Stateside Live! Is Getting a $20 Million Glow-Up, Just in Time for Philly’s Biggest Summer
Rendering of the updated Stateside Live! in the South Philadelphia Sports Complex / Renderings courtesy of Comcast Spectacor
If the South Philly Sports Complex already feels like the center of the universe on game days, it’s about to get a whole lot louder and more ambitious. Comcast Spectacor and the Cordish Companies are unveiling a refreshed Stateside Live! (fka Xfinity Live) on May 29th after a $20 million expansion that they hope will turn the space into something more than a place to grab a drink before kickoff or watch a game you couldn’t get into.
Instead, they’re hoping you might come to Stateside Live! without a ticket to anything — and not feel like you’re missing out.
At the center is a rebuilt plaza designed to handle up to 5,000 people, anchored by a new outdoor concert stage that they hope will pull in national acts as well as watch parties and local events. (Think less tailgate-adjacent and more programmed like a venue.)
For opening weekend they’re planning a free concert by Taking Back Sunday (free tickets will be released online Friday, April 17th at 10 a.m.) followed by DJ duo Two Friends the next night.
“As we look ahead to the future of the South Philadelphia Sports Complex, the newly transformed Stateside Live! represents an important anchor for what’s next,” said Dan Hilferty, chairman and CEO of Comcast Spectacor. The expansion connects to a longer-running question about what the Sports Complex could become beyond game days. If you’ll recall the discussions and speculations surrounding the Sports Complex as the 76ers postured their Market East arena plan in 2023, the prospect of adding a stadium-district music venue to capture the smaller-show market was one that Comcast Spectacor was entertaining as part of a broader redevelopment vision of the area as all four major teams stayed put.
According to an insider at Comcast Spectacor, that project is now “on hold” as they focus their priorities on plans for the new arena. Once that is built, they’ll have a better idea of what else fits in with the revamped Sports Complex, they said. So, while an additional entertainment venue hasn’t been ruled out entirely, the new outdoor stage at Stateside Live! may be how, for now, live music could play a larger role in the complex’s future.
Rendering of the two-level AVA rooftop bar
Back to Stateside Live!, they’re also planning a new, two-level rooftop bar, AVA, rising above the complex with unobstructed views of the stadiums — a perspective the Sports Complex has never really capitalized on. (Imagine posting up with a cocktail for fireworks games this summer!) They’re going for elevated lounge vibes, with bottle service, DJ sets, and a menu featuring lobster rolls and short-rib sliders.
Rendering of AVA’s second floor
Down below, the country-themed PBR Philly nearly doubles in size with the Backyard and a bigger dance floor; while a new Blue Moon Beer Garden and Stateside Crush cocktail bar add more reasons to linger outside. The whole thing is built to flex: daytime hangs, game-day overflow, nighttime dance parties.
The indoor food lineup sticks with what works: Chickie’s & Pete’s, Lorenzo’s Pizza, Geno’s Steaks.
All of this is landing just as South Philly heads into one of its most packed stretches ever, with both the World Cup and the MLB All-Star Game bringing huge crowds to the complex this summer.
Stateside Live! is clearly trying to capture that moment, but more importantly, it’s trying to stick around after it. The real test may not be opening weekend or those high-profile sporting events that put us on the world stage, but whether this feels like somewhere you’ll go when nothing major is happening at all.
Living in Fitler Square: A Neighborhood Guide
Fitler Square’s cheery rowhouses / Photograph by Jon Lovette/Alamy
Tucked away in Center City’s far southwest corner, Fitler Square is a surprisingly peaceful — and almost totally residential — enclave. Its lovely tree-lined streets and well-appointed rowhouses give it a more intimate feel than neighboring (and always bustling) Rittenhouse, with Carl Dranoff’s One Riverside condo tower providing its lone splashy exclamation point. Two beautiful parks add to the community’s relaxed character, and a smattering of eateries (several with outdoor seating) beckon locals and visitors to linger over a meal.
Pine Street Grill / Photograph courtesy of Pine Street Grill
One of the latest — and most exciting — additions to the dining scene is Pine Street Grill, run by the duo who brought us Rittenhouse’s My Loup and Her Place Supper Club and serving classic American fare. It fits right in with favorites like Cafe Lutécia, Trattoria Carina, Sally, and Rowhome Coffee.
On Saturday mornings (year-round!), folks can stock up on fresh, seasonal produce from the farmers market, held in the square itself. Or they can stop by Bacchus Market and Catering to pick up sandwiches and salads for a springtime picnic in either of the parks. (Nearby Schuylkill River Park has tables available on a first-come, first-served basis — and it’s fun to watch pups play at the fenced-in dog runs.)
Schuylkill River Park / Photograph by Bre Furlong
And if a Fitler Square resident wants more, it’s probably accessible on foot or by public transit. That’s what drew Kim Dillon, who grew up in the neighborhood, back after two decades in the posh Phoenix suburb of Scottsdale. “We wanted our kids to grow up in a cultural environment,” says the 53-year-old retired investment adviser. “And we wanted them to experience diverse-background city living.” Dillon appreciates the abundance of attractions and amenities in and close to Fitler Square. Plus, she says, “There’s a lot of access to academia, and we love that there are playgrounds and art museums nearby. It’s a great place to raise kids.”
While there have been many changes in the neighborhood during her time away, one thing she says hasn’t changed is its small-town feel. “The kids I grew up with — my kids are playing with their kids,” she says. “You’ve got a great sense of community here. You’re like one degree of separation from everyone else.”
Published as “Living in Fitler Square” in the April 2026 issue of Philadelphia magazine.
Gardening for Good: Grave Gardening at The Woodlands
Grave gardening at The Woodlands / Photograph by Ryan Collerd
At The Woodlands, a volunteer-staffed program restores flowers to cradle graves and builds community in the process.
(Almost) Everybody Must Get Stoned at Alex Grubard’s Long-Running Comedy Game Show
Chanel Ali takes the mic at a previous edition of Weeding out the Stoned, hosted by Alex Grubard (right). / Photograph courtesy of Alex Grubard
When Alex Grubard steps onto the stage to host another edition of Weeding out the Stoned, he knows he’s going to be herding cats all night. Founded on small Philly comedy stages 11 years ago, the show requires the audience to determine which of the eight comedians on his panel are high at the moment, and which one is stone-cold sober. Along the way, Grubard administers several “sobriety tests” of dubious scientific rigor that have contestants riffing, blowing up balloons, reciting the alphabet backwards, etc.
Still, it’s not as easy as it sounds. “I try and tell the audience before the show — they’re all comedians. They’re all gonna say things that are silly. Don’t eliminate silly. Eliminate stupid.”
Grubard, who was a Temple student when he created the show in 2015, now lives in Jersey City, but frequently takes the show on the road. The current tour in celebration of the 4/20 holiday includes stops in Boston, New York, and Philly’s Sidequest Theater on April 18th. Part of the appeal of Weeding out the Stoned, Grubard says, is the result of changing attitudes about pot. “People like that little rebellion.”
You probably couldn’t have done this show 25 years ago.
Weed was just decriminalized in Philly right when we started. Honestly, the timing couldn’t have been better in regards to that. Now you read [about] people going to shows and not drinking; they’re getting high beforehand. I think it just kind of taps into what’s been trending — a trend that’s now happened that’s dispensary based, and edibles, and dog walker joints, and things like that, new little things that you never would have really done that much. I mean, when I started eating edibles, they were cookies, they were brownies.
What’s it like trying to maintain order during Weeding Out the Stoned?
With comics, there’s a way to lead them places. It’s like an organic, “unscripted television kind of thing.” They’re performers. They know what to do. And if people get off track, I’m always there to bring them back to the game show.
Sometimes you let them ramble.
It’s like letting somebody dig their own grave a little bit. We’re eliminating the people that are being high, so if you’re going off on rant after rant and being such a big personality, people are going to be like, “That guy is high.” I love when people do stuff like that, but you can tell. They’re not fooling anybody.
You can tell some people are impaired, regardless of all the sobriety tests.
It’s so fun when somebody on stage gets the giggles, or even in the audience. I mean, it’s an interactive show.
When you go to a different city, you have to try to recruit comedians from that area?
Every area has a local comedy scene, and people coming in from out of town for other shows. You get this lineup of eight people that maybe would have never been in the same green room at the same time. It’s great going to local comedy scenes and being like, “Hey, wanna do something other than a stand-up showcase?” It’s a little more of a community thing.
You’ve had some comics like Todd Glass, Jordan Jensen, and Danny Tamberelli on the show. Do you have a wish list, like Doug Benson perhaps?
Definitely, Doug Benson. I’m a big Tommy Chong guy. Those are some big names as far as weed guys go. Noah Gardenswartz is a super funny comic; I don’t think he’s ever done the show. Sometimes I get surprised, some comics that I love, I’ll be like, “Oh, you should be on Weeding.” And they’re like, “I did it in 2019.”
Weeding out the Stoned, April 18th, 7 p.m., $16.79, SideQuest Theater, 2030 Sansom Street.
Ask Dr. Mike: What the Hell Is Up With These God-Awful Seasonal Allergies?
Mike Cirigliano, aka Penn’s Dr. Mike, who explains why seasonal allergies are so bad and what medications might help
Listen to the audio edition here:
Meet internal medicine physician Michael Cirigliano, affectionately known as “Dr. Mike” to not only his 2,000 patients, who love his unfussy brilliance, tenacity, humor, and warmth (he’s a hugger!), but also to viewers of FOX 29’s Good Day Philadelphia, where he’s been a long-time contributor. For 32 years, he’s been on the faculty at Penn, where he trained. And he’s been named a Philadelphia magazine Top Doc every year since 2008. Now, he’s our in-house doc for the questions you’ve been itching (perhaps literally) to ask a medical expert who’ll answer in words you actually understand. Got a doozy for him? Ask Dr. Mike at victor@phillymag.com.
Dr. Mike, we just sent four astronauts up for a nine-day lunar flyby — the first manned NASA flight outside of low Earth orbit since Nixon was in the Oval Office — and brought them back safely to earth despite traveling at 25,000 miles per hour at temperatures twice that as the surface of the sun with a basically untested heat shield. And yet, we can’t seem to do much about seasonal allergies.
Well, we live on a planet that has so many plants and trees. That’s what makes the Earth so amazing. But they can also make people miserable.
How many people have seasonal allergies?
About one third of the population suffers from what we call either seasonal allergies or allergic rhinitis. It makes you have thickened nasal passages, itchy eyes, runny nose, lines under your eyes, and a little bit of swelling — you just feel miserable. And it can really affect your sleep to the point where you call people like Dr. Mike.
What are most of these people allergic to? Tree pollen?
Well, without getting too fancy-schmancy here, there are allergens everywhere. But right now, the thing that is making most people miserable is tree pollen. That starts in March but really starts to kick in now and lasts into early summer. That’s followed by grass pollen, which kicks in around June and July.
What medications actually help?
You have your nasal steroids. I like Sensimist, which is Flonase but with an improved applicator. Some people were complaining that Flonase had a bad smell and a bad taste, and the new design not only reduces those side effects but also gets better penetration into what we call the osteomatal complex. It’s the Grand Central Station of sinus schmutz, where all your maxillary frontal sinuses drain into. You want to keep that open because, if you don’t, you have the possibility of sinus infection. So nasal steroids are critical. The other thing I am a believer in is nasal lavage.
Like a neti pot?
So, a neti pot looks like a teapot and is from ancient times, before we had polymer plastics. A neti pot also uses gravity, and you have to hold it up and let it drain into your nose. I don’t recommend the neti pot. I recommend something like NeilMed sinus rinse. You put distilled water or boiled tap water or spring water into the squeeze bottle from the box and add this little packet of salt and bicarbonate. If you don’t put that in, it will burn the hell out of you and you’ll never do that again — and you squeeze the bottle and it flushes out all the schmutz.
Dr. Mike demonstrates nasal lavage, which can be helpful in treating seasonal allergies
Why can’t I just use water out of the tap directly?
There have been cases, especially down South, where there’s an amoeba in the tap water that can get into your brain and kill you. I do nasal lavage in the morning when I wake up and at night before I go to bed. I have a little touch of a deviated septum, and this has kept me out of the operating room. I’m afraid of surgery! For most people, Sensimist and nasal lavage should do the trick in keeping your sinuses clear.
My wife is on the CVS brand of Flonase and Claritin, and she uses eye drops. Plus, she takes Benadryl at night because she can’t sleep with allergies otherwise. Is she doing this right?
No. Some big mistakes. First of all, I realize why she’s taking Benadryl, but what worries me is that the Benadryl will actually dry her out at night, which will lead to an accumulation of nasal secretions.
We’re actually in New Jersey right now, so should I just pick up some indica weed gummies for her sleeping?
Oh, God. Here we go. I would suggest we come up with a better plan for her than taking Benadryl at night. The eyedrops are fine, but I think that if she can do the NeilMed twice a day with the Sensimist, she will see improvement and get better sleep. As for antihistamine, I suggest Allegra, which causes the least amount of drowsiness out of Benadryl, Allegra, and Zyrtec.
And if none of this works?
Well, maybe it’s time to see an ear, nose and throat person, or an allergist. There may be a deviated septum issue. Maybe she’ll need immunotherapy. But she should not be suffering. There’s no reason for that. No reason! There’s also avoidance therapy …
I’m guessing this is where you say that she needs to avoid nature. Problem is, she teaches at an outdoor, nature-based school and is literally in the woods all day, every day.
I imagine she’s not going to want to wear an N-95 mask in the woods. But at home, she should not have the windows open. Put the air conditioner on instead. Also, she needs to wash her hair and her clothes at night to get rid of all of the pollen that has accumulated. If she’s working in the woods, she’s going to have tree and grass pollen all over the place.
She just sent me a link for an expensive air purifier.
There you go. That’s another one.
I was hoping you would tell me it was a waste of money.
Put one in the bedroom.
I’m 51 years old and have never experienced any kind of allergy in my life. Am I out of the woods, so to speak?
You’re never really out of the woods until you die, alright? Any time of life, you can have these allergies. You might not be allergic to something but if you get exposed to it repeatedly, you can suddenly become allergic. Now, if your seasonal allergies are accompanied by a dark discharge from your nose or if you have a frontal headache or your teeth hurt, call me. This can be a sinus infection. And then we need to figure out if you need antibiotics. Sometimes, we’ll need to do a CT scan of the maxillofacial region.
I think I’ll just get a beach house and stay down there until this is all over.
Well, maybe, maybe not. There’s actually a lot of wind and grass down there. There’s a lot of pollen.
I just can’t win.
You’re screwed, basically, unless you go into a bubble where there are no allergens and the air is completely controlled, like on Artemis. But we have so much beautiful foliage and other outdoor things, and from a point of view of health, it’s good to get out. The benefits outweigh the risks.
Death Valley or Antarctica, here I come.
Well, yeah. In Death Valley, you’ll die from heat exposure and dehydration. In Antarctica, you’ll freeze to death.
Or be allergic to polar bear dander. Screwed no matter what.
No, no, no, no, no. We have technology, buddy. And, you know, it’s part of the fun of being on Planet Earth. Did you see the moon? Who the fuck wants to live over there?
Requiem for Fleur’s: A Great Restaurant You’ll Never Eat at Again
Dishes from Fleur’s / Photography by Mike Prince
Listen to the audio edition here:
By the time you read this, Fleur’s will be closed.
And that sucks. It sucks for all the usual reasons that any restaurant closure sucks. It means hopes dashed, people out of work, families left in the lurch, and dozens of lives and careers upended or thrown into a spin.
But the news about Fleur’s sucks a little extra because this was a huge project (130-seat restaurant, rooftop bar, event space, boutique hotel) that took years to put together. It had three serious industry heavyweights behind it (veteran chef George Sabatino, Josh Mann who did 16 years with Starr as an FOH pro, then a few more with Defined Hospitality, and Graham Gernsheimer, ex of Amis, Osteria, Frankford Hall, Loco Pez and elsewhere), and all of them had spent decades working for other people, running other peoples’ kitchens, bars and dining rooms. Over the years, these three guys kept bumping into each other, crossing paths in kitchens and back offices, until finally they decided they wanted to make something of their own, together. It was their big swing. Their retirement plan. The last restaurant any of them were going to work in.
“It felt like we’d found a home here,” Sabatino told me when I got him on the phone last week, just heading into the last couple days of service. And he meant that in every way.
George Sabatino
Fleur’s lasted seven months, opening day to closing night. The news about their closing broke late last week and, last night, it was all over. I ate my last meal there about a week before the announcement, prepping for a review that will never run, unwittingly taking part in a story where the end had already been written, just not yet made public.
Were there red flags? Absolutely. The slow tide of 6:30 p.m. reservations, the nearly empty bed of ice in the display case at the end of the raw bar, the fact that I was able to park almost right in front of the restaurant. I’ve been doing this a long time. I should’ve seen these signs from a mile off. But I didn’t.
And do you know why? Because the restaurant was really fucking good.
There were uni custard tarts with a shock of lemon and spoonfuls of golden Osetra caviar for the high rollers, plates of oysters with watermelon mignonette, white bowls of beef tallow frites at happy hour that paired perfectly with the rich and fatty pork terrine cut with a sting of pear mustard. The Parisian gnocchi (with local mushroom ragout, hazelnut oil, a bass note of thyme leaves) tasted like summer forest air at dusk, the heat of the day still rising from the ground, and Sabatino (who has always had a way with vegetables) also served thick slices of sweet potato here, creamy-soft and sharply grill-marked, topped with sunflower seeds for texture, then a line of mustardy sauce gribiche, threaded with dill, that cut through the heavy starch and sweetness like a razor.
At the bar, there were gin martinis spiked with white Armagnac, rum-and-rye Green Stripe cocktails, and a playlist of French pop and jazz filling the space when it was light on actual customers. Yes, service could be a little spotty. And the space itself always felt slightly unfinished to me (lots of white latex paint over brick, mezzanine seating guard-railed with white cutouts of the restaurant’s floral logo), but that was fine. Fleur’s was always going to be a work-in-progress at this point in their multi-phase roll-out, so even if it sometimes felt as if a very nice long bar and lounge were dropped into the middle of a not entirely built-out room, that was all easy to forget when the food started coming.
“We have made mistakes,” Sabatino told me on the phone. “We need to figure that out. But there’s lessons in here, for sure. I’m just beginning to process it.”
He tells me that none of this — the announcement, the closure — was the neighborhood’s fault. None of it was the staff’s fault. He says that they (he, Mann, and Gernsheimer) didn’t consider the neighborhood enough. That they didn’t provide the kind of experience that people were looking for.
“We wanted it to be the kind of place where you could show up in your gym clothes, sit at the bar, and get a roast chicken,” he explained, but that also they wanted it to be a destination. And trying to force a project to be both of those things at once? That rarely (if ever) works.
Tropea onion tarte tatin
On the other hand, the kitchen did make a very good roast chicken. Or half-chicken, actually — split along the breast, juicy, warm and with this ideal, crispy, black-and-golden skin. The kitchen separated the bird into a breast and wing, drumstick and rib, piling them on the plate with whatever sides strike them. In the gray months, a spray of green herbs and rich pommes duchesse or a cheesy gratin. More recently, as the seasons turned, quartered and roasted baby potatoes, a red and green pepper Basque piperade that leant a spark to the tender meat, and all of it swimming in a rich and buttery sauce that felt, in the early days of spring, like a luxury earned after a long, cold winter. At my last dinner, at one of the last tables Fleur’s would take, I paired mine with a Tropea onion tarte tatin, served like half a pie on a dark plate, under a bright white snowfall of grated Gruyère and with a curl of cultured cream to the side, dotted with a well of chive oil.
Tropea onions are Calabrian, extremely sweet (for an onion), and shaped like old-fashioned Christmas lights — bulbous in the middle and pointy at the end — and Fleur’s kitchen had used them whole, cut with tangles of sweated, miso-marinated shallots, baking the onions soft and caramelizing them the same way you would apples in the more recognizable version of this recipe. It was amazing. Overwhelming. And it killed me that I couldn’t finish the whole thing (half an onion pie is a lot of onions for one man), but the first bite of it, before I had any idea what I was getting myself into, was remarkable. Unlike anything I’d tasted in forever. A rich and deep and woody sweetness, the bright garlic flavor of shallot, the bluntness of the pie shell and sour cream bite — all of it perfectly balanced. All of it incredibly delicious.
And that matters but, ultimately, it didn’t really matter, you know? Because Fleur’s closed anyway. Because Fleur’s was already closing while I was eating my onion tart, even if I didn’t realize it then.
“We knew a few weeks ago,” Sabatino told me. Knew that it was all going wrong. That they were probably going to have to close. “There’s something past saying, Okay, we have five cooks scheduled tonight and we’re going to cut a couple of them and just cover stations.” And that’s where Fleur’s was. The doom of it was already written, even then.
And the owners wanted to be as kind and as transparent about this awful thing as possible. They wanted to let their staff know as far in advance as they could so they could help get them placed elsewhere. They didn’t want payroll checks to start bouncing. They didn’t want suppliers to go unpaid. So they made this hard decision. They would close. Stop the bleeding. Seven months and they were going dark.
In my reviews, I used to live and die by the idea that nothing mattered more than the food. That I could be seated on an old milk crate in an alley in the rain, and if the food was good, I was going to call the place a success. But that black-and-white thinking — that misguided absolutism — was a younger man’s arrogance. It was a willful disregard for the thousand small choices that go into the opening of any restaurant, and the countless daily struggles of owners and operators just trying to keep the lights on. If it were just about the food, Fleur’s would still be here. My review would still be running. I’d be celebrating a place that was young and maybe a little bit clumsy, but growing well into the restaurant it someday wanted to be.
But that’s not the world we live in now.
The bar at Fleur’s before it opened in September 2025
Sabatino told me that there aren’t really any plans yet for what will happen with the Fleur’s space. He and Mann and Gernsheimer own the building — the massive 14,000-square-foot former furniture showroom and warehouse at 2205 North Front Street in Kensington — so they’re going to have to do something with it, but right now the ideas are all vapor.
“A 2.0 version would look like more of a neighborhood place,” Sabatino told me. Smaller. Fewer service days maybe. “Brunch right off the bat, for sure.” But he doesn’t really know. None of them do.
But someday, there’ll be a plan. New ideas. A new menu. Fleur’s 2.0 will come together simply because it has to. Because these guys have invested everything — time, money, their professional reputations — into this space. Because, at least right now, Sabatino (who planned his future around this project, and moved into a new place two blocks away about a year ago just so he could be closer to the restaurant), doesn’t see any other way forward.
And when it does, I’ll be there to check it out. Because while I may no longer believe that what’s on the plate is the only thing that matters when it comes to the success or failure of a restaurant, I still think it matters a lot. More than anything, just not more than everything. And one thing that was absolutely true about the team at Fleur’s?
They could really fucking cook.
Philly’s Outdoor Drinking Spots That Are Already Open for the Season
PHS Pop-Up Garden in Manayunk / Photograph courtesy of PHS
Spring is here, so despite the erratic weather, outdoor drinking season in Philly has officially begun! As with nature, the thaw is gradual; we’re waiting on a full roster of beer gardens, rooftops, and patios on which to wear sunglasses and sip cocktails. But that hasn’t stopped some of our favorites from leading the way, 40-degree days be damned. And for that we are thankful. So in that spirit, and to help you get a jump on your al fresco adventures, here are the seasonal outdoor drinking destinations holding it down — plus some more on the horizon.
PHS Pop-Up Gardens
PHS really started the whole seasonal pop-up beer garden craze years ago, so it’s only fitting that they got the season started, too: They soft-opened on March 13th, at 15th and South and in Manayunk. Both locations offer plenty of greenery, food, craft brews, and cocktails; plus events like plant swaps and craft workshops throughout the spring and summer seasons. As for the menus, Manayunk describes theirs as “boardwalk-inspired” with snacks like loaded fries, fried clams, and fish and chips. South Street’s offerings are more “globally inspired,” with new items like chai pretzel bites, Jamaican jerk wings with pineapple and passionfruit chutney, and tofu-ricotta dip with lemon zest and pita. And don’t worry: Both locations still have their frozen drink lineup, including the ever-popular Gritty Margarita (orange and rimmed with black salt, of course). 1438 South Street and 106 Jamestown Avenue.
Walnut Garden / Photograph courtesy of FCM Hospitality
Walnut Garden
The vacant, McDonald’s-size hole turned beer garden returned to Walnut Street on April 1st. The 11,500-square-foot space in Rittenhouse is laidback and both kid- and dog-friendly, so it works for weekend afternoons as much as it does for happy hour. Likewise, the food menu is approachable with cheesesteaks, chicken sandwiches, and shareable snacks. Bonus: They’re serving up $7 mimosas for Open Streets Sundays through May 17th. 1706-10 Walnut Stree
Parks on Tap
Parks on Tap is already back to touring for the season; this is their first weekend! They’ll be popping over 27 weeks, beginning with the Azalea Garden for their first two. With lots of room to run around, the cleanest bathroom trailers I’ve ever seen, and food offerings like burgers and hot dogs for the kids, this is one of the best ways to spend a lazy weekend afternoon. Even better? A portion of all proceeds benefits each park they visit, ensuring outdoor play can go on long after the tour. Here’s their lineup for the first two months of the season:
- April 8th-12th and April 15th-19th: Azalea Garden (East Fairmount Park)
- April 22nd-26th: Columbus Square (South Philly)
- April 29th-May 3rd: Schuylkill River Park (Fitler Square)
- May 6th-10th: FDR Park (South Philly)
- May 13th-17th: Matthias Baldwin Park (Logan Square)
- May 20th-25th: Clark Park (West Philly)
- May 27th-31st: Water Works (Art Museum)
- June 3rd-7th: Powers Park (Port Richmond)
- June 10th-14th: Burholme Park (Northeast)
Cantina La Martina nachos at Bok Bar / Photograph by Laura Swartz
Bok Bar
This South Philly rooftop fave just opened this week, and they’ve got an exciting chef residency lineup, too. To kick things off, James Beard-nominated chef Dionicio Jiménez of Cantina La Martina will be serving up tacos, nachos, and churros from April 9th through May 3rd. Here’s the whole lineup:
- April: Cantina La Martina
- May: Tabachoy
- June: Puyero
- July: Gabriella’s Vietnam
- August: Korea Taqueria
- September: Rice & Sambal
- October: Darnel’s
And as always, they’ve got a full season of events, from yoga to drag shows to Salsa Sundays. Check out the calendar here. 1901 South 9th Street
On the Horizon
Frankie’s Summer Club / Photograph by Laura Swartz
Frankie’s Summer Club
Philly’s newest beer garden opened last summer in the courtyard of what used to be UArts’ Furness Hall, and it’ll be back May 1st. Also returning: food and drink by Irwin’s (the soft-serve is a must) to complement the backyard-party vibes. 355 South 15th Street
Sunset Social
Located on the 1.2-acre Cira Green rooftop park, Sunset Social is planning its return on April 13th! Expect the return of Quizzo on Tuesdays, movie nights on Wednesdays, and kid-friendly movie matinees on Saturdays. Plus, they’ve got Thursdays set aside for the pups this year, with Paws and Pints every Thursday from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. 129 South 30th Street
Philly’s Driverless Future Is Here, Whether We’re Ready or Not
Is Philly ready for Waymo? / Photograph via Logoboom/Adobe Stock
Mamadu Barry — a 28-year-old structural engineer and part-time Uber driver — was behind the wheel this past February when he first spotted the future, tucked away in a parking lot in University City.
It was a white Jaguar SUV, though not straight from the factory: This model had sensors protruding from the hood like bug eyes. The back windows were pitch black; the front ones were clear. Most distinctively, a 360-degree rotational apparatus was rigged to the roof, striking a passing resemblance to a baby-bottle nipple. Emblazoned on the side of the car, rather than the automaker’s name, was the name of the company responsible for gussying it up: Waymo.
“I’m guessing they’re hiding them in there for now, getting ready to take over the world,” Barry said, when he spotted the vehicle.
He’s not wrong. Waymo — the self-driving car company owned by Google parent Alphabet — has rapidly scaled up its conquests in the past year. Today, Waymo robotaxis are zipping around 10 cities, including Los Angeles and Austin, where they can be hailed via an app. In some places, you can simply order one through Uber.
On a recent visit to Phoenix, where Waymo launched first, I shared the road with several driverless cars. I found their presence unsettling — the stuff of sci-fi — but my friend who lives in the city had actual horror stories, like the night a robotaxi erroneously dropped her off on the opposite side of town. And there was no stopping it.
Ever since, that friend’s husband has been exacting a bit of humanist revenge: throwing wood chips at Waymo cars whenever they’re idling on their street. Sensing danger, the vehicles move along. “I terrorize those things,” he says.
It’s arguably a hopeless rebellion. Hundreds of Waymo cars are on the road each day in Phoenix, the core of a national fleet numbering in the thousands. And Philly could be next. Waymo announced in September that it would be ramping up testing for a launch in several East Coast cities, including ours. You and I won’t be able to hail one for some time, contingent on approvals from PennDOT, but that hasn’t stopped the company from sending in human drivers in their cars to map Philly roads and train its artificial intelligence for prime time.
While Waymo spokesperson Ethan Teicher declined to give a timetable for offering commercial ride-hailing services in Philly, it sounds like the company is barreling toward a soft launch. “Our next step will be to operate the vehicles fully autonomously for employees only,” Teicher says.
You can imagine, probably, that plenty of Philadelphians won’t exactly welcome this future with open arms. Our distaste for outsiders and their ideas is legendary. “Distrust and caution are the parents of security,” Benjamin Franklin once wrote — and not much has changed our views since then.
Still, Waymo’s résumé does stand out for one notable reason: its safety record. According to the company’s own data, which is made available to independent researchers and is regularly submitted to peer-reviewed journals, AI drivers are far from amateurs. In fact, a recent company analysis, covering 127 million miles of trips taken by its fully autonomous robotaxis, suggested that autonomous vehicles are now vastly outperforming humans. The Waymo system, says Teicher, “achieved a tenfold reduction in serious-injury-or-worse crashes, and a twelvefold reduction in injury crashes with pedestrians.”
It’s quite the sales pitch, offering a tantalizing vision of the future, absent some of the worst forms of human behavior. AI drivers, after all, don’t text and drive. They don’t punch out someone’s mirror in anger; they don’t argue with their spouse while driving down 76. They don’t smoke or sneeze or answer the phone. They never try to flirt with you (or worse). To be clear, there are caveats to the company’s sterling record: Most driverless trips have been completed in safer-than-average driving conditions (avoiding freeways and hazardous weather for the most part). Still, the opportunity to save lives is a powerful motivator for embracing them.
Plus, proponents say, these cars are improving constantly due to deep-learning tools and advancements in computer vision, like the system affixed to the Waymo roof — those spinning baby-bottle nipples — which can “see” about 1,600 feet into the distance.
Adopted on a mass scale, advocates argue, driverless cars could be a public health breakthrough as much as a technological one. Some boosters have gone as far as to suggest that Vision Zero, the goal of eliminating traffic fatalities, might finally be in reach. (In Philly alone we average north of 100 traffic-related fatalities each year.)
Writing in The New York Times last year, Jonathan Slotkin, a neurosurgeon based a few hours northwest of Philadelphia, in Lewisburg, compared the early Waymo data to a groundbreaking clinical trial. “In medical research, there’s a practice of ending a study early when the results are too striking to ignore. We stop when there is unexpected harm. We also stop for overwhelming benefit, when a treatment is working so well that it would be unethical to continue giving anyone a placebo,” he wrote. Driverless cars, he believes, fall into the latter category.
Barry is less enthused. He’ll face immediate consequences from Waymo’s deployment, though he feels fortunate that ride-share earnings are not his primary salary. “I have friends whose lifestyle and family income are going to be very challenged,” he says. Waymo, after all, is partnering with Uber in some cities — ditching drivers in favor of AI. “[Uber] is a billion-dollar company, so [robotaxis] are not going to impact them that much. But for us? It could tank the entire industry for drivers.”
All of which highlights the obvious tension at play here. Road safety is a laudable goal. But at what expense? It gets downright existential, if you think about it: What is the human toll of replacing truck and ride-share drivers with robots in the country’s second-poorest big city? And, good or bad, are we ready for it?
Given a choice between modernity and tradition, Philadelphians will often side with the Luddites. Our public sector has at times been notoriously slow to adopt emerging tech (even email) over the course of decades. We had SEPTA tokens in circulation until two years ago. And who doesn’t look back fondly on the decapitation and dismemberment of hitchBOT? OK, maybe that last one had little to do with technology per se, but it seemed to amplify a familiar message: In Philly, no robots need apply.
Of course, in reality, it’s far less one-sided than that. While the city has had its fair share of technological failings, there has also been progress in some areas, like City Hall pulling the right levers over the past decade to promote electric vehicles and implementing various “smart city” pilots. And we have plenty of techno-optimists, it turns out, intrigued by the potential of Waymo to reshape how we live. “I imagine in a hundred years, future citizens of Earth will think it’s crazy that humans — with all of our flaws and distractibility and mixed judgment — were ever allowed behind the wheel of something so powerful,” says Jennifer Leonard, founder of a consultancy that advises law firms on AI strategy. There are plenty of folks in agreement with her in that modern town hall, Reddit, though there opinions range from “Philly drivers are scum” and Waymo should be an “order of magnitude safer” to those who’d prefer if we could bolster SEPTA before we see driverless cars hit the streets. Those mixed reactions are reflected in Harrisburg.
“It would be great if it turns out driverless cars are significantly safer than people behind the wheel of vehicles, but we know there are other proven things that make the roads safer,” says Philly-based Democratic State Senator Nikil Saval, who sits on the transportation committee. “Increased public transit is what we should be devoting ourselves to and orienting our cities around.”
In other words, maybe autonomous vehicles (AVs, for short) are a legitimate public-safety innovation, but they also invite concerns of their own, including from an environmental standpoint: While Waymo cars are emissions-free, like other advanced forms of AI they require significant electricity — and producing that, for the most part, requires, well, emissions. “These are like data centers on wheels,” Saval says. “Are we prepared for the massive increase in computing needs?”
There are also legislative and engineering feats that welcoming AVs would likely require: considering measures such as congestion pricing to offset the influx of volume on the roads that will result from AVs and changing our citywide approach to parking — a touchy subject for Philadelphians and elected officials.
But even more than all of these concerns, Saval says, he’s thinking about the potential human toll: “What are we prepared to do about those Uber drivers?”
We can’t rely on the big technology companies, because they have shown that they don’t care for their workers up to this point.” — State Senator Nikil Saval
About a decade ago, we were collectively asking the same question about taxi drivers when Uber stormed into Philly. Between 2014 and 2017, the value of a taxi medallion — the source of family-sustaining wealth for many taxi drivers — plummeted from a high of more than $500,000 to $10,000. Uber and Lyft eventually grew the total amount of jobs for drivers, although they ended up remaking them in the mold of the gig economy. Today, 74 percent of the roughly 29,000 Uber ride-share drivers in Philly work part time, or fewer than 30 hours per week. After expenses, they make an estimated $21.29 per hour. It’s better than the state’s paltry minimum wage ($7.25 per hour) but rarely enough to be considered a career.
One lesson that can be learned from the transition away from taxis is that some technologies don’t just obliterate jobs; they also transform the nature of work over time, often worsening outcomes for workers until there’s less to fight for and automation becomes inevitable. In other words, Uber had to crawl before Waymo could run.
Saval worries that this is a slippery slope — from taxi drivers to contract workers, and now contract workers to robots — that we’re right to be losing sleep over. “We can’t rely on the big technology companies, because they have shown that they don’t care for their workers up to this point.”
According to Waymo, the company employs local workers in the 10 cities where it’s currently operating at scale. Though Teicher declined to provide a specific number of jobs, he listed some of the positions that regularly need to be filled: operations partners with expertise in vehicle maintenance, construction and skilled trades, fleet management, and more — all told, “hundreds of people to support our service.”
Waymo also employs dozens of “remote assistance agents” in the Philippines. Wired recently wrote about these workers and their roles, describing them as “human babysitters” for robotaxis, which has led some conspiracy theorists to suspect that fully autonomous cars are currently a ruse — that there’s a person manning the joysticks abroad, like an episode of The Twilight Zone come to life. Even if that’s a stretch, the outsourcing of work to the Philippines is indicative of what can reasonably be expected of a Big Tech company’s relationship to employment in a city like Philly.
With roughly 29,000 active ride-share drivers in the Philly area, the situation has caught the attention of some in City Hall. Workforce concerns are one reason members of City Council, including at-large Councilmember Jim Harrity, recently called for hearings to study the wide-ranging impact of self-driving cars — including job displacement and consumer costs. In a city like San Francisco, where Waymo has grabbed 10 percent of the ride-hailing market share, the average fare remains 12 percent higher than Uber’s and 17 percent higher than Lyft’s.
It’s also difficult to imagine those costs going down substantially, at least anytime soon, considering that Waymo, the industry leader in self-driving cars, is billions of dollars in the red.
In the meantime, though, there’s also a chance that all of this hand-wringing over jobs in the short term is simply delaying the future, even slowing down the city’s ability to develop our infrastructure and economy for a new age. Besides, the question of whether Philly should or should not allow Waymo onto our streets is moot. It’s up to the state — not City Council — to allow Google to operate its robotaxis here (or not). And given that robots are expected to replace millions of driving jobs across the country over the next several decades, why would it be any different here?
Instead, this moment presents an opportunity to determine how this technology is deployed here — and who will ultimately benefit from it.
I want us to not only hold on to thinking about how we regulate the AV industry currently, but also hold on to the promise of what they mean for our society.” — State Representative Napoleon Nelson
State Representative Napoleon Nelson, a Democrat from Montgomery County, fears that without embracing AVs, Philly could slide backwards in more ways than one. “I think that all cities will need to have Waymo to be considered a real 21st-century metropolitan space,” says Nelson, a Mount Airy native and MIT computer science graduate. And, in fact, he thinks there are benefits to be gained far beyond Waymo.
Before robotaxis swarm our streets, Nelson would like all taxpayers to have access to the same technologies. He worries that the healthy fears over job losses related to robotaxis have overshadowed some of the positives around self-driving technology — such as the creation of newfound mobility for seniors and individuals with disabilities who could own a car without needing to drive it.
“I want us to not only hold on to thinking about how we regulate the AV industry currently, but also hold on to the promise of what they mean for our society,” he says.
Some women in media stories on the subject have reported that AVs feel safer precisely because they’re empty, considering the troublingly high rate of sexual assaults and harassment from ride-share drivers. Of course you hear counters to that, too. A recent article in the Washington Post described a phenomenon of passengers feeling like “sitting ducks” when people make threatening gestures toward the AI-controlled car, including multiple accounts of male drivers trailing and harassing women in Waymo cars. And the anxiety doesn’t end there. It’s not hard to imagine a world in which someone manages to hack into a car and drive off with you inside.
For Nelson, a Wharton MBA, these debates — and others, including Saval’s concerns over energy consumption — are not reasons to dismiss the technology altogether. He fears that knee-jerk instinct will hold us back from realizing that the toothpaste is already out of the tube when it comes to AI: “I do buy into the benefits of capitalism, and its ability to supercharge the innovation cycle,” he says. In his mind, there’s an opportunity to approach the adoption of driverless cars thoughtfully and with an eye toward equity, especially in a place like Pennsylvania. The state boasts a unique blend of institutions, such as Carnegie Mellon University, that are advancing the science behind these technologies; these institutions could be brought to the table with elected officials and workers to approach the future of driverless cars more thoughtfully.
“We’ve got the labor,” says Nelson. “We’ve got the strongest unions in the country. If there’s going to be a place that’s going to marry technology with the workforce, that should be happening at the table here in Harrisburg.”
In fact, the most fervent admirers of driverless cars have gone as far as to suggest that politicians who block Waymo will have blood on their hands, especially in a place like Philly, where traffic deaths are higher than in most cities.
What remains unclear is the timetable in Harrisburg for a decision on Waymo’s future in the commonwealth. Saval says that so far, he’s heard no rumblings about an impending hearing on Waymo from colleagues on the state’s bipartisan transportation committee. That doesn’t mean it can’t come together quickly.
In the meantime, nothing is stopping us — except, of course, the humans involved — from pushing for improved mobility and reduced accidents throughout the city and state. “There are many ways to get at safer streets,” says Saval. “Most of them are proven, and most of them don’t involve cars whatsoever. That will remain true, with or without the use of AI, and I hope we keep our sights on that.”
Back in early 2021, just as my own new sense of normal — or lack thereof — began to settle in during the pandemic, I took a plunge into the uncanny valley of artificial intelligence.
I visited a drone laboratory; I picked the mind of President Obama’s AI czar; I tried impersonating Jeff Goldblum using ChatGPT. All of it was reporting for a podcast called AI Nation, which, unfortunately, has lost relevance with each passing day due to the breakneck speed of AI advances.
One piece of content that hasn’t lost relevance, though, is a conversation with Andrew Hawkins, a senior transportation reporter for The Verge. At the time we spoke, he was one of the only people who’d ridden in the back of a Waymo in Phoenix, prior to the company’s public launch. And he recalled the first time he experienced a degree of hope as a passenger in a driverless car: witnessing a Waymo slam on the brakes for some pigeons in the middle of the road.
“You can very easily see a callous human driver just barreling through the flock of pigeons without any second thought,” Hawkins said, half-jokingly. “And yet this benevolent AI decided to spare the life of the lowly pigeon.”
That anecdote has been on my mind since Waymo’s arrival in Philly, because it clarifies something we can miss in thinking about AI: We often don’t trust our fellow humans to make the right decisions. I’d wager that some of the mistrust toward AI is a more generalized product of our lack of trust in one another, as a whole, which reached a new high during the pandemic.
As we turn over more control to AI in our daily lives, one risk is that we lose our ability to solve problems — because why would we, when the robot can do it? With the ingenuity that remains, perhaps the most pressing need is to find a way to make sure that AI is working for humanity, not against us, driving us toward a place we actually want to be.
We Asked, You Answered: Would You Waymo?
Photograph courtesy of Waymo
Riders and drivers around Philly on the prospect of driverless cars hitting the streets
“I’ve seen them in L.A. They’re everywhere there; my friends use them all the time. I can see using Waymo here, for low-stakes rides in which being late wouldn’t matter. What really appeals to me is not having to deal with a person when you’ve been out late, it’s midnight, you’re tired, and you just want to get home in peace. I wouldn’t use Waymo for my mom, though. She’s 90, and I call Ubers for her a lot. If she’s not at the exact address for pickup, she and the driver can communicate with each other and figure it out. With Waymo, who figures it out with you?” — Erin, 61, Chestnut Hill
“I’ve never been in one, and will never be if I can help it. Hope they end up in the same ditch as hitchBOT. The only thing driving robots are good for are spare parts for my car.” — Nicole, 37, Point Breeze
“Philly is the last place I would use a robot car. Philly drivers drive insane, first off. Secondly, the potholes, the amount of construction, the way pedestrians are … it’s just way too much. You need to learn how to drive efficiently and politely, but aggressively, in Philly. I don’t think a robot can handle all those desires.” — Saloua, 27, South Philly
“Waymo stops way too long at stop signs. Design one with a South Philly slide.” — Kate, 37, Fishtown
What the fuck is Waymo?” — John, 66, Whitman
“I am not ready for Waymo. I know I’m on the far end of the tech spectrum — like, I don’t have ChatGPT on my phone. All my friends do, but I won’t do it. I think it’s the downfall of humanity. I know that’s not the same as driverless cars, but it falls under the same umbrella — an umbrella I don’t trust. If the data makes you feel safe, then you go for it. I’m not there.” — Carrie, 45, Wayne
“We’ve been in a Waymo three times. It was actually a really cool experience because we got to put on music we liked and Mama got to sit in the front seat. It wasn’t that scary. It was actually really cool. I would definitely do it again.” — Nuala, 9, East Passyunk
“I’d never use one. I don’t trust technology that hasn’t been proven safe. If the brakes fail on a car, the driver still has a chance to get it to stop. Who tries to stop Waymo? — Robert, 65, Roslyn
“I’d take a Waymo because it eliminates human error. The cars have cameras and won’t get distracted, so it seems safer.” — Zoe, 18, Mount Airy
“For me, the Waymos cannot get here fast enough — and that’s mainly because they are programmed to obey the speed limit (as opposed to many humans I know).” — Jen, 46, Fairmount
Published as “Your Ride Is Here. Your Driver Is Not.” in the April 2026 issue of Philadelphia magazine.
Is David Uosikkinen the Ringo Starr of Philadelphia?
David Uosikkinen’s In the Pocket only plays music with a Philly connection. / Photograph by Dallyn Pavey Uosikkinen
Thanks to Gamble and Huff, Philly was known for its soul, its R&B, even its disco, in the ’70s and early ’80s. But rock-and-roll was a tougher road. Philly bands were often forced to haul their gear up I-95 to court the attention of major label reps in New York.
The Hooters were different.
“I remember with us, and with [Robert] Hazard, labels started coming down to Philadelphia, to check us out on our own turf,” drummer David Uosikkinen recalls.
It was 1981, and the band was playing a long run of Monday nights at the edgy rock and cabaret club Grendel’s Lair at 5th and South. “There were like a handful of people at the first show,” recalls Uosikkinen. “By the time we were done playing [the residency], there was a line three blocks down on South Street.”
The labels came running and the rest is history. The Hooters went on to tour the world, storm the radio waves with a slew of hits — “All You Zombies,” “And We Danced,” “Day by Day,” “Satellite,” “Johnny B,” etc. — and play gigantic concerts like Live Aid in 1985 and Roger Waters’s famous The Wall concert in Berlin in 1990. To this day, the Hooters still have an active fanbase in Germany and neighboring countries.
Seventeen years ago, after living in California for a while, Uosikkinen moved back home and discovered a Philadelphia on the upswing. The Phillies had just won a championship, downtown was hopping with sidewalk dining, and lots of his friends were still making music.
Almost immediately, he and his wife and manager Dallyn Pavey Uosikkinen started dreaming up In the Pocket — a homegrown supergroup dedicated to making music with Philly connections. The band has a “rotating lineup”; on any given night you’re likely to spot Charlie Ingui of Soul Survivors, Tommy Conwell of the Young Rumblers, Richard Bush of the A’s, and more up there on stage. A typical setlist may include “Expressway to Your Heart,” “Back Stabbers,” “Woman’s Got the Power,” “Punk Rock Girl,” and more.
In the Pocket has a reputation for high energy, feel-good concerts that shed new light on old (and sometimes forgotten) favorites. In addition to the Spinners’ “I’ll Be Around,” the band is looking to record a reboot of “98.6,” a lovely but minor hit by local “sunshine pop” artist Keith from 1968.
Late last year, when rock radio legend Pierre Robert passed away, both the Hooters and In the Pocket were summoned to play the tribute show at the Fillmore. Uosikkinen, of course, was behind the kit for both — despite having his bass-drum knee replaced just five weeks earlier.
“I desperately wanted to play that show,” he recalls. “I started walking and pushing myself on the steps. Even if it was a little uncomfortable, I was like, I gotta do it.” A live recording from that night may eventually see the light of day.
Next month, the Philadelphia Music Alliance is hosting a gala at the Kimmel Center to celebrate this year’s inductees into the city’s Walk of Fame, and David Uosikkinen’s In the Pocket is one of the bands enlisted to perform. It’s an easy choice: The Hooters already have their own shiny brass plaque on Broad Street.
This year’s inductees include Philadelphia Orchestra conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin, the Philadelphia Boys Choir, Broadway star Hugh Panaro (he played the title roles in Sweeney Todd and Phantom of the Opera), award-winning producer and music director Adam Blackstone (whose CV includes Rhianna, Maroon 5, Justin Timberlake, etc.), rapper and pioneering hip-hop radio DJ Lady B, legendary free jazz astronauts the Sun Ra Arkestra (led by centenarian saxophonist Marshall Allen), PA State Rep and veteran broadcaster Louise Williams Bishop, and renowned jazz and blues percussionist Pablo Batista.
The evening’s festivities also include bestowing a lifetime achievement award upon Earl Young, the prolific founder and drummer for the Trammps — making it an especially powerful evening for Uosikkinen. In The Pocket has been known to include “Disco Inferno” into their set lists. He’s very much a fan of Young.
“Earl didn’t play a lot of drum fills — he grooved,” says Uosikkinen, basically a walking talking encyclopedia of drummer knowledge. “He was the king of the four-four. I mean, there were other guys — Charles Collins and Keith Benson were [great] session guys — but Earl was the king. And he played with everybody.”
A stroll down Broad Street backs him up. Young already has five plaques on the Walk of Fame for his work with the Trammps, Philadelphia International Records’ esteemed house band MFSB, the Salsoul Orchestra, the Baker-Harris-Young rhythm section, and John Davis & the Monster Orchestra.
“I hope [Philly Music Alliance] keeps doing this, honoring the past, and looking forward to the new stuff that’s happening,” says Uosikkinen, citing younger acts he enjoys like Catbite and Low Cut Connie. He appreciates anybody “fighting the good fight” these days. The rise of AI-based music has been on his mind recently. Haven’t people been trying to replace drummers with robots for years?
“I get the drummer jokes, but listen, the rhythm is created by the man behind those drums, pushing it.”
If honorees Early Young or Pablo Batista want to join In the Pocket on stage, Uosikkinen says he’ll gladly turn over the sticks and the spotlight to them.
So … is David Uosikkinen the Ringo Starr of Philadelphia — the worldly rock veteran known for assembling a skilled group of all-stars to keep the music alive?
He ducks the comparison. “I’m humbled by the great drummers in Philadelphia — I mean Questlove, Pat Berkery, just some great, great drummers,” he says, before recalling all the great jazz concerts he saw with his dad at the Lambertville Music Circus in the ’60s.
In the Pocket, he says, is about a lot of things: celebrating the city’s musical past, keeping himself fresh, and having a good time with his fellow musicians. “This is a way of pulling the guys together and honoring what made us want to do what we do.”
Philadelphia Music Alliance 2026 Walk of Fame Gala will be held May 13th, 7:30 p.m., at Marian Anderson Hall at the Kimmel Center, 300 South Broad Street. (P.S. The Hooters are playing this year’s WMMRBQ, May 9th with Alice Cooper, Everclear and more.)
I Tried It: Can a Spa Fix Your Sleep?
Health and wellness editor Laura Brzyski relays her experience getting a rest-focused spa treatment at Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia’s new Sky Garden floor. / Photographs: The Sky Garden spa suite, by Joe Thomas (left); a massage treatment, by Southcote Digital
Listen to the audio edition here:
I’ve always had high sleep needs. That means I function best on 10 to 11 hours of sleep per night — and no, that’s not an excuse to get my 40 winks and then some.
While there’s little data on people like me, known as “long sleepers,” research shows that sleep duration is not one-size-fits-all and is often influenced by a person’s genetics and circadian rhythm. Many experts chalk up the problem to oversleeping — they claim that more than nine hours of sleep can make a person feel more tired or could signal an underlying medical issue — but I’ve had the tests and studies done: No sleep apnea. No low levels of iron or essential vitamins. No thyroid issues. (Though, I’ve not yet ruled out chronic fatigue syndrome, a condition that’s difficult to diagnose — Stanford scientists have created a blood test that identifies an associated biomarker, but it’s still in the pilot phase — and has no cure.)
And while I’m still trying to convince my husband of the science, studies suggest women need more sleep than men, yet our ever-fluctuating hormones — due to our menstrual cycles and the lead-up to menopause — often disrupt our ability to get quality rest.
(Also, I genuinely love catching some z’s. Sleep is, as writer Sara Protasi argues in this delightful essay for Aeon, delicious.)
During the early days of the pandemic, though, I, like many others, experienced bouts of insomnia due to increased anxiety. My sleep was so royally messed up that I eventually went on a sleep retreat to figure out how to combat my recurring tossings and turnings. The experience altered my mindset and my approach to sleep health — I learned tactics to naturally wind down before bed and to keep calm during middle-of-the-night wakings. But I’m still not completely immune from insomnia, especially during periods of high stress. It’s not just a me problem, either: According to a recent Gallup poll, U.S. adults are both severely stressed and sleep-deprived, clocking in fewer than seven hours per night.
While lack of sleep is a real problem in today’s go-go-go world, many of us forget that lack of rest — or feeling physically, mentally, emotionally, socially, and sensorially at ease and capable of refueling — is also grinding us down. So, I was intrigued when I learned that Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia launched new spa treatments, some of which are designed to support optimal rest, at what they’re calling Sky Garden, the hotel’s never-before-used floor set on the 45th level. (The refurbished space is home to eight residential-style rooms and suites, including a killer 4,000-square-foot penthouse, and a private, one-person spa suite.)
The Four Season’s main spa on the 57th floor is one of the best in the world — it’s the only spa in Philadelphia with a Forbes’ five-star rating, a designation given to just 123 others around the world — but the treatments, like those at most spas, don’t target specific health or lifestyle needs. So, while you might leave feeling totally pampered regardless of whether you get a massage, facial, or body scrub, you may nonetheless bring home low energy, a dysregulated nervous system, or stress you’re still struggling to stave off.
The brand-new spa services at Sky Garden just 12 levels below the 57th floor spa aim to do just that. “High Vitality,” as the service menu is called, is designed around precise outcomes: stress relief through services like breathwork and yoga; more restful sleep via acupuncture, sound therapy, and Reiki; and immunity support with lymphatic drainage, IV therapy, and a comprehensive facial. (Senior spa director Stéphanie Cherbakow Baron, a believer that longevity should be at the core of the wellness industry, developed the menu after spending two decades working closely with and learning from energy healers, acupuncturists, breathwork facilitators, and other wellness practitioners across the world.)
The full High Vitality spa treatment menu / Image courtesy of Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia
It’s a shift we’re seeing globally: Many spas and wellness resorts are now tailoring their services toward longevity — which Vogue deemed one of 2026’s biggest wellness trends — and, as a result, are altering their approaches from providing temporary relaxation to results-driven treatments that aim to provide measurable, long-lasting health benefits.
Given my personal history with sleep issues and the current, universal rest deficit, I wanted to give one of the new “High Vitality” services a try.
Sky Garden’s spa suite is discreet and private, tucked in a quiet corner on the floor. The suite itself is spacious, but not too big — there’s a single-person bathroom with a shower, one massage bed, and a small sofa by the floor-to-ceiling windows that overlook Center City and the Schuylkill River. Because I’m here with rest as my goal, the curtains have been closed against the afternoon sun, dimming the room. The effect is instantly calming — I feel in the right place and headspace, and also a bit ready for bed, despite it being midday.
I’ve opted for Sleep Ritual (starting at $490), a 90-minute treatment comprising contrast therapy, two kinds of massage, and sleep-supporting refreshments — all intended to calm the nervous system and nurture deep relaxation, backed by the belief that rest is something that can be structured and facilitated.
My spa therapist and I discuss why I’ve selected Sleep Ritual — parenthood, work, and the chaotic state of the world have left me feeling tired-but-wired — and how I hope to feel after (relaxed in mind, body, and soul). There’s no other assessment for diagnosing — they aren’t prescribing meds, after all. The thought is, if you’ve chosen a rest-focused service, you likely need it.
The treatment begins with time spent in an infrared sauna blanket that’s laid out atop the massage bed. It’s more like a sleeping bag — a toasty, cozy cocoon — enveloping my body from the neck down in complete warmth and allowing my tight muscles and stiff joints to loosen.
As I let the infrared heat do its thing — it has several physiological benefits, including helping muscles to relax and supporting immune function, both necessary for getting optimal rest — I put aside any stressful or negative thoughts. I figure if my head isn’t free of anxiety, my body won’t be, either. How can I achieve rest if I’m not practicing or embracing it when the time, space, and support are all at my disposal?
The Sleep Ritual begins with time in an infrared sauna blanket. / Photograph by Laura Brzyski
My body warms and I’m starting to sweat a bit — for some people, that feeling might not be relaxing, but as someone born during a heat wave, I am in my natural element, which puts me at ease. The therapist starts massaging my scalp, and the rhythmic nature of her hands in my hair almost cause me to doze, and no wonder: Massaging the head has been said to reduce the stress hormone cortisol and boost serotonin, a neurotransmitter that aids in the production of melatonin, which regulates the sleep cycle.
She tells me, with a whisper, it’s time for me to enter the private shower and run cool water on my body, the second part of this contrast therapy. This is surprising to me, as cold water is known to jolt the body awake — which doesn’t seem to fit with this rest protocol — but I also understand that nobody wants to be sweating for the rest of a spa service, so I oblige. The cold water hits, and I’m immediately taken out of my peaceful reverie — I’m more alert now — and it takes a few minutes for my body and mind to fall back into a relaxed state. (Later, I learn that contrast therapy has the potential to improve sleep quality — how long and how well you snooze — as raising then lowering of your core body temperature can help shift your nervous system from fight-or-flight to rest-and-digest.)
I return to the massage bed — I now understand why it’s called a “bed” — for a full-body treatment, customized to my areas of tension, like my aching hamstrings and upper-body knots. Normally, any good massage will make me a little sleepy, but this one really settles me, thanks to a magnesium mist sprayed directly onto my skin. Magnesium, an essential mineral the human body needs to function properly, is known for its sleep benefits, including improving sleep quality and reducing stress and anxiety, which often contribute to insomnia. While there’s currently little evidence to show our skin can adequately absorb magnesium via topicals — oral supplements are recommended more often — some skin experts believe non-harmful placebos can be powerful, especially when it comes to catching z’s.
As the service ends and I rise from the massage table in a way that resembles a big stretch first thing in the morning (bedhead included), I find a pot of Sleepytime tea — a caffeine-free herbal blend with calming ingredients like chamomile and lemongrass — and a piece of dark chocolate from the good-for-you chocolate brand Alice. (This particular one is made with reishi mushroom, a stress-reducing adaptogen, as well as magnesium and chamomile.) I sip some tea and decide to nibble the chocolate closer to bedtime. It’s only 3 p.m., after all.
Later that evening, as I’m lounging on my couch, I forgo my typical dessert — ice cream or cookies — and grab the chocolate that’s meant to be the final flourish of my restful experience. Though I can’t taste the sleep-supporting ingredients and don’t totally buy into the idea that this single bite will have that great an impact, I feel heavy-eyed and ready to be horizontal.
By 9 p.m., I’m in bed — oh, how Friday nights have changed — and eventually drift into what turns out to be a deep, restorative sleep. So much so that when I wake up at 8 a.m. the next morning, I don’t groan at the time on the clock. I may be awake earlier than I normally am, but I’m not tired at all. I actually feel completely rested and even energized.
There are no miracle cures to rest, and exhaustion isn’t just about sleep deprivation, but maybe what I’ve experienced — what this new spa service has to offer — isn’t a placebo after all.
I climb out of bed, relieved that, for at least this morning, my rest feels earned and not chased. I’ll take that as a win.
Four Seasons Philadelphia is located at 1 North 19th Street in Center City.