Down with my Crew

I'm sitting in a ubiquitous-mermaid caffeine-habit-satisfaction shop, and I get an instant message. It's an ex-co-worker who's moved south from the Bay Area. She mentions that she's quoted in today's Los Angeles Times. "Suh-weet," I say.

Adrienne Crew stops short of using a term such as "new sincerity" but says she's noticed a growing interest among young urbanites to simplify their lives. Crew, a 40-year-old attorney and "brainiac" writing a novel on African American geeks, is the founder of labrainterrain.com, a blog and calendar listing of intellectual events around L.A.

"I'm seeing these youngsters who are really looking for expressions of unmediated experience, fun that's not created by consumer culture," she says. A growing trend she sees as a reaction to hipsterism is "granny chic," or social groups centered around archaic hobbies. Stitch and Bitch and The Church of Craft are two Los Angeles-based examples of groups that gather to work on quilting, needlework, paper craft and lace making — in unabashed earnestness.

Crew also cites the Machine Project, a group that combines performance art with science, hosting workshops on such topics as how to build a radio. Says Crew, "Every two days I get these e-mails that go, 'Hey, kids, we've got this goofy thing we're going to be doing, so bring anything you want demagnetized!'"

Check out Adrienne at L.A. Brain Terrain.Noticed elsewhere:Cobb's "What Do Black Conservatives Look Like?"