New Bern Cooks 300 Years of Good Food

I was asked if I would be willing to work with Merci Clinic and the New Bern 300th Anniversary Committee to produce a cookbook. ALL proceeds go to Merci Clinic.

We get asked every day for donations and frankly we just can't do it all but in this case I was honored to help.

In fact all the images we used in this cookbook are available at Carolina Creations as prints. Click here to see those.

You can purchase the cookbook online by clicking here. It's $15 plus shipping.

New Bern Cooks! offers a variety of recipes, notes and helpful hints. There are even a few recipes from Switzerland! Decendants of the city's founder, Baron Christophe de Graffenreid, were gracious enough to send recipes.

Of course, a book written in Eastern Carolina must have many traditional favorites. Everything from syllabub to cornbread and delicious seaford recipes are included.

To retain historical perspective, recipes ere also collected from the Tryon Palace library.




The cookbooks are available at Carolina Creations.

New Bern Spring Home Tour

For the ?? year in a row my artwork is featured on the Spring Historic Homes and Garden Tour poster and brochure in our town.

New Bern is celebrating its 300th Anniversary this year so this will be a great year to come visit and no better time than the beginning of April.

If you're not from here our area is STUNNING this time of the year with the azaleas and dogwood in bloom. It is like a picture postcard.

The date of the Tour is April 9 & 10.

As has been our pleasure for the past 4 or 5 years we will host a reception on Friday evening, April 9 from 5-7. I will be signing prints of the art work and we'll have refreshments too.

The prints are also on sale on our website.

You can see the sizes and prices by clicking here.

You can purchase tickets for the tour online by clicking here.

Hope you can come! Jan Francoeur

New Book by local author New Bern At Night

We like to support our local authors by carrying their books in our gallery.

The newest book we've added is "New Bern at Night", a beautiful hardcover photo/historical book created by New Bern photographer Nicholas Mathews.

It's a great remembrance of our beautiful historic district with photos taken at night.

You can order online or stop in for a preview, all our copies are signed by the artist. $25.

2010 It's going to be a great year!

We're thrilled that we survived 2009 and we're looking forward to a fun and prosperous 2010.

Our Dickens of a Christmas was a huge success. The lights throughout the business district was great! We couldn't have done it without the city support.

Our expanded "A Christmas Carol" got rave reviews and got people strolling on 2 more blocks than last year.

Our mistletoe "Kissing Stations" got press as far away as Evansville, Indiana.

First night was a roaring success. We were open until 9:30 pm and had a great day.

A great start to the new year.

For 2010 we'll continue to celebrate Carolina Creations 20th anniversary with special events throughout the year.

Our home will be on tour for the Main Street 30th Anniversary Conference later this month. The Conference is outstanding and if you're interested in attending here is a link to the website.

Our annual fundraising show for the Craven County Schools Art Program opens on January 29 and runs through February 14. This is our third year for this event. Children from the Craven County schools create the cards, we sell them for $3 and donate all the money back to the school Art Program.

In March we'll host the NC Governor's Conference on Hospitality and Tourism, another great Conference and worth your while to attend. Click here to read all about it.

ArtWalks start the 2nd Friday of March and continue every other month throughout the year.

The 300th committee has a great lineup, click here for the years events.

I'm going to spend the year really concentrating on doing paintings and clay that depicts our beautiful town. I'll have a show that opens during the September ArtWalk which is the week before the "Jubilee" Weekend for the 300th.

Pictured one of my New Bern pots and my painting Pollock and East Front Street watercolor.

An article about social media appeared in Niche Magazine this month and I was quoted. They even had a photo of me!

More about each of these events as they get closer.