Battle Creek’s only year-round costume shop and dry cleaning service
will close in a month. Debra Wondergem, the owner of Fantasy Costume on
East Emmett Street, said the need for costumes and dry cleaning services
isn’t as great as it used to be.
Wondergem began working for
Baker Brother’s Fine Dry Cleaning 30 years ago when her husband asked
for her help. Five years later she opened the year-round costume store.
“We
had two bedrooms and one feather and we stuck it in every hat,” said
Wondergem. “In the early days I didn’t advertise because I didn’t think
we had enough to offer.”
Now, her store is full of accessories,
wigs, make-up, masks and costumes to fulfill any customer’s dream, or at
least get it started. And it’s all on sale.
“We could have Halloween here tomorrow we’re so stocked,” she said. “If I don’t have it, I’ll get it.”
Wondergem grew up in a family of seamstresses and her mother was a milliner. From them, she learned how to sew.
The
costume shop’s owner also joined the National Costumers Association and
began attending regional meetings. There, she met other costumers and
has been taking classes every year for 20 years to enhance her skills.
She is hoping some of her friends from the association will be able to
take the larger costumes off her hands.
Originally from East Detroit, Wondergem said her career was hard work, but she had a lot of fun.
“It’s kind of hard to sum up in a moment,” said the owner. “There are too many memories, too many people.”
Wondergem
and her team have designed, created, and cleaned costumes for companies
as big as Macy’s, while still selling retail costumes for every price
range. Her shop has cleaned the Tony the Tiger suit for years and
recently supplied the make-up and wigs for Marshall’s production of “A
Midsummer Night’s Dream.”
She said the cleaning aspect of her business has been the strongest part of the operation.
“We were able to produce the finest finished product,” said Wondergem.
Though
her store is more than just a Halloween costume shop, Wondergem said by
the time she gets to Halloween, she’s almost glad it’s over because
she’s so exhausted. But that doesn’t stop the fun.
She’s often invited to numerous parties and is often asked to judge costume contests.
“I love seeing what people like to create,” she said.
Wondergem said Internet sales, 30-day discount Halloween stores and the recession have made things more difficult for her.
“The
30-day stores are not costume shops. They sell inexpensive costumes in
bags,” she said. “We sell quality costumes; we have fabulous costumes
and award-winning costumes.”
“That’s why we’re here year-round;
we’re not just a Halloween store. Some (costumes) take months to make.”
Read the full story at www.aulaundry.com web.
Wondergem
has welcomed frantic mothers and teachers who need last-minute costumes
and gotten tall orders from people as far away as California. She said
she hopes she helped and inspired creativity to them all.
2013年6月7日 星期五
2013年5月16日 星期四
County OKs Lompoc wind farm permit extension
The Lompoc Wind Energy Project will move forward after the Santa Barbara County Planning Commission on Wednesday granted a time extension for its permits and denied an appeal of a neighboring property owner.
The project, which will place 65 wind turbine generators along the hilltops southeast of Vandenberg Air Force Base, was originally approved in 2008.
The commission unanimously approved a two-year economic hardship time extension for the project and in doing so denied the appeal of George and Cheryl Bedford, who own and live on acreage adjacent to the project.
The Bedfords have opposed the project since it was first proposed five years ago. They appealed the commission’s initial approval to the Board of Supervisors in 2009. When the board denied their appeal, they took their case to Superior Court, where a judge ruled for the county. They eventually took their case to the state Court of Appeals, which upheld the lower court verdict.
On Wednesday, attorney Richard Adam, representing the Bedfords, argued that time extension violated the plain language of both the original conditional use permit for the project and the Land Use Development Code.
Adam said the original conditional use permit “shall become null and void and automatically revoked” if the project is discontinued for more than one year. He said that more than a year had passed since Pacific Renewable Energy Generation LLC (PREG) had surveyed the area, and cut and graded service roads, when in their opinion work had stopped.
Quoting sections of the conditional use permit, Adam also said the Planning Commission could extend the permit “one time” for good cause.
The appeal also said the time extension violated the Land Use Development Code because it said the proposed project “would not be detrimental to the comfort, convenience, general welfare, health and safety of the neighborhood” and it would be compatible with the surrounding area.
Adam said the project, which will spread out over portions of approximately 2,950 acres off San Miguelito Road, is located on rural hillsides used mostly for cattle grazing and isn’t a compatible use.
Adam questioned the director’s authority to grant the permit and said the county shouldn’t “rubber stamp” time extensions.
Kevin Drude, supervising planner with the county, argued that the construction of the project approved by the permits hasn’t yet started, so it couldn’t have been discontinued for a year. He also said nothing in the project had changed since it had been approved, and that Planning and Development Director Glenn Russell had the authority to grant the time extension.
Jason Donajkowski, project manager for PREG, said the company sought the time extensions because of the economic downturn that began just as the project was approved. He said the company expects to complete engineering the project in 2014 and finish construction by 2015.
The project, which will place 65 wind turbine generators along the hilltops southeast of Vandenberg Air Force Base, was originally approved in 2008.
The commission unanimously approved a two-year economic hardship time extension for the project and in doing so denied the appeal of George and Cheryl Bedford, who own and live on acreage adjacent to the project.
The Bedfords have opposed the project since it was first proposed five years ago. They appealed the commission’s initial approval to the Board of Supervisors in 2009. When the board denied their appeal, they took their case to Superior Court, where a judge ruled for the county. They eventually took their case to the state Court of Appeals, which upheld the lower court verdict.
On Wednesday, attorney Richard Adam, representing the Bedfords, argued that time extension violated the plain language of both the original conditional use permit for the project and the Land Use Development Code.
Adam said the original conditional use permit “shall become null and void and automatically revoked” if the project is discontinued for more than one year. He said that more than a year had passed since Pacific Renewable Energy Generation LLC (PREG) had surveyed the area, and cut and graded service roads, when in their opinion work had stopped.
Quoting sections of the conditional use permit, Adam also said the Planning Commission could extend the permit “one time” for good cause.
The appeal also said the time extension violated the Land Use Development Code because it said the proposed project “would not be detrimental to the comfort, convenience, general welfare, health and safety of the neighborhood” and it would be compatible with the surrounding area.
Adam said the project, which will spread out over portions of approximately 2,950 acres off San Miguelito Road, is located on rural hillsides used mostly for cattle grazing and isn’t a compatible use.
Adam questioned the director’s authority to grant the permit and said the county shouldn’t “rubber stamp” time extensions.
Kevin Drude, supervising planner with the county, argued that the construction of the project approved by the permits hasn’t yet started, so it couldn’t have been discontinued for a year. He also said nothing in the project had changed since it had been approved, and that Planning and Development Director Glenn Russell had the authority to grant the time extension.
Jason Donajkowski, project manager for PREG, said the company sought the time extensions because of the economic downturn that began just as the project was approved. He said the company expects to complete engineering the project in 2014 and finish construction by 2015.
2013年5月1日 星期三
Wind power plan 'can't be delayed'
Securing an intergovernmental agreement between the UK and Ireland to facilitate the export of Irish wind energy is crucial to the future of the multi-billion euro midlands wind project.
"We need that intergovernmental agreement. We need that this year; any delay to that, is a delay to the project. Each delay to the project curtails it," said Mainstream Power's founder and CEO Eddie O'Connor.
"The earlier we get an intergovernmental agreement, the sooner we can start spending this money. Before we can spend seriously big money we need to see that both governments are committed."
Mr O'Connor was speaking at a conference in Tullamore where some of the world's leading manufacturers of wind farm components and transmission technology met to discuss the potential of setting up a supply chain in the midlands worth at least 7bn.
Between 2016 and 2020, Mainstream's 5,000 megawatt Energy Bridge alone will require 1,700 turbine towers, 5,000 blades, 1,700 nacelles, 16,000km of inter-array cabling, 1,700 convertors, 30 electrical substations and 400km of HVDC underground cables. Rather than importing these materials, which are worth well in excess of 7bn, the plan is to attract these manufacturers to set up base in Ireland employing tens of thousands of people locally.
Mr O'Connor said if you could show the companies the development was going ahead they would locate manufacturing plants here.
Larry de Vaal, business development manager with wind turbine manufacturer XEMC Darwind said: "XEMC Darwind has already looked at manufacturing opportunities in Ireland and with a project of this scale there is a very real opportunity to locate component manufacturing, assembly, installation and long-term maintenance here in the midlands."
However, Mr O'Connor said that there is a narrow window of opportunity during which Ireland needs to move or else the whole project will fail.
"We have taken an awful lot of risk upfront in anticipation that they (Government) will do what they said that they will do.
"There is a need in Britain for renewable power as they are committed in law to have 15% of their power generated by renewables by 2020. We have a window of opportunity we either take it now, use it of lose it."
With this insight and reports of global growth forecasts in renewable energy from both financial and market analysts in mind, Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics today announced its strategic initiatives for composite bearings applications in renewable energy markets.
The Bearings and Tolerance Rings Group at Saint-Gobain designs composite bearings solutions that withstand harsh vibration, improve efficiency, extend performance and reduce operational downtime in both solar energy and wind turbine applications. As part of its strategic focus in renewable energy markets, Saint-Gobain has added the design engineering expertise of industrial global market manager, Edward Rumble, to its team. With his extensive design and engineering experience, Rumble will lead the increasing efforts to develop the next generation of composite bearings for solar and wind applications.
"Renewable energy, fuelled by innovative solar and wind turbine technologies, will prove to be the future of sustainable power generation", says Rumble. "To help today's and tomorrow's leaders in renewable energy production, we are committed to partnering with OEMs to deliver innovative solutions that enhance efficiency in solar and wind applications."
For the solar market, Saint-Gobain manufactures an innovative, maintenance-free composite bearing. Proprietary fluoropolymer compounds in Solglide composite bearings increase the long-term operational efficiency of solar equipment, reduce energy usage and decrease long-term costs.
"We need that intergovernmental agreement. We need that this year; any delay to that, is a delay to the project. Each delay to the project curtails it," said Mainstream Power's founder and CEO Eddie O'Connor.
"The earlier we get an intergovernmental agreement, the sooner we can start spending this money. Before we can spend seriously big money we need to see that both governments are committed."
Mr O'Connor was speaking at a conference in Tullamore where some of the world's leading manufacturers of wind farm components and transmission technology met to discuss the potential of setting up a supply chain in the midlands worth at least 7bn.
Between 2016 and 2020, Mainstream's 5,000 megawatt Energy Bridge alone will require 1,700 turbine towers, 5,000 blades, 1,700 nacelles, 16,000km of inter-array cabling, 1,700 convertors, 30 electrical substations and 400km of HVDC underground cables. Rather than importing these materials, which are worth well in excess of 7bn, the plan is to attract these manufacturers to set up base in Ireland employing tens of thousands of people locally.
Mr O'Connor said if you could show the companies the development was going ahead they would locate manufacturing plants here.
Larry de Vaal, business development manager with wind turbine manufacturer XEMC Darwind said: "XEMC Darwind has already looked at manufacturing opportunities in Ireland and with a project of this scale there is a very real opportunity to locate component manufacturing, assembly, installation and long-term maintenance here in the midlands."
However, Mr O'Connor said that there is a narrow window of opportunity during which Ireland needs to move or else the whole project will fail.
"We have taken an awful lot of risk upfront in anticipation that they (Government) will do what they said that they will do.
"There is a need in Britain for renewable power as they are committed in law to have 15% of their power generated by renewables by 2020. We have a window of opportunity we either take it now, use it of lose it."
With this insight and reports of global growth forecasts in renewable energy from both financial and market analysts in mind, Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics today announced its strategic initiatives for composite bearings applications in renewable energy markets.
The Bearings and Tolerance Rings Group at Saint-Gobain designs composite bearings solutions that withstand harsh vibration, improve efficiency, extend performance and reduce operational downtime in both solar energy and wind turbine applications. As part of its strategic focus in renewable energy markets, Saint-Gobain has added the design engineering expertise of industrial global market manager, Edward Rumble, to its team. With his extensive design and engineering experience, Rumble will lead the increasing efforts to develop the next generation of composite bearings for solar and wind applications.
"Renewable energy, fuelled by innovative solar and wind turbine technologies, will prove to be the future of sustainable power generation", says Rumble. "To help today's and tomorrow's leaders in renewable energy production, we are committed to partnering with OEMs to deliver innovative solutions that enhance efficiency in solar and wind applications."
For the solar market, Saint-Gobain manufactures an innovative, maintenance-free composite bearing. Proprietary fluoropolymer compounds in Solglide composite bearings increase the long-term operational efficiency of solar equipment, reduce energy usage and decrease long-term costs.
2013年4月26日 星期五
A new brick in the Great Wall
ALTHOUGH it is the weekend, a small factory in the Haidian district of Beijing is hard at work. Eight machines, the biggest the size of a delivery van, are busy making things. Yet the factory, owned by Beijing Longyuan Automated Fabrication System (known as AFS), appears almost deserted. This is because it is using additive-manufacturing machines, popularly known as three-dimensional (3D) printers, which run unattended day and night, seven days a week.
The printers require an occasional visit from a supervisor to top them up with the powdered materials they use as their “inks”, or to remove a completed item, but apart from that they can be left on their own. They build up the objects they are making one layer at a time, as the ink is sintered into place with a laser in a way that creates little waste and can make shapes impossible to achieve using the traditional “subtractive” technology of lathes, milling machines and cutting tools.
Though it is not yet ready for use in mass production (building things up is slower than trimming them down), 3D printing is excellent for making prototypes, customised jobs and short production runs, for there is no need to retool each time the specification changes. All that need be done is to alter the software that controls the print heads.
Western countries led the development of 3D printing, and the technique has been praised by Barack Obama as a way to revive America’s manufacturing industries. It may yet do so. But the extent to which that revival will be brought about by the return to America of production which has migrated to countries like China is harder to predict—for China has plans of its own.
At the moment AFS is in the prototyping business. Its customers are mainly aerospace firms and vehicle-makers that need experimental designs turned into metal quickly. The powders in its machines’ hoppers are plastics, waxes and foundry sand. The results are sent off to foundries, where they are used to make moulds for the sand-casting of metal objects.
According to William Zeng, AFS’s deputy general manager, all the parts needed to make a prototype car engine can be printed and cast in this way in under two weeks. A conventional machine shop would need several months to do that—not least because many of the components would have to be made by hand.
AFS also has a second line of business. It sells the laser-sintering printers it makes to others, for this is a rapidly growing industry. And some of its machines, which cost up to 1.5m yuan (about $250,000), can do more than just sinter plastics, wax and sand; they can sinter metals directly.
Indeed, one of the country’s largest 3D printers (though it was not made by AFS) does just this. It is 12 metres long and it belongs to the National Laboratory for Aeronautics and Astronautics at Beihang University. Wang Huaming, the laboratory’s chief scientist, told a digital-manufacturing seminar organised recently by the Laboratory of High Performance Computing, a government research institute, that this behemoth is being employed to make large and complex parts for China’s commercial-aircraft programme, which plans to build planes to rival those turned out by Airbus and Boeing.
These parts include titanium fuselage frames and high-strength steel landing-gear—objects that require the metal they are made from to be free of flaws which might cause them to fail. Printing such things, rather than making them from precast metal, will be a technical tour de force, and Dr Wang’s team is therefore working on the tricky problem of controlling the recrystallisation of metals after they have been melted by the laser.
The printers require an occasional visit from a supervisor to top them up with the powdered materials they use as their “inks”, or to remove a completed item, but apart from that they can be left on their own. They build up the objects they are making one layer at a time, as the ink is sintered into place with a laser in a way that creates little waste and can make shapes impossible to achieve using the traditional “subtractive” technology of lathes, milling machines and cutting tools.
Though it is not yet ready for use in mass production (building things up is slower than trimming them down), 3D printing is excellent for making prototypes, customised jobs and short production runs, for there is no need to retool each time the specification changes. All that need be done is to alter the software that controls the print heads.
Western countries led the development of 3D printing, and the technique has been praised by Barack Obama as a way to revive America’s manufacturing industries. It may yet do so. But the extent to which that revival will be brought about by the return to America of production which has migrated to countries like China is harder to predict—for China has plans of its own.
At the moment AFS is in the prototyping business. Its customers are mainly aerospace firms and vehicle-makers that need experimental designs turned into metal quickly. The powders in its machines’ hoppers are plastics, waxes and foundry sand. The results are sent off to foundries, where they are used to make moulds for the sand-casting of metal objects.
According to William Zeng, AFS’s deputy general manager, all the parts needed to make a prototype car engine can be printed and cast in this way in under two weeks. A conventional machine shop would need several months to do that—not least because many of the components would have to be made by hand.
AFS also has a second line of business. It sells the laser-sintering printers it makes to others, for this is a rapidly growing industry. And some of its machines, which cost up to 1.5m yuan (about $250,000), can do more than just sinter plastics, wax and sand; they can sinter metals directly.
Indeed, one of the country’s largest 3D printers (though it was not made by AFS) does just this. It is 12 metres long and it belongs to the National Laboratory for Aeronautics and Astronautics at Beihang University. Wang Huaming, the laboratory’s chief scientist, told a digital-manufacturing seminar organised recently by the Laboratory of High Performance Computing, a government research institute, that this behemoth is being employed to make large and complex parts for China’s commercial-aircraft programme, which plans to build planes to rival those turned out by Airbus and Boeing.
These parts include titanium fuselage frames and high-strength steel landing-gear—objects that require the metal they are made from to be free of flaws which might cause them to fail. Printing such things, rather than making them from precast metal, will be a technical tour de force, and Dr Wang’s team is therefore working on the tricky problem of controlling the recrystallisation of metals after they have been melted by the laser.
2013年4月14日 星期日
Turbine approved despite protests
Heavily disputed plans for a wind turbine in Clare were passed despite fears being raised it could set a precedent for more in the area.
St Edmundsbury Council’s development control committee spent almost two hours hearing about the application at a meeting on Thursday before following planning officer Gemma Pannell’s recommendation and approving the turbine. Nine councillors voted for the proposals and four against them.
Plans for the 78-metre-high turbine – the height of a 25-storey building – at Maple Hill, near Chilton Street, were opposed by a long line of organisations, including Clare Town Council and Stoke by Clare parish council.
English Heritage, the Colne-Stour Countryside Association, Suffolk Preservation Society and the Stop Turbines Over Clare (STOC) action group were also among those calling for the introduction of a turbine to be refused.
But councillors chose to ignore those concerns, and the 170 objection letters received, and vote through the plans.
Applicant James Sills said the wind turbine would provide power for 319 homes, though Iona Parker, from STOC, argued it would only power 125 homes.
“A renewable energy project that does more harm than good is not a sustainable development and under planning policy should be refused,” she said.
“The benefit is some electricity being generated resulting in some CO2 savings, but this area is in the bottom five per cent of places for generating wind in the UK so the benefit is miniscule compared to the harm that would be caused.
“The introduction of a vertical structure atop a hill in an area as unspoilt as this will cause irreparable damage to the landscape.”
Concerns were also raised about the method by which Mr Sills estimated how much power would be generated, as he based his figures on online data rather than data collected at the site.
Last year BT dropped plans for three turbines in Clare after their research showed there was not enough wind to make it financially viable.
But Mr Sills said in a letter to residents that putting up one wind turbine was entirely different to three, thus making his viable.
Margaret Golding of Clare Town Council said she was worried about the number of lorries that would be going through the town as construction traffic, while fears were voiced that the decision to build the turbine could result in more cropping up.
“This may be the precursor for others to go ahead if we approve this,” said Peter Stevens, representing Cavendish.
Mrs Pannell assured members the door to more turbines would not be opened and pointed out the cables to connect the turbine to the grid would run underground.
Speaking after the vote to push through the plans, Iona Parker said she feared the consequences of the decision.
“It doesn’t bode well for future applications and setting a precedent is a huge worry as ones on the scale of the one at Brinkley (Wadlow) could now be brought forward,” she said.
St Edmundsbury Council’s development control committee spent almost two hours hearing about the application at a meeting on Thursday before following planning officer Gemma Pannell’s recommendation and approving the turbine. Nine councillors voted for the proposals and four against them.
Plans for the 78-metre-high turbine – the height of a 25-storey building – at Maple Hill, near Chilton Street, were opposed by a long line of organisations, including Clare Town Council and Stoke by Clare parish council.
English Heritage, the Colne-Stour Countryside Association, Suffolk Preservation Society and the Stop Turbines Over Clare (STOC) action group were also among those calling for the introduction of a turbine to be refused.
But councillors chose to ignore those concerns, and the 170 objection letters received, and vote through the plans.
Applicant James Sills said the wind turbine would provide power for 319 homes, though Iona Parker, from STOC, argued it would only power 125 homes.
“A renewable energy project that does more harm than good is not a sustainable development and under planning policy should be refused,” she said.
“The benefit is some electricity being generated resulting in some CO2 savings, but this area is in the bottom five per cent of places for generating wind in the UK so the benefit is miniscule compared to the harm that would be caused.
“The introduction of a vertical structure atop a hill in an area as unspoilt as this will cause irreparable damage to the landscape.”
Concerns were also raised about the method by which Mr Sills estimated how much power would be generated, as he based his figures on online data rather than data collected at the site.
Last year BT dropped plans for three turbines in Clare after their research showed there was not enough wind to make it financially viable.
But Mr Sills said in a letter to residents that putting up one wind turbine was entirely different to three, thus making his viable.
Margaret Golding of Clare Town Council said she was worried about the number of lorries that would be going through the town as construction traffic, while fears were voiced that the decision to build the turbine could result in more cropping up.
“This may be the precursor for others to go ahead if we approve this,” said Peter Stevens, representing Cavendish.
Mrs Pannell assured members the door to more turbines would not be opened and pointed out the cables to connect the turbine to the grid would run underground.
Speaking after the vote to push through the plans, Iona Parker said she feared the consequences of the decision.
“It doesn’t bode well for future applications and setting a precedent is a huge worry as ones on the scale of the one at Brinkley (Wadlow) could now be brought forward,” she said.
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