Philly Love Notes Says Goodbye

The site is closing down after 3 1/2 years and 300 odes to the city. Emma Fried-Cassorla will post its 300th, and final, entry tonight.

Emma Fried-Cassorla, the

Emma Fried-Cassorla, the founder of Philly Love Notes | Photo by Bradley Maule

Philly Love Notes, the website that gave people literally hundreds of reasons to crush on a city that can feel frustratingly unlovable at times, is calling it quits.

Emma Fried-Cassorla, the site’s founder, announced that she is publishing its final love note on Tuesday night. Philly Love Notes’ archives will remain online for people to enjoy, however, and the brand’s Facebook and Twitter accounts will continue to share content.

“Philly Love Notes as a blog is finished because it did what it needed to do — it’s been a part of the changing conversation about Philly, it’s provided (and will still provide) a space of total positivity for the city, and it’s helped me meet hundreds of new people and fall deeper in love with the city,” said Fried-Cassorla in an email. “The social media accounts will remain in order to keep pushing out positive messages, but the blog, well, it reached 300 posts (the 300th will be mine), and it seemed like a good number to stop at, so I did.”

Philly Love Notes was created at the perfect time. It was 2012, and officials had recently announced that Philadelphia was growing for the first time in 60 years. There was a renewed sense of optimism about Philly, and yet many people kept talking about it in the same old defeatist ways. Philly Love Notes dared to try something new, and though it ever-so-occasionally veered toward being too saccharine, it more often than not challenged our ideas about the city’s image, reminded us why we love well-known attractions, and introduced us to charming places we’ve never been.

Philly Love Notes captured the zeitgeist of the last few years, and it will be missed.

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