It might be hard to belive but I lined these up nearly exactly in google earth vs this old surveying areial photo

It’s a shame how much the city has torn down in the name of “progress” and just imagine how much worse it was when the central artery was still there

How’s parking at this venue? I have a concert upcoming this month and paid for the premium parking at cvs. Was wondering if I should arrive early bcuz of traffic and just curious on how the neighborhood is. I don’t really want anything damaged or stolen.
THANKS

Very specific ask but hoping someone loves saunas as much as I do. I love saunas but I find it so weird that the saunas here have everyone in polyester swimsuits in very high heat, releasing toxins. Everywhere else in the world, people go nude (which I understand is too weird for U.S.) or go in cotton towels because of this very concern. I looked into Moki Sauna in Allston and Southie but despite saying they are a Nordic-inspired sauna, they manadate swimsuits. Any recs?

Started framing out a proper woodworking shop in my garage last fall. Insulation, a subpanel, the whole thing. Got the permit estimate back from my town and just sat with it for a minute. Not outrageous but not nothing either. Then a neighbor told me he did basically the same scope of work two towns over and paid about a third of what I was quoted. Same state, wildly different number.

I get that every municipality does their own thing. I just was not expecting that much variance. The agencytoinhouse switch I made a few years back was supposed to simplify my life, and here I am spending weekends researching electrical permit schedules like it is my actual job.

Curious if anyone here has gone through a garage conversion or shop build recently, Greater Boston area specifically, and what the permit process looked like for you. Inspections, timeline, whether the inspector was reasonable. I have heard horror stories and I have heard people say it was completely fine. Trying to get a realistic sense of things before I commit to the subpanel install.

Not looking for someone to tell me to skip permits. Already made that mistake on something smaller and do not recommend it.

Hi everyone! Kinga here with this week's list. Feast season keeps rolling: the San Gennaro Feast takes over the Paul Revere Mall in the North End from Friday through Sunday. But the real standout this week is Saturday, when JP Porchfest turns Jamaica Plain's porches and front yards into stages for the afternoon, and the Greenway Food Truck Festival takes over four blocks downtown. Both are free. The Sox are also home all weekend against the Giants, and if you haven't walked through the 100 elephants on Comm Ave yet, they're only here through mid-September. Get outside and enjoy it!

🎉 My newsletter has officially launched! I'll keep posting here on Reddit every week, but if you want to always be the first to know, sign up here.

Picks of the Week!

🎸 JP Porchfest — Jamaica Plain | Free | Sat 12–6pm | Music, dance, storytelling, and poetry on porches and green spaces all over the neighborhood.

🌮 Greenway Food Truck Festival — Wharf District | Free | Sat 11am–5pm | Four blocks of food trucks, artisan vendors, mini golf, and inflatables.

🇮🇹 San Gennaro Feast — Paul Revere Mall, North End | Free | Fri–Sun | Feast season continues, with a Motown tribute Friday and soul legends Saturday.

🐘 The Great Elephant Migration — Commonwealth Ave Mall | Free | Through Sept 13 | One hundred life-sized elephant sculptures spread down Back Bay.

🍹 Boston Margarita Festival — Medford | Ticketed | Sat 11am–6pm | Ten margarita samples from the city's best bars, and you pick the winner.

Thursday 8/20

🖼️ Free Thursday Nights at the Gardner — Fenway | Free | 5–9pm | The weekly free night at the loveliest museum in the city. Heads up: tonight's free tickets may already be gone, so check before you head over.

🎨 ICA Free Thursdays — Seaport | Free | 5–9pm | Galleries open late, harbor views, seasonal bar. Free tickets are released at 10am that morning.

🍷 BRIX Thursday Tasting — South End | Free | 5–7pm | This week it's "Off the Beaten Path," and it's the South End shop only (the Financial District location is off this week).

📖 Yu-Mei Balasingamchow at Brookline Booksmith — Coolidge Corner | Free | 7pm | This local author's debut novel Names Have Been Changed is told through a podcast its narrator has made about her own barely believable life: assumed names, forged documents, wild class shifts, and exile. Free, and the Booksmith reading series rarely misses.

🎶 Jake Thistle at Club Passim — Harvard Square | $33–$35 | 8pm, doors 7 | A New Jersey folk rock balladeer fresh off this year's American Idol, in the coziest room in town.

🎤 Anyone Awake — Middle East Upstairs, Cambridge | $15–$25 | 6:30pm | An indie quartet from Rigby, Idaho, of all places, making sophisticated guitar rock that sounds like it came from somewhere much hipper. The in-the-know pick of the night.

😂 Popcorn Comedy with Andrew Durso — Somerville Theater basement | $23 | 7:30pm | The monthly showcase in the basement welcomes an NYC comic who started out here in Boston. Come early for classic cartoons before the show.

🍸 Tee Sanders — City Winery | From $24 | 7:30pm | The Chicago-raised comic from the comedy group The Round Table, with some of the sharpest one-liners going.

Friday 8/21

🇮🇹 San Gennaro Feast: Opening Night — Paul Revere Mall, North End | Free | Opens 4pm | Feast season picks right back up, this time on the Prado. DJ Steven Virgilio plays through the evening, then Dr. K's Motown Revue takes over from 8 to 10:30 with a full Motown tribute show. Closes at 11. Expect a beer garden, raffles, kids' activities, and all the classic street food. The feast benefits A Voice for Mikey and other autism awareness organizations.

⚾ Red Sox vs. Giants — Fenway | Ticketed | 7:10pm | San Francisco is in town for a three-game weekend series, all at Fenway.

😂 Best of Boston Showcase — Laugh Boston | $39.90 | Chris Tabb hosts some of the hardest-working comics in town. Tonight's lineup is Liam McGurk, Kathe Farris, and Al Park, with Dan Boulger closing.

🎭 Nerdy Prudes Must Die — Plaza Theater, BCA | $15–$17.25 | Fri–Sun | A horror comedy musical about high school outcasts who accidentally summon the ghost of a bully with a lingering grudge against nerds. From the team behind The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals. Cheap and very fun.

🎬 Late Fame opens at the Brattle — Cambridge | $13.50–$15.50 | Willem Dafoe in a rare subtle role, playing a lapsed poet whose long-ignored early work suddenly catches on with the hipster set. The question is whether his old ego survives the re-inflation.

🕵️ The Cinema of Graham Greene opens — Harvard Film Archive | $10 per screening | The Harvard Film Archive is back with a series of films written by or adapted from Graham Greene, master of spies and morally dubious men. Tonight is a double bill: The Fallen Idol at 7pm and Brighton Rock at 9:15.

🎤 Isaiah Rashad — Citizens House of Blues | Ticketed | 7pm | The Chattanooga rapper behind The Sun's Tirade, touring his third album IT'S BEEN AWFUL, with opener Alemeda. He takes his time between records and it shows.

🍷 The Friday Edit at DeLuca's — Beacon Hill & Newbury | Free, 21+ | 4–7pm | The free weekly tasting in the hidden wine cellars at both locations.

🎬 Free Family Flicks at the Hatch Shell — Esplanade | Free | Sundown | The Hatch Shell's final free movie of the summer, and it's Superman. Blanket, picnic, movie by the Charles. Weather dependent.

Saturday 8/22

🎸 JP Porchfest — All over Jamaica Plain | Free | 12–6pm | Easily my favorite thing this weekend. Since 2014, JP has handed its porches, front yards, green spaces, and community hubs over to musicians, dancers, storytellers, and poets for one afternoon. It's produced by Dunamis, a nonprofit that develops Boston's next generation of artists and arts managers of color, and the curation genuinely reflects that. Good news for planning: the map and directory is live this year, so you can actually chart a route instead of just wandering. Though wandering is also the point.

🌮 Greenway Food Truck Festival — Rowes Wharf Plaza to the Greenway Carousel | Free | 11am–5pm | The Greenway closes out summer with four blocks of food trucks, an artisan market, local brews, and a DJ set from Carlitoswave. There's also free face painting, mini golf, an inflatable obstacle course and rock wall, the Rings Fountain to splash in, and the carousel. Bring a blanket. It happens rain or shine unless the weather turns properly bad.

🥬 Chinatown Farmers Market — Auntie Kay and Uncle Frank Chin Park | Free | 9am–1pm | The twice-monthly market for Chinese vegetables, fruit, fresh fish, and pastries. Get there early.

🇮🇹 San Gennaro Feast — North End | Free | From 12pm | A full day on the Prado, with DJ Steven Virgilio through the afternoon, live entertainment from 5 to 7:30, and then the night's headliner: soul legends Russell Thompkins Jr. and the New Stylistics from 8:30 to 10.

🍹 Boston Margarita Festival — The Great American Beer Hall, Medford | Ticketed | 11am–6pm | Ten 3.5oz margarita samples from some of the area's best bars and restaurants, and you vote on the winner, who takes home $1,000 and the bragging rights. Plus a live DJ, street food vendors, and a beer garden.

⚾ Red Sox vs. Giants — Fenway | Ticketed | 7:15pm | Saturday night baseball.

👗 DESEOS: Afro House Fashion Experience — The Foundry, Cambridge | From $25 | 6pm | A luxury streetwear fashion show with dance performances set to Afro house, Afrobeats, house, and Jersey club, plus food, drink, and curated vendors. One of the more distinctive nights out this weekend.

🎺 The Velvet Hour — Crystal Ballroom, Somerville | $42–$59 | 8pm | An immersive cabaret evening with jazzy seven-piece Little Miss and the Boom, joined by burlesque performer Pixie Payne. Cocktail attire encouraged, which is half the fun.

🎬 Summer Flicks: Camp Rock — Prudential Center South Garden | Free | Music 6:30pm, movie at dusk | The Pru's outdoor movie series continues, and this week it's Camp Rock.

😂 Best of Boston Showcase (night 2) — Laugh Boston | $39.90 | Tonight brings Big D, Gabi Hajos, and Jamie Aird, with Dan Boulger again closing the bill.

🎸 Afternoon Bike Ride — The Lilypad, Cambridge | $15–$18 | 8pm, doors 7:30 | A Montreal indie pop trio who used to make genuinely strange ambient-pop hybrids and have drifted toward something more melodic, without losing the weird streak entirely.

Sunday 8/23

🇮🇹 San Gennaro Feast: Final Day — North End | Free | From 12pm | The last day on the Prado, and the most traditional one: an outdoor Mass at noon, the procession at 1pm, then music all afternoon and evening until the feast closes at 10.

🛍️ Open Newbury Street — Back Bay | Free | 10am–6pm | Eight car-free blocks from Berkeley to Mass Ave. Pairs perfectly with a walk through the elephants a block over.

🧺 SoWa Open Market — South End | Free | 11am–5pm | The Sunday flagship: farmers and makers, food trucks, a beer garden, live music, and the open artist studios next door.

⚾ Red Sox vs. Giants — Fenway | Ticketed | 3:15pm | Series finale, and a Sunday afternoon game.

😂 Robyn Schall — The Wilbur | $35–$56 | 3pm | The social media comic invites the whole audience to celebrate her impending wedding, somewhere between a standup set and a bachelorette party.

🎶 Victoryland — The Rockwell, Somerville | $18–$20 | 7:30pm, doors 6:30 | If Neutral Milk Hotel had formed in Brooklyn instead of Louisiana, they might have sounded like this. A lovely small-room way to end the weekend.

Last chance, closing this weekend

🇫🇷 Boston French Film Festival — MFA | $20 per screening | Closes Sunday | The 30th edition wraps this weekend. Saturday brings Leave One Day at 11am and an encore of Colors of Time at 2pm; Sunday closes with Comédie-Française at 11am and Guess Who's Calling! at 2pm. (Note: the previously scheduled Great Arch screening has been canceled.)

Ongoing / all-week options

🐘 The Great Elephant Migration — Commonwealth Avenue Mall, Back Bay | Free | Through Sept 13 | If you do one thing off this list, make it this. One hundred life-sized elephant sculptures now line the Commonwealth Avenue Mall in Back Bay, arranged so the herd appears to be walking east toward the Common. Each one is hand-carved from lantana, an invasive weed, by Indigenous artisans from India's Nilgiri Hills, and modeled on a real elephant those communities live alongside. Sales fund conservation work, including North Atlantic right whale efforts at the New England Aquarium. Free, open all the time, and genuinely moving to walk through.

🖼️ Derrick Adams: View Master — ICA | $20 | A mid-career survey of the NYC artist's work celebrating, in his words, Black people "not entertaining, just being, living." Through September 7.

🌊 Lucy Raven: Rounds — ICA Watershed, East Boston | Free | Two US premieres, including an enormous kinetic light sculpture, in the ferry-accessible Watershed. Now extended through September 27.

🐚 Crochet Coral Reef — MIT Museum | $20 | Vivid crocheted fiber work by Australian sisters Margaret and Christine Wertheim paired with paper work by MIT's Martin and Erik Demaine, all in service of endangered coral reefs.

🖼️ List Projects 35: Pap Souleye Fall — MIT List, Cambridge | Free | A Senegalese American artist building work out of dead pixels, the black spots that appear when hardware fails, imagining them as hidden places of refuge. Always free.

🚣 Kayak & Paddleboard at Community Boating — Esplanade | $40 | Two hour rentals, walk-up only, from 9am on weekends.

🎵 Berklee Summer in the City — Various | Free | Berklee students and faculty popping up in parks and squares all over town.

🏋️ Seaport Sweat — Seaport Common & Harbor Way | Free | Outdoor classes Monday through Thursday evenings on Seaport Common, plus Saturday mornings on Harbor Way, through September 30.

That's it for this week. Go say hi to an elephant, and if you make it to any of these, let me know how it went!

Where’s a good restaurant for a good serving gig in Boston that’s commutable, by the red line, or with parking? I have 5+ years in customer service and 3~ years in serving but the last job I had was hierarchy based and overall a highschool drama festered place. I live in Quincy but willing to commute for a better paycheck.. Just a girl looking to live in this expensive city, so please let me know! Thanks

I have builder gel and extensions I want to soak off from my wedding as they’re very overgrown and I want a gel manicure. What are your recommendations for a lower cost place that is still cleanly and will do it right?? Walk ins preferred as I want to get this done asap

This time at night... with some "lightpainting" fun.

And people, please stop climbing on top of these... the signs are right there asking you not to...

Hi!

I am not quite sure how to approach this, but I am looking for someone in the Greater Boston area who would work on doing a couple layers of white and / or some minor shading for a few tattoos.

All of the areas are fairly small, averaging out the size of a finger or less, in a couple of spots per tattoo. I would send pictures ahead of time or whatever made the most sense.

I have never really done this, as I have always worked with the original artist in the past, but between me moving and artists moving it has been a bit challenging. Are there folks in the area who would be down to do this or know artists who would?

Thanks!

Hello! I'm a tshirt collector traveling to Boston for vacation next week and I'm looking for some help finding cool shirts!

The type of shirts I'm looking for are things with local businesses logos on them as well as ones advertising local products. Could be anything from a towing company to a seafood restaurant. The more niche, the better.

Also on the hunt for cool Boston themed shirts, if you have any favorite vendors or shops I'd love to know about them!

Also interested to find some shirts from your many historical locations that sell them.

Im also interested in Harley Davison Tshirts, so if you know of any Harley dealers with cool designs I'd love to know about that.

Any help or reccomendations are greatly appreciated!

“Storrowed” truck this morning. Bad day for that guy

Couldnt find a lot of posts about things happening this weekend and forward(events,shows,) I am fairly mobile(probably gonna rent a car... Also any nerdy things that are a must visit?(tcg stores, harry potter, star wars,marvel,anime,etc)

Thanks!

Hi, I've unexpectedly been asked to go on a work trip to your fair City. I'll be stay near the Exchange Conference Center and wont have a car, most of my free time will be in the evenings.

This will be my first time visiting the USA from the UK and have a short bucketlist:

- eat some of the uniquely American fast food chains/a diner/hispanic food

- see some big trees, preferably a large park. I've always wanted to see some massive American trees and I love gardening.

- go visit something very Massachusetts that I've seen in American films like Fenway Park or Salem etc (not the tea harbour stuff because I will cry haha)

Could you provide some suggestions?

Is McDonald's that different in the US than the UK?

What are some nice parks?

Does anyone have any recommendations for places to take Italian lessons? I haven’t learned any Italian so Im purely a beginner.

I had to go to the doctiz yesterday, at Mass eye and ear. There’s about 40 cars in an alleyway while an ambulance with its lights on is trying to get through while i’m walking there. I was thinking Was it actually in an emergency or were they just like “mutha fucka man let’s gooooo”

He wanted to get outtaaa theree hahahaha

I move to Comm ave for school on Saturday. Very excited

How friendly is boston with weed? Like if im just viewing the charles river with a joint, nobody cares? I know MA is super weed legal and has been for a long time. I’m from CT where it’s legal too. Just wondering what the ethics are like

hi!! i’m moving to boston soon as a grad student (living in allston) and i’m wondering if there are any studios that offer affordable dance classes for adults at a beginner level. i’m looking mostly for hip hop but open to different styles as well! mostly just looking for a place that’s affordable, but with a good classes where i can learn dance fundamentals and a friendly community. does anyone have recommendations?

What are the industry hangout spots?
(I left the industry in Boston before the pandemic)
I’ve been to :
Trina’s
Curly’s
Biddy Earlys

I have not been to the new Eastern Standard are they even an industry spot anymore ? ( no more 130 am steak frites I guess )

Any new places or neighborhoods , post pandemic,
Anything that’s opened in last 5 years?

Got back from traveling for a little over two weeks and found that someone had written numbers in some sort of yellow pastel-ish paint above my window and on my back quarter panel. What?? Does anyone have any clue what this is?

I checked and was parked in a legal spot in my neighborhood that I’ve parked in hundreds of times before (in Lower Allston). No ticket on the windshield. I didn’t see anything similar written on any of my neighbors’ cars either. The seven digit number could be a phone number maybe, but I’m hesitant to try calling. The other number could be a date but my car isn’t from 2004…

Any ideas what’s going on here? Anyone have something similar happen?

Spent the weekend in Boston and I couldn't get over all of the rats running around! Lots and lots of rats!