People & Places >>

• Best Citizen
  Tom Schlafly
  A shrewd businessman can capitalize on current events with his own marketing plan, make more money in the process and still keep the public smiling. When your business is brewing and selling beer, in St. Louis of all places, you have to stay original in the eyes of your customers and community,... More >>
• Best Lawyer (4 Comments)
  Jim Bennett
  Jim Bennett has made a name for himself defending some of this town's more notorious folk. In 2004 the attorney asked the Missouri Supreme Court to toss out drunk-driving charges against St. Louis Rams defensive end Leonard Little. (The court refused, but Little was eventually acquitted of the... More >>
• Best Place to Get Goosebumps
  Lemp Mansion Restaurant & Inn
  Some of you get your thrills on the topsy-turvy belly-sinkers at the amusement park, but that's not our scene. We prefer a more supernatural source for our scares — we love to get our spook on at the Lemp Mansion Restaurant & Inn. Not only does this historic building play host to... More >>
• Best Bureaucrat (2 Comments)
  Rick Sullivan, CEO
  St. Louis Public Schools Special Administrative Board
  Don't recognize the name? All the more reason Rick Sullivan is this year's finest unelected official. Since being appointed to oversee the St. Louis Public Schools last year, Sullivan has quietly worked to restore the troubled school district. That he's done so without the histrionics and... More >>
• Best Gadfly
  John Chasnoff
  For most of the past nine years, John Chasnoff, a house painter, has been an outspoken — but polite — critic of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department. Then the 2006 World Series ticket scandal struck, and Chasnoff felt compelled to get down and dirty. Like some of the media... More >>
• Best Geezer
  I.E. Millstone
  I.E. Millstone built Pruitt-Igoe and outlived it. He built Busch Stadium II, yet that landmark, too, beat him to the grave. Millstone also built the original Highway 40, and his construction company, now called Millstone-Bangert, is rebuilding the roadway. Will he live to see the end of its... More >>
• Best Local Politician (1 Comment)
  Kacie Starr Triplett
  The youngest member of the St. Louis Board of Aldermen, Kacie Triplett serves some of the city's most activist neighborhoods with a savvy that she must have learned from her late grandfather, former state senator John Bass. A little over a year into her job representing the Sixth Ward, the... More >>
• Best Moustache
  Jason LaRue
  Honorable mention in this category goes to erstwhile St. Louis police chief Joe Mokwa for sporting the ultimate cop 'stache. But Cardinals catcher Jason LaRue is in a facial-hair league of his own. As the Cardinals' fortunes rose and fell this season, LaRue's untamed horseshoe shone like a... More >>
• Best Fashion Police
  Pine Lawn Police Department
  For years "fashion police" have patrolled the world of haute couture armed only with their snarky insults, furled lips and brazen bitchiness. Then along comes the City of Pine Lawn, which last year passed an ordinance outlawing baggy pants in the north St. Louis County suburb. All of a sudden... More >>
• Best Festival
  St. Louis Microfest
  More than a decade ago, the operators of Lift for Life Gym hatched an alchemical combo for the ages: day-drinking + do-gooding. Their brainchild, St. Louis Microfest, a smorgasbord of craft beers from across the nation, takes place annually during the first or second weekend of June in the upper... More >>
• Best Craft Festival
  Strange Folk
  There must be some serious local shoppers out there who've seen passing references to the Strange Folk Festival, imagined Joni Mitchell cover artists and said forget it. What a pity. Strange name, maybe, but as craft shows go, Strange Folk is folkin' awesome. Hundreds of indie artisans from... More >>
• Best Place to People-Watch
  Soulard Farmers' Market
  St. Louis is often thought of as a city compartmentalized by race, ethnicity, social class and (for natives, anyway) even which high school one attended. But on Saturday mornings Soulard Farmers' Market is one of the few places in the city where people of all backgrounds can be seen together... More >>
• Best Ambassador for St. Louis
  David Robertson, music director
  Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra
  David Robertson has a winning smile and the gift of gab. Those two assets will take you far in life, but Robertson also has vision. And vision will carry the possessor and all who share it to great heights. Robertson's vision is that the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, which he directs, becomes... More >>
• Best Place to Learn Spanish
  La Tropicana Market
  Cubans speak a dialect of Spanish that is notoriously difficult to understand. They talk fast, use a lot of slang, and often cut off the ends of their words. Lucky for you, however, if you go to La Tropicana to practice your español you'll mostly be speaking to a bunch of gringos and... More >>
• Best Cheap Thrill
  Cart Escalator at Target
  A trip down Target's wide aisles lined with matchy-matchy merchandise can be so soothing, it's easy to forget that you only set out to buy, say, toilet paper. Awakening from your trance, you realize you're about to become $50 lighter and wonder, "What is it about Michael Graves?" Now the great... More >>
• Best Kids' Thrill
  Bob Kramer's Marionnettes
  Kids are what make the CGI world go 'round — they're into tech, and in a major way. Yet if a grownup spends an afternoon with a whippersnapper or two, that adult will learn that while kids are well versed in all things electronic and modern, they also get as much of a thrill from the same... More >>
• Best Place to Spend the Day with Grandma
  Plaza Frontenac
  In her prime, Grandma was the queen of the shoppers. The woman could determine the quality of a store just from its smell. The credit-card bill sometimes made Grandpa break out in a cold sweat, but even he couldn't deny she always looked like a million bucks. (Besides, what did he know? He liked... More >>
• Best Hotel
  Four Seasons St. Louis
  After an hour at the Four Seasons St. Louis, you wonder if the well-manicured staff somehow has mistaken you for a much more prominent guest staying in the $245-to-$3,000-per-night, 200-room hotel. With every turn your presence conjures smiles, greetings, opened doors. Even the valet thinks... More >>
• Best Bed & Breakfast
  The Fleur-de-Lys Mansion
  For the traveler who values privacy, a bed & breakfast can be a little unsettling. There are the awkward "oh-hi-where-are-you-from"s in the living room, the shared bathrooms, the strange feeling of waking up in a room filled with someone else's Precious Moments figurines. At the stunning... More >>
• Best Kept Secret
  The Nature Institute
  Ever wonder what's on top of those bluffs you drive under along the Great River Road just north of Alton? We know what — the area's best-kept beauty secret. The Nature Institute owns more than 500 acres along this bend of the river: the Kemp & Cora Hutchinson Bird Sanctuary, which... More >>
• Best Thing to Happen to St. Louis This Year
  Surviving Highway 40 construction
  Take a bow, MoDOT. There was no Carmageddon after all. All those doomsday disciples' predictions of calamitous traffic jams, businesses going under and Cardinals fans still filing into the ballpark in the seventh inning never did materialize. An occasional hiccup, sure, but overall, rebuilding... More >>
• Best Old Building
  St. Louis City Hall
  Throughout its entire history, St. Louis City Hall has been sadly neglected by the municipal government — even before it was built. Modeled after Paris' Hôtel de Ville, the edifice was scheduled for completion in 1892, but construction limped along for twelve additional years, paid... More >>
• Best Local Boy Made Good
  Gerard Craft
  Gerard Craft has lived in Washington, D.C., Los Angeles and Salt Lake City, but it was in St. Louis that the young chef opened Niche in 2005. The Benton Park restaurant quickly became a favorite of the city's gourmands and critics (last year Riverfront Times named Craft Best Local Chef). But... More >>
• Best New Building
  Gateway Station
  Gateway Station (full name: The Gateway Multimodal Transportation Center) merges Greyhound, MetroLink and Amtrak in one low-slung building that looks more modern-art museum than inner-city transit station. Designed by local architecture firm KAI Design & Build (www.kai-db.com), the building... More >>
• Best Statue
  Friedrich Ludwig Jahn Memorial
  Should you happen to stumble upon this formidable monument from the rear — and stumbling upon it is practically the only way to find it — you might think that the long-bearded fellow in the center is Shakespeare. And indeed, the monument dominates a sloping hill just to the north of... More >>
• Best Public Restroom (2 Comments)
  CBGB
  You don't expect much in the way of bathroom cleanliness from a bar where the front doorknob is held in place with duct tape. After a few gasoline-strength drinks, you'll be happy if someone hasn't thrown up on the seat. You might be just a little taken aback, however, when you find that instead... More >>
• Best Addition to Washington Avenue
  Flamingo Bowl
  What makes a great bowling alley? Is it the dusty chic of 1950s-era furniture and watery beer specials? Or is it the sheer enormity of some of the newer hi-tech bowling emporiums, featuring a small city's worth of alleys, several cafés and even laser tag? In the case of Flamingo Bowl, Joe... More >>
• Best Bus Route
  No. 93 Midtown-South County
  If Metro's bus No. 93 were a reporter, we'd say it had been promoted from the predictable university beat to the much more vibrant city desk. Good ol' 93, which for years trundled dutifully between Washington University and the Wydown area, now has a fresh new route: Midtown-South County. That... More >>
• Best Place for a First Date
  Northwest Coffee Roasting Co.
  Coffee shops in general are good places for a first date. If there's no chemistry, you don't even have to finish your drink before making your escape. If you connect, no one is going to interrupt a long conversation. We're partial to this Northwest Coffee location precisely because of its... More >>
• Best Wi-Fi
  Companion Bakery and Café
  The Central West End outpost of Companion Bakery and Café has one of the strongest signals of any café we've patronized (if not the strongest). Now that free wi-fi is widely available, the consideration comes to atmosphere, absence of censorship and signal strength. Geeks love... More >>
• Best View of Downtown
  I-55 northbound, just south of the Poplar Street Bridge
  Sunrise on a misty April morning is best, when the traffic is light and the only movement is the gray-white steam fluttering up from the manholes on Broadway. Take it slow and easy. The Arch is radiant now; dancing rays of sunshine have turned our curved steel treasure the color of apricot. The... More >>
• Best View of Someplace Other Than Downtown
  Top of the East Slope at Art Hill
  You say you want to steal away to an Archless view, devoid off any steel at all — stainless or otherwise? Here's what you do. Go to Forest Park. Then get to the parking lot just east of the Saint Louis Art Museum, directly above the site of the Shakespeare Festival. At the far end of that... More >>
• Best Place to Take Out-of-Town Guests
  Anheuser-Busch Brewery Tour
  Head for the mountains of...Belgium? Like it or not, Anheuser-Busch is now Brito's brew, in bed with Stella and a part of the InBev empire. But don't let that deter you from taking in the splendor of the Anheuser-Busch Brewery Tour. Less secretive than Willy Wonka's factory, the Anheuser-Busch... More >>
• Best Local Girl Made Good
  Christina Machamer
  She kept the secret for an entire year. But now the whole television-watching world knows that St. Louis' own Christina Machamer won the fourth season of FOX Television's popular reality series Hell's Kitchen, starring blustery British chef Gordon Ramsay. Twenty-six-year-old Machamer, a blond... More >>
• Best Sign
  Combs Tire and Auto Service
  If the folks at Combs Tire and Auto Service weren't so unfailingly pleasant, we'd think their sign was part of a devious ruse to bring in more business. It would go something like this: See funny sign. Slow down to read funny sign. Take eyes off road while laughing. Get rear-ended by fellow... More >>
• Best Month to be in St. Louis
  April
  Dogwoods bloom. The sun shines. Strolling downtown, you think you hear the swinging sound of Count Basie's orchestra. It's April in — wait — this is St. Louis. Any minute an ominous black cloud might move across the sky like a lid across the top of a well. Flowers that have emerged,... More >>
• Best Month to Leave St. Louis
  February
  It's bloody cold. And gray. And the novelty of winter wore off long ago. You're sick to death of scraping windshields, weary of wearing layers. The thought of another "wintry mix" storm makes you cringe. On top of it all, Punxsutawney Phil, that rotten little hog, had the gall to see his shadow.... More >>
• Best Place to Live
  Dogtown
  During the Ancient Order of Hibernians' parade each St. Patrick's Day, the corner of Clayton and Tamm avenues is the place to soak up one's Irish heritage, and suck down a lot of beer. The other 364 days of the year, Dogtowners revel in the peace and quietude of a city neighborhood that most who... More >>
• Best Volunteer (1 Comment)
  Gladys Stannard
  Muddy floodwaters are up to the fourth row of your living-room bookshelf. The same can be said about many of your possessions. And you're not the type to ask for a handout. Adding to the stress, you have three kids under age five. Figuring out what to do next can be mind-boggling. Many... More >>
• Best Worthy Cause
  International Institute St. Louis
  Sure, this country still accepts some of the poor and huddled masses from around the world, but usually it's not enough to merely welcome folks here. New Americans may struggle with the language barrier, and they often face difficulty finding housing and employment. Thanks to the work of... More >>
• Best Place to Meet Single Men
  Lambert Field Baggage Carousel M-6
  As America wages wars on two fronts, Lambert Field can at times seem like the U.S. Army's Central Command, with as many as 3,000 soldiers passing through the airport during any given week. Most of these warriors touch down in our fair city for just a few minutes. Others have considerably more... More >>
• Best Local Girl Gone Bad
  Patty Wente
  Dozens of past and present staff members at St. Louis public radio affiliate KWMU (90.7 FM) turned on Patty Wente with a vengeance. There were tales of how she upbraided station employees for the pettiest offenses, routinely made improper sexual comments and arrived intoxicated to KMWU events.... More >>
• Best Place to Meet Single Women
  Parties in the Park
  Also known as "Secretary's Ball" for its ability to cause female office workers to lose their inhibitions (and pantsuits) as quickly as the proverbial prom dress, Parties in the Park remains the region's biggest open-air meat market. For 25 years huntresses by the hundreds have descended on... More >>
• Best Villain
  Lori Drew
  Before Megan Meier hanged herself, Waterford Crystal Drive was just another cookie-cutter patch of suburbia weaving through Dardenne Prairie. Lori Drew and Tina Meier were two working moms living four doors apart, whose daughters shared a typical teenage relationship: hot one day, cold the next.... More >>
• Best Local Boy Gone Bad
  Floyd Irons
  Sadly, this past year brought no shortage of stunning downfalls around these parts. (The tragic homicidal unraveling of Cookie Thornton and the drug-addled train wreck of Seven-Up heir Andrew Gladney spring to mind.) The biggest plunge from the pedestal, though, had to have been Floyd Irons,... More >>
• Best Place for a Last Date
  Anheuser-Busch Brewery Tour
  Need to tell someone it's really, truly over? Looking to send a message that says, "It's not me, it's you"? Take your soon-to-be-jilted lover on a tour of the Anheuser-Busch Brewery. Breathe in the aroma of hops and bitter irony as you stand in the shadow of a St. Louis icon — a place we... More >>
• Best Local Website
  Keaggy.com
  The eponymously named website Keaggy.com is for everyone who has stared too long at an object on the street while at a stoplight. In other words, it's for most of us. Compiled by Bill Keaggy, a curious collector and St. Louisan who amasses photographs of everyday objects, keaggy.com and its... More >>
• Best Blog
  Angry Black Bitch
  "Did I mention that Glenn Beck is an asshole?" St. Louis-based blogger Angry Black Bitch wrote after the CNN commentator opined that the government should deliver its "economic stimulus" payments in the form of debit cards so that people couldn't use the money to reduce debt. Other times,... More >>
• Best Mile of the East Side
  Highway 100 (Great River Road), from Elsah to Grafton
  This stretch of scenic Highway 100 is best experienced from the back of a motorcycle, but you can approximate the effect by calling shotgun and riding with your window down. Reflecting blue sky on a sunny day, the muddy Mississippi becomes a glittering ribbon, dotted with boats (sailboats... More >>
• Best Cemetery
  St. Paul Churchyard
  Earlier this year, Marilyn Yalom, in her book titled The American Resting Place, made the arresting case that cemeteries in this country are increasingly being tucked out of sight. Not so St. Paul Churchyard. There's nothing shy about this old boneyard. Here, 65 tree-studded acres of tranquility... More >>
• Best Mayor
  Mike Swoboda
  R.I.P. More >>
• Best Mile of St. Louis
  Cherokee Street
  If you had a nickel for every stretch of St. Louis where you could snack on an authentic taqueria-style taco between taking in a contemporary art show and shopping for a 1930s china pattern just like your grandmother had...well, you would be only five cents richer, because nothing else in St.... More >>