The arts community honored two of its own Monday night at Heritage Hall for its R&R – reading and rockin’. The Kirkland Cultural Council and Mayor’s Cachet Awards were presented to Jeff Lockhart of Northwest University’s (NU) Creatio program and Parkplace Books.
“We had over 18 nominees for these awards, more than could be expected,” said Kirkland Mayor Joan McBride. “… and over the last year the Kirkland Cachet has been a great resource for our community.”
Cachet stands for Collaboration, Arts, Culture, Heritage, Education and Theatre and the award, in its first year, is meant to honor the best in the city within those categories by the Kirkland Heritage Society and Cultural Council.
Lockhart was presented with the individual Cachet Award for his work in creating Creatio program at NU, which is one of the largest state of the art recording studios and programs in the Pacific Northwest. It also produces U-Rock , a program for teens that teaches recording, business techniques and most important – how to create music in a rock n’ roll atmosphere.
He told the audience of about 75 people that, when completed the Creatio recording studio will be the largest north of Los Angeles and West of the Mississippi River.
“And we don’t think that should be in Bellevue or Seattle but it should here in Kirkland. We are honored to be leading the charge,” said Lockhart. “This is a profound honor.”
Parkplace Books was given the Cachet Award for the best business or organization contributing to the arts. The bookstore supports many arts based programs and over 50 different book clubs.
“We love Kirkland and have always felt like it deserves the best quality of everything,” said Rebecca Willow of Parkplace Books. “The arts provide food for the soul.”
The winners were presented with a framed picture of Kirkland drawn by Peter Kirk sixth graders that also contained a small plaque commemorating the event.
Finalists in the individual category also included author and historian Matthew McCauley, who wrote “A look to the past: Kirkland,” and local artist Chris Sharp. In the business or organization category the finalists were Studio East and the Kirkland Arts Center. Other nominees included: William “Bill” Ballantine; Henry Bischofberger Violins, LLC; Evergreen Hospital Medical Center; Loita Hawkinson, President of the Kirkland Heritage Society; Howard Mandville Gallery; Kirkland Choral Society; Kirkland Performance Center; “A” Suraphong Liengboonlertchai; Kaylee Nilan; Northlake Unitarian Universalist Church; Michele Parsons; and the School of Prophetic Arts.
