Neighborhood:
Northwest 21st & 23rd If you assigned the outer reaches of Northwest Portland human body parts, Northwest Vaughn Street would get a penis, and just two blocks away, Thurman would earn a vagina. (read more) If that sounds crass, read on. Although Northwest Vaughn has a couple of upscale outlets—including a garden of incredible eating called Meriwether’s Restaurant (2601 NW Vaughn St., 228-1250, meriwethersnw.com) and the classy Clear Creek Distillery (2389 NW Wilson St., 248-9470, clearcreekdistillery.com), home to the “how’d they do that?” pear-in-the-bottle brandy—this balls-to-the-wall boulevard keeps things macho with Fetzer sausage carts and rooms that go zoom, including a Vespa dealership (2318 NW Vaughn St., 222-3779, vespaportland.com) and MotoCorsa (2170 NW Wilson St., 292-7488, motocorsa.com), which sells Ducati motorcycles. Not to mention nearby vegan strip joint Casa Diablo Gentlemen’s Club (2839 St. Helens Road, 222-6600, casadiablo.com). The more feminine Thurman Street is all about being seen and being green. A co-op grocery outlet, Food Front (2375 NW Thurman St., 222-5658, foodfront.coop) sits across the street from French-ified (girlie) St. Honoré Boulangerie (2335 NW Thurman St., 445-4342, sthonorebakery.com), a great place to spend too much on a sandwich. Reuben gurus Kenny and Zuke recently opened a new deli, SandwichWorks (2376 NW Thurman St., 954-1737), on this street; it’s a perfect complement to bustling Big Dan’s West Coast Bento (2368-A NW Thurman St., 227-1779, westcoastbento.com), fromage-filled Steve’s Cheese (2321 NW Thurman St., inside Square Deal Wines, 222-6014), and Trilogy Video’s (2325 NW Thurman St., 229-1884, trilogy-video.com) racks of Die Hard sequels and chick flicks alike. —Byron Beck
Featured in Pocket Shop 2009
Wow, that’s a lot of beads. WW’s bead dealer of choice (around the corner from our office) specializes in silver, glass and stone beads, not the plastic or copper chunks you played with in elementary school. Its classes will get you started on making your own jewelry.
