A Bottle Restored

Just north of downtown, a couple of vacant lots beyond the football-dome-without-a-team, lies a rehaber's fantasy called The Bottle District. It proved to be another St. Louis restoration project that fizzled.

The name comes from a local icon, a huge model of a bottle of Vess Lemon Lime soda. Vess is a soft drink brand that has been made and sold in St. Louis for a century. The bottle has been there for as long as I can remember and had become rather decrepit. With no fanfare, someone brought it back to mint condition earlier this summer. Don't know who or why. Maybe it's a good sign.             

The Stuff Of Legends

A 90 degree turn to the left from yesterday's photo. When I first glanced at this I thought the second line read "leg end." Then I had my duh moment. No idea who Horbin is.              

Supersize It

Make it UGE, as the Donald says. (And my view of that?) I just like the light, shape and space in this one. 

The view here is a 180 turn from Tuesday's picture. There are a number of old abandoned industrial buildings clustered around the big Vess soda bottle. Some dreamers have talked about turning them into a residential/restaurant/entertainment area to be known as the Bottle District. Nothing shaking.                 

Bottle District

No, it's not an area packed with bars, although there was an effort to create that. A giant bottle of Vess soda shares the skyline with the Arch in St. Louis' erstwhile Bottle District. Vess, whose slogan is "The Billion Bubble Beverage," was a very popular regional soft drink company. It's still around on a reduced scale. Developers wanted to create a mixed dining, entertainment, hotel and residential district around this great monument to sweet fizzy water. This Wikipedia piece says it was supposed to get going in 2005. The area's current web site (at least someone is paying for a web site!) says things are opening up this summer. When I walked around the area a few weeks ago, there was nothing shaking at all. It's all a matter of money. I don't see how this medium-sized city could dupport it and other projects downtown. Sometime soon I'll feature the swampy pit that was supposed to become the glittering Ballpark Village next to the new Busch Stadium.