to touch this. THIS is why we MUST start factoring the present and future that holds space for artificial intelligence problem solving and incentivize weighing-up human-centered critical thinking outcomes. We must continue prioritizing critical human thinking in developing urban spaces in forecasting for the future.

If not prioritized are WE really prepared to see every independent business we love phase away? Prepared to watch thoughtful environments in which we can escape + rest disappear.

TRICKLEDOWN

Studies show 68% of your dollars stay in the community when you spend them locally. Micro- intentions matter, especially when we are all facing so many new strapping norms. But this can’t just come from constituents and nonprofits-profits. They have to collectively derive from anyone brushing main streets, especially larger enterprises.

I recently heard a leader in the, immediate triangle, Downtown Pittsburgh corridor express and interest to have small businesses not downtown for six months but six years — and that is such a disservice to how business owners envisions our futures.

Each entity has its own unique standards of operation. We have great news, small-batch makers, ARE the future of rescaling what U.S. manufacturing potential looks like. Pittsburgh has creative power. This region is the birthplace of so many impactful innovations.

Each time an independent owned brick-and-mortar is supported you are offering an entire eco-system (see legend) support that benefits community morale, artisan makers. public artists, marketing teams, locally owned publications, media and tourism.

The caveat to widespread trickledown—with each literal and metaphor road block, bridge closure and parking catastrophe. Main Street founders realize that local customers have lost the time, once belonging to them, to drop in to favorite spaces. Coupled with shrinking population and increase cost of living more strapping, protections as stakeholders reimagine our communities mostly benefitting tourism districts is warranted.

COLLABORATION IS KEY

When you purchase a piece of positive affirmation apparel at www.spruceandadorn.com you support an initiative that started with the consideration of another business owner developing creative solutions during the global pandemic.

Thanks to the collaborative spirit of Daniel Parente at Revival Print Co. what began as a simple gesture to design a t-shirt procured on his website ultimately expanded into an entire line of spruce & adorn™ branded pieces. Designed & Printed in Pittsburgh with {heart}.

Our communities become stronger when we take the opportunity to draw people into them together — not apart.

CODEPENDENCY ON MAIN STREETS

Micro-owned businesses are the top 3% reason why you visit a neighborhood and the bottom 3% of who is given sustaining leverage.

We are the landscape reason to arrive to a destination (neighborhood) downtown. Each business has a purpose for resolving a void they felt they could contribute to community. My superpower is to transform unsuspecting spaces into spirit engaging spaces. A window admired walking a pet or young family. But our unspoken weights root as backdrop to how time is spent when visitors come to town. Favorite street to drive through. Unspoken vigilantes holding some sense of order in the neighborhood watch. Personalities creating a representation for diverse audiences. Sponsors and donors to causes. Drivers of local culture marketing at expense to us.

In 2023, my store attracted journalist Martha Raddatz who stepped foot in my store, passing through Pittsburgh, on assignment for ABC News THIS WEEK. I knew who she was immediately. I respect her bravery reporting as an overseas War Correspondent.

Ahead of the 2024 Presidential Election she was gaging constituents, on Butler Street, about their upcoming vote. We later reconnected as she passed by again. Her producer urged her to speak to me but she was certain whom I was going to vote for and passed. For me this election wasn’t about policy. It was about democracy and my hopes my candidate would prioritize overlooked small business needs, not even on that administrations radar.

QUANTIFIABLE LEADERSHIP

As districts grow larger and more dense, leadership needs to scale with it. Alleviating unspoken expectations on independent owners. It could look like hiring a part-time representative per super-block, for zone coverage, in the ward over lapping support to one another. Maximizing capabilities for the main street, residential, commercial and tourism districts they represent.

A prime example, Butler St. in Lawrenceville 15 year expansion from lower 31st to upper 62nd Street. Considering dynamics as vast from technology, real estate and and hospitality to high-ticket sensory retailers dependent on foot-traffic.

EFFECT OF SPONTANEITY

It is visible how collectives of makers, trades and retailers work together. It is also clear small enterprise and large enterprise are like oil and water. Let’s visit the open and closer of Starbucks in Lawrencville in one year. They were largely unwelcome. Lawerenceville United largely led the protests. It is a notable conversation but did highlight divisive opinions.

I was more upset by the unannounced construction than I was their arrival. Regardless it put a spotlight on the protections community wants to provide their sweet district. It can’t stop there. It has to start factoring concessions for main streets from industries within their RFP’s bidding on a job/prospective home of their offices?

Let’s expect this process to become ‘relearned’ with solutions for parking, facade maintenance, utility support for home and business of founders, guaranteed community purchasing based on value of business represented in the project, penalties owed to the businesses for not disclosing a business district disruption, plans + solutions.

The spontaneity of unannounced construction is as comparable to the catastrophic event I experienced the morning I woke up with flu like symptoms after an electric company controlled brown out. I got up lethargically arose and forced myself to work. Being only August, I had already exhausted all of my vacation & sick time recovering from an unrelated shoulder surgery. If it tool me I would not be sharing my experiences.

That morning, I literally argued with myself in the mirror to wear my coveted and locally designed IMAN B x Karl Mullen wool dress. I wasn’t going on a date, I was going to work ...on a Sunday. I bypassed the urge. I truly believed I would return home to snuggle back up under my comforter and AC and take another rest.

Instead, I’d walk into work, receiving a call on my employers landline. “Jenifer” my neighbor screamed. “Your alive!” They then broke the news my third-story apartment, in a house, was up in flames. The headboard of my bed and was gassing carbon monoxide for 14 hours.

I rushed ‘home’ and didn’t have one. I sat with the fire inspector who determined the fire began as a surge that from the from the wiring in the front wall of the house. Passing through the floor boards to the back wall, smoldering in the walls. All due to a weather induced incident.

Hurricane Katrina, which I am still always learning about, would hit New Orleans a week later and Tracy Chapman would drop “Change” one month later.

All of this injected me with great purpose to be impactful with the life I am humbly living. This is my why for both of my businesses. They are deeply personal and are the gifts the divine offered me to share.

The humanity in neglect and preventable nature of the circumstances is devastating.

Imagine, I arrive to my space of business, two years after a global shutdown, resource of primary income, fueled by a service to community mission, offering others access to their dignity. Eighteen years later it strikes like an identical act of trauma to the fire.

Unannounced. Uninsurable. Assimilating the shared community trauma of isolation, grief and terror of the global pandemic. And recently we watch another citing in Minneapolis, MN who continue to survive through more barbaric acts of spontaneous disruption.

Alex Pretti was murdered on my birthday, while I was at an art residency in Chicago.

Support group, Extreme Weather Survivors, recently introduced me to the term ‘portfolio of complex trauma’. My portfolio is rich. I am not sure at this time, anyone is living outside of this catalogue.

My consciousness of overwhelmed nervous systems is my inspiration for creating a sacred space, filled with special finds, meant to slow people down. To explore in a space of discovery for at least 10 minutes — was the goal. The time that gives permission to our adrenal and sympathetic nerves to Rest. Relax. Revive. And from first hand experience, I would share coping skills that have benefitted my living my life as joyfully as I can.

We really owe it to each other to #lovethyneighbor and work tirelessly to keep our downtowns active with the passionate entrepreneurs and artist in service to community. We all deserve the the unspoken rewards that come from them.

Wether infrastructure upgrades or militia vs. the people, if either were weather related there would be a better chance FEMA would be assigned to assist in the Natural Disaster.

I implore our Governor, County and City Officials to consider... more preparedness around these instances and financial aid to those of us still trying to get back up from starting our businesses the year of the pandemic. This city has made a wreck of our potential. The uninviting tone and scarcity of the NFL Draft Zone would magnify this sentiment.

The Affordable Insurance and Recovery Act (SB982), out of California, seems like a great place for provisions including costs directly related to historic, once in a lifetime, infrastructure upgrades.

COEXISTING IN SPONTANEOUS DISRUPTION

Spontaneous disruption shouldn’t have to be a feared reality, but unfortunately it has become one. Action is necessary. We are all living in the same eco system—we must take care of each other in it.

When discovery came to surface—during a period of absence at our State Representatives office—the Lower Lawrenceville District was never notified by our local business advocacy group, our city council member, the utility company, contracted traffic control services, Penn Dot, Department of Mobility and Infrastructure, City Permitting Deptartment, or City of Pittsburgh but rather notified by orange cones, no-parking signs, and a visit from Channel 11, again who used my storefront spruce & adornTM, for the story with no attempt to reach us for comment.

So you think ‘I’ll pivot and go with the flow...’ the start date was followed a week later by a bank robbery, in broad daylight, a block away. Did I mention this a year prior three blocks from our first location?

NOW WHAT?

We all know the phrase “Superman is not coming to save you”. I have heard it twice this week.

I’ve been fighting since 2020 for the dignified life I was building and deserve, we all deserve. I want my business back thriving on a Main Street, pouring into my service to community mission and honoring the dues I gladly signed up for as a business owner.

I want us all to count on being treated with safeguards, work together, negotiate the needs of landscape, infrastructure and policy upgrades that serves us all.

I want Pennsylvania to prove investing in humanity is as possible as investing in industry.

It reminds me greatly of the calming agenda one girl’s graphics created at Warwick Dentistry in the Mellon Building in downtown Pittsburgh, PA.

On March 26th, 2026 I had the opportunity to attend a tour coordinated by Society of Experiential Graphic Design (SEGD) Community Pittsburgh’s organized field trip to the newly relocated Pittsburgh International Airport. It offered so much more context than my initial walk thru as I traveled over the December holidays shortly after its launch.

Conscious of the curated artist contributions, in a large portion of it’s press as a Terminal Modernization Program, it was lost on me when I flew through why I kept stepping around beautiful metal leaves inlayed on the lobby floor. TSA, nor airport security could answer my question of what their intentions were.

So I was beyond thrilled, to meet the architects at Gensler + HDR Architecture Firm (who collaborated on the entire scope with spanish team luis vidal + architects) on-site from Washington D.C. who shared so many thrilling curiosities. Unsuspecting, and to my surprise, I ironically wore my spruce & adorn™ ‘Hug a Tree’ zip-up I proudly designed and printed with {heart} in Pittsburgh, Pa.

Each wave in the ceiling one of my favorite considerations as if you are staring into the range of the blue mountains and each metal pressed leaf in the floor a representation of trees native to Southwest Pa. We believe trees should be respected, admired and loved all year round.

The real agenda was to modernize the time and distance between destination and baggage claim. You tell us the next time you travel. Did you a good experience? YOU are the reason for the change.

Our environmental lobby tour outlined details in the way findings, color schematics, project timeline’s and delays, productivity goals, artist collaborations, of course user core decisions.

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I was two days ago years old, when I realized the depth of Keith Harings history in Pittsburgh, Pa —where I left Cincinnati, Ohio to attend the Art Institute of Pittsburgh in the 90’s— to earn a degree in Visual Communications with an emphasis in Specialized Technology.

There are so many reasons now why that title is a hoot but I had no idea that there was another private art school here that rivaled that of my ama matter.

I knew my path was highly inspired by the craftsmanship of Andy Warhol but if you knew me when I was young artist, well, I am blown away at the parallels to my line art style and his.

So why did I even discover this? Because I am practicing my marker to paper skills again and entered an exhibit celebrating 01980’s era of Keith Haring in Durham, North Carolina. In my research I came across some seriously AWEsome discoveries.

#staytuned #lifestyledwithintention

In the meantime, I sketches 33 pages of thumbnails and interactive pieces while I developed ‘house of triangles’. Its intention is to celebrate iconic architecture and trifecta of triangles related to Keith Haring and two of the cities he impacted.

Pittsburgh, PA : Golden Triangle + George Washington Ferris Wheel

Durham, NC : Research Triangle + Lucky Strike Tobacco Water Tower

“Silence is Death” : Pink Triangle

Read our art bio to discover the vertices connect by the stroke of Keith Harings influence. As always follow spruce & adorn™ and the vibrancy sessions.

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