BILATERAL BREAST CANCER conqueror Cari Hahn had no family history of the disease. So when she was diagnosed eight years ago, she took a good look at the personal care products she had been using. “I wanted to make sure everything I put on my body was as clean as it could be.” That goal led her, with the help of husband Matt , to start making perfumes, body oils, and soaps. “Playing with fragrance was my healing outlet,” she recalls. “I used perfume to comfort myself during treatment.”

Cari sold her first Clutch and Kindle products at farmers markets, but they now appear in 25 Indianapolis-area retailers. Hand-poured in small batches, her cruelty-free and vegan products are free of a long list of nasties: phthalates, preservatives, parabens, known hormone disruptors, and toxic chemicals. In short, “they’re made with the cleanest ingredients sourced in the United States that I can find,” says Cari.

Newest perfume Adorn, a lightly sweet amber musk, was a huge seller almost immediately. Others that fly off the shelves are Boho, with pistachio, vanilla, and salted caramel notes, and Broke and Bougie, a woody scent with a hint of jasmine.

“Cancer is a huge part of my story,” says Cari. To that end, the Hahns donate 5 percent of profits to local breast cancer charities. Cari also gives back to mental health organizations that serve first responders to honor Matt , a 25-year veteran of the Indianapolis Fire Department. “I’m proud to share that he’s been in recovery and alcohol-free for six years,” says Cari.

When Clutch and Kindle is likened to another local perfumer, the wildly popular Ambre Blends, Cari demurs. “I am definitely a fan! The only similarity is maybe that we both use clean ingredients. I tend toward many more floral and gourmand notes. But I’m honored that people think we could become a well-known fine fragrance brand.”

The post Body + Soul: Sweet Smell of Success appeared first on Indianapolis Monthly.

WE’VE ALL READ A NOVEL in which a sickly heroine is sent to the seashore for fresh salt air, where she recovers to meet a swarthy lighthouse keeper. The plot device is based on a grain of truth.

After visiting a salt cave in Massachusetts, Skye Winslow, a naturopathic doctor, was inspired. Salt air is charged with negative ions, shown to increase oxygen absorption, reduce symptoms of colds and allergies, and ease respiratory ailments. Thus began a three-year effort to transform a historic home into the Carmel Salt Caves.

They aren’t actual caves but two cave-like rooms. No matter. They’re bewitching, hand-hewn from pink Himalayan salt sustainably sourced from Pakistan. Chill in a zero-gravity recliner or plop down on the salt. Starry lights twinkle, the “fireplace” carved from 300-million-year-old salt glows, and the sound of waves mingled with spa music lulls. Microparticles of pharmaceutical grade salt are dry-misted inside the low humidity, 73-degree caves.

A 50-minute session is like spending four hours at the ocean. Go on, make salt angels.

The post Soul Soother: Cave of Wonders appeared first on Indianapolis Monthly.

WHEN DRIVING BY SPRING MILL ROAD and West 116th Street at night, it’s impossible to miss: a towering structure, shining like an ethereal beacon. The inside of the Indianapolis LDS Temple is just as inspiring, but most will never see it. The chapels of the LDS Church (formerly known as Mormon), of which there are 13 in the Indianapolis area, are where ordinary weekly worship happens. The temple is for the extraordinary. Its rooms have distinct purposes: one where devotees endeavor to grow in their knowledge of the faith; one where marriages are sealed “for time and eternity”; one where those concerned with the fate of deceased relatives can undergo proxy baptisms on their behalf; and more. The Celestial Room, though, is not for doing but simply for being. The name suggests it is meant to give a taste of the peace of heaven. Rebecca Connolly, director of communication for the Indiana region of the LDS Church, shares that tables bear Scriptures to aid in introspection and boxes of tissues for when self-realization leads to tears. The stained glass windows display tulip poplars, the Indiana state tree, and circles with the letter X representing the Crossroads of America. Only Latter-day Saints in good standing can enter the temple. (Anyone is welcome to enjoy the grounds, with trees, benches, and a fountain.) Perhaps the rest of us can cultivate such a space in our minds, where we retreat to be still when the tumult of life overwhelms.

The post Back Story: The Celestial Room appeared first on Indianapolis Monthly.

WHEN JAKE MILLER GRADUATED from IUPUI in 2006, he believed in the college’s claims that it offered the best of both Indiana and Purdue Universities. Now the founder of a software development and consulting firm, he credits his success to the communication and critical thinking skills he learned as an English and linguistics major. “One of the most important things in any STEM job—or, really, any job—is communication skills,” says Miller. “What surprised me, working with a lot of engineers, is how weak most are in that area. It’s like society thinks we should either be math people or English people when, in reality, we need to be both.”

As of July 1, IUPUI split into separate Indianapolis campuses, a much-hyped endeavor. To seal the deal, state officials sweetened the pot with $60 million in taxpayer money for each university to build new facilities. But in all the hype, you won’t hear much about preserving the balance of skills that has, for example, allowed Miller to build a growing startup that employs 39 Hoosiers. Instead, the focus seems solely on STEM—shorthand for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. Press releases boast additions to science faculty and laboratory space but fail to mention similar advances for social sciences, such as psychology, or humanities disciplines, such as history, English, foreign languages, or religion. The schools’ marketing centers around catering to business leaders’ demand for graduates with specific vocational skills rather than promoting themselves as training grounds for citizens of the world who can think and communicate for themselves and seek fulfilling careers and meaningful lives, not just a paycheck.

For Nicole Nimri, a national think tank project manager who graduated from IUPUI in 2018, the decline in funding for humanities comes at a time when our nation needs those courses most. “We’re living in a world today where we are so civilly unsound to each other,” she says, “and instead of teaching people how to think from other people’s perspectives, they’re slashing [those offerings]. That is very disheartening and really unwise.”

Some fear the breakup will be the death blow to a sector that’s already faced a steep decline. From 2013 to 2023, student enrollment in liberal arts at IUPUI declined by nearly half. By comparison, total enrollment at IUPUI dropped by 10 percent in those 10 years (from 28,461 to 25,497). But while funding for liberal arts was cut by 26 percent ($30 million to $22 million), the university’s total budget actually grew by 20 percent ($632 million to $758 million) during that same 10-year period, according to university finance officials. “Obviously, there are many factors that go into an increasing budget that go beyond enrollment,” says Mark Bode, spokesperson for IUI—the new shorthand for Indiana University Indianapolis. Those revenue extras include money from research grants and contracts, most of which go to STEM programs.

Administrators at IUI say they are still “very committed” to liberal arts, but they won’t say yet how the university’s revised funding formula for the 2025–26 academic year will impact their liberal arts programs. The university “will always have humanities, social sciences, physical sciences, the arts, at its core,” says Jay Gladden, IUI’s interim executive vice chancellor and chief academic officer. “That will be a foundation for what every undergraduate student here at IU Indianapolis experiences.”

Faculty members, however, are not so sure. They report that in the last 10 years, the number of full-time faculty in liberal arts at IUPUI dropped from around 260 to about 150 and that the English department hasn’t hired a tenure-line faculty person since 2015.

In a letter to the IU board of trustees last fall, then-IUPUI faculty representative Philip Goff made an impassioned plea for the board not to forget the university’s liberal arts mission on the new IUI campus. “There are no biology courses that can analyze and prevent another January 6. There is no math course that teaches how the electoral college works. Computer science does not teach Socrates, the Stoics, or modern philosophy, all of which help us examine our own lives and how we live them. All of these are good and important majors, but we must ensure the vibrancy of the liberal arts alongside them to breathe life and leadership into our students.”

“It’s an education that ‘frees’ you, right?” says Tom Davis, a professor of religious studies and a former IUPUI dean for academic programs. “If you’re ever going to reach a situation where you’re not circumscribed by your circumstances [in life], you need to know things about yourself, about your community and the world around you, and the liberal arts will help you know those things.”

IUPUI’s general education requirements—six credits in life and physical sciences and nine credits spread across arts, humanities, and social sciences—used to be an important recruiting tool for liberal arts. “We picked up a lot of our majors from people who just came in not knowing what they were going to do,” Goff says. “They took a course, say, in the American Revolution and fell in love with history. Now, we don’t get those new students.”

Making matters worse for liberal arts recruiting, a growing number of students are now able to earn their general education credits at the high school level before they even enter IUI. And under the current funding formula at the university, known as Responsibility-Centered Management, department budgets for this academic year will again be largely determined by student enrollment. Gladden says the university is still calculating those numbers. “If [enrollment in liberal arts] goes up, there would probably be some more revenue there. If it goes down, there’d probably be a little less.”

Declining enrollment in liberal arts is a national trend that experts say shows no signs of reversing. With state support for higher education declining across the country, students are paying more out of their own pockets (or their parents’) and borrowing more money against their future incomes—so, understandably, they’re enrolling in majors touted to offer stronger job prospects and higher pay.

English and history have been hit particularly hard, with graduates of both majors down by a third or more between 2009 and 2020, according to a 2020 study from The Hechinger Report, a national nonprofit devoted to covering education issues. Meanwhile, in the past 20 years, business majors have gone up 60 percent, engineering majors have gone up 100 percent, and the health and medicine field has gone up by 200 percent.

With the expansion of STEM programs, administrators at the new IU and Purdue campuses in Indianapolis say they plan to significantly increase their enrollment, but faculty members say such growth is unrealistic given what has been called “the demographic cliff ” facing universities across the country. A report by nonprofit accreditation organization Cognia projects that by next year, America will hit a peak of around 3.9 million high school graduates. After that, the traditional college-going population is expected to shrink for the next five to 10 years by as much as 15 percent.

To help counter the decline, universities like IUI are trying to engage adults who started but never finished college (some 40 million nationally, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education) and high school students, especially those from historically and systemically marginalized communities.

Liberal arts majors, however, may be a hard sell to students who fear they will not find jobs following graduation—which is the public’s perception of liberal arts–related careers. But academic experts who have looked at the national data say it’s not entirely true that liberal arts students face bleaker job prospects. A study by Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce found that at the 10-year mark, the average “return on investment” (the sum of income in relation to what the student spent on college) for liberal arts colleges is $62,000, or about 40 percent below the average return of all colleges. But 40 years after enrollment, or by retirement age, the average return for liberal arts colleges reaches $918,000, more than 25 percent above the average.

Davis says liberal arts majors can and do find satisfying employment after college, but they must start thinking earlier than students in more job-oriented majors about how they will put their education to practical use. An academic approach introduced seven years ago at IUPUI—Project-Based Education—is one good way for students to do just that. “You may be in a philosophy class, or you may be in a religious studies class, but you’ve got a real-world project that you work on,” Davis says.

In 2017, IUPUI also launched a Ph.D. program in American studies that embeds students in local cultural institutions—museums, historic sites, and performing arts organizations— while preparing them for jobs in the fi eld. Davis says encouraging students to build a portfolio of their undergraduate works, “particularly those that highlight their skills in solving problems,” is a growing movement in the liberal arts.

Sarah Bahr, a 28-year-old senior staff editor at The New York Times who also writes about culture and style, is a good example of someone who put her portfolio at IUPUI to good use. A triple major in English, journalism, and Spanish, the 2018 graduate interned with both Indianapolis Monthly and The Indianapolis Star. Her liberal arts background and collection of published articles was enough to land her a job at America’s premier newspaper at the age of 25. “It was great to have this liberal arts background where I knew a little about a lot of different things,” Bahr says. “And from my science courses, I learned how to interpret data and to convey that graphically.”

Beyond preparing students for careers or for taking their place as thoughtful citizens in a democratic society, liberal arts degrees traditionally come with a “useless” component, as well—creating a thirst for knowledge for its own sake.

As the technocrats tell us, today’s fast-changing world demands we all become lifelong learners, and the technocrats are, of course, correct. But many people who study and value the liberal arts do so to enrich their souls, not just their careers, in pursuit of lasting truths to sustain them throughout their lives.

The return on that investment?

Priceless.

The post Oh, The Humanities appeared first on Indianapolis Monthly.

DURING THIS YEAR’S Olympic basketball competitions, viewers witnessed what appeared to be blatant holding and moving screens on nearly every play. But because International Basketball Federation (FIBA) rules were in effect, those normally illegal moves were not called by officials. I questioned whether the competitiveness of those games was worse or better than what we typically see in sanctioned NBA and WNBA matchups.

But how exciting were the Olympic men’s and women’s basketball games and the finals? Off the charts—that is, if you are a fan of USA Basketball. Even if you aren’t, the on-court action in nearly every game was fast, exciting, and fantastic.

If the NBA adopted a smattering of FIBA rules, those changes would greatly enhance the play, competition, and entertainment value of NBA games. My suggestions include:

• Eliminate the defensive three-second violation, allowing players to stay in the free throw lane indefinitely, even when not defending an opponent. Removing this violation helps defense but also puts the onus on offense to cut through the lane to open the middle and move the ball effectively around the perimeter of the court to create open shots. It also helps if the center can hit 3-point shots. Getting rid of this violation would not take away layups, just uncontested blow bys or overmatched back downs.
• Limit the number of fouls allowable to five per contest per player, instead of six. This puts more pressure on players to perform better and coaches to work smarter.
• My biggest recommendation is to allow players to be more physical. With a big man allowed to clog the middle and the expectation that defensive players keep their hands and arms vertical—especially when an offensive player initiates contact (which, in my estimation, is an offensive foul that never gets called)—this change would help keep defensive players from getting backed down to the basket, where they have two choices: Allow a score or get called for a foul. Actually playing defense is not a choice in that situation. This would change that.

The NBA is all about high energy offense, while defense is the casualty. If the adage, “Offense wins games; defense wins championships,” is true, then let teams play defense in the paint without getting a foul called. Offense has a distinct advantage in the game with the current rules.

For much of the 1980s, I played basketball at the Jordan YMCA on Westfield Boulevard. At the time, the first court in the old gym was reserved for talented Hoosiers like John Laskowski, Ray Tolbert, and Vicki Hall, among other former high school and college stars who came to play pickup ball.

Those games were self-officiated. If I called a foul, it had to be a good one. Many times, games devolved into a pushing match for inside position or a hack-fest for driving players, with an occasional minor “discussion” over a call.

In retrospect, those games had many of the same characteristics as FIBA-officiated games. We saw lots of holding, moving screens, and slapping, but very few fouls were called. Each game was hotly contested, and the competition was fierce, but we shook hands at the end (fist bumps and high fives weren’t the norm yet). The winners stayed, and the losers called next game.

I enjoyed watching that same style and physicality play out in the Olympic games. Let’s face it, the NBA—and don’t get me wrong, I love watching the NBA—has become desensitized.

When I say desensitized, I’m referring to the plethora of ticky-tacky fouls officials call based on what they see on screens away from the ball for things like reaching and hand checking—the overemphasis on these fouls to get calls that do nothing but slow the game and stop the flow of play.

In my opinion, the main reason to adopt some of these FIBA rules is to give the players final say in how they play. Let the game be decided and settled by the athletes instead of the officials. And really, isn’t that all we ever want out of basketball anyway?

The post Naysayer: Hey, NBA! Let’s Get Physical, FIBA-style appeared first on Indianapolis Monthly.

It’s lights out for Gallery Pastry Bar. The Star was the first to report that the downtown outpost of the Gallery family of restaurants shuttered on August 11. The restaurant at 110 S. Pennsylvania St. opened in July of 2020, arguably the most challenging time to launch a business in recent history. The well-reviewed spot prevailed, however, with this publication referring to it as “The Beautiful Escape We All Need Right Now.” The IBJ notes that owner Alison Keefer blames  “constant sales swings” for the closure. The company’s two other locations, at 4573 N. College Ave. and 319 E. 16th St., remain open.

Two popular chains are opening locations at the Greenwood Park Mall. In a press release, owner/operator Simon Property Group says that private equity-owned global chain P.F. Chang’s will bring its Asian fusion menu to the mall in 2025, adding to the chain’s roster of over 300 restaurants across 22 countries. Also opening at the mall’s 1251 U.S. 31 address in 2025 is a far more locally owned venue: Verde Flavors of Mexico, a four-location Mexican restaurant from Fishers-based Arechiga Restaurant Group. That opening is part of a big expansion for the company that the IBJ reported on in March; other restaurants in Arechiga’s portfolio include recently opened Casa Santa in Noblesville (13521 Tegler Dr., 317-764-2354) and Bottleworks-area Piedra, which is set to open by the end of the year.

Mochinut is headed south. A sign promising a location of the popular mochi doughnut chain has appeared in a window at the strip mall at 8635 S. Emerson Ave. in Greenwood. No opening date has been announced for the restaurant, which is known for a wide selection of doughnuts, boba drinks, and encrusted Korean corn dogs. This will be the third Indy-area outpost for the global company, which also has storefronts in Fishers and Plainfield.

A corn topping landed a longtime hot dog vendor in hot water. WTHR (among others) reports that the Marion County Health Department informed the owner of Garcia’s Hot Dogs that by adding Indiana’s iconic vegetable to a dog, he broke the agency’s food cart rules. According to owner Abacuc Garcia, he’s operated his cart for 14 years at the corner of 16th Street and Emerson Avenue but recently expanded the toppings menu in an effort to boost revenue. A spokesperson for the agency says that if Garcia wants to bring in foods beyond the standard hot dog cart fare, he needs to operate a food truck, not a cart. In the short term, Garcia has pulled corn from the menu—and in the long term, he is seeking donations for an upgrade from cart to truck.

Shall we just rename Indianapolis “Flavortown”? Earlier this month, we saw westside sausage destination Che Chori (3124 W. 16th St., 317-737-2012) on Food Network show Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives, and this month, lauded eastside taco shop Tlaolli (2830 E. Washington St., 317-410-9507) gets a feature on the Guy Fieri–hosted show, its owners announced on Instagram. Owner Carlos Hutchinson tells the Mirror, “[Fieri said] he’s eaten birria all over the country and said he considered my vegan birria better than many of them.” The episode airs on August 30 at 9 p.m. and will be available via the Food Network’s streaming platform the next day. 

West Fork Whiskey’s wild Westfield plan has hit a speed bump. In March, the 2-year-old distillery at 10 E. 191st St. (317-763-5400) announced an ambitious plan to create a “live and play entertainment district” in the acres surrounding the business. The so-called West Fork District would include “150 townhomes, walking paths, fire pits, a pond, outdoor concert venue, dog park, whiskey aging warehouse and space for future commercial development,” the Star reported at the time. Last week, Current reported that the Westfield City Council turned down West Fork’s application to move forward, with one member saying, “This has been a complete disaster.” The council member complained that “there has been iteration after iteration” of the plans and that they “have drawings that don’t match wordings.” As of publication time, the future of the project remains unknown.

The post The Feed: Southside Chain Restaurant Boom, Downtown Favorite’s Closure appeared first on Indianapolis Monthly.

YOU WON’T FIND an address or phone number for The Barrel Room online. Instead, there’s a reservation page that assures you a mysterious stranger will contact you with logistical details after your two-hour slot at the downtown micro-speakeasy is approved. Barrel Bar’s beverage director, who goes only by Ariel, promises the six-seat operation is “fully legal,” but to maintain exclusivity, location intel is kept under wraps. She does disclose that the bar is fueled by wall-mounted barrels of rare, unique, and hard-to-secure spirits that are crafted into extremely high-end cocktails ranging from $30 to $80 or more. “Think of it as a chef’s table but for drinks,” she says.

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DENISE KATZ WANTS TO take the shame out of being a purebred dog breeder, and, for that matter, out of having one’s heart set on a specific breed of dog. The vet has spent 10 years in animal rescue, including time with Indianapolis Animal Care Services. Her current mission as director of Zionsville’s The Love Pet Project rescue is to improve the health of dogs in need of a home. TLPP works with shelters in Boone County and occasionally supports the Marion County Sheriff’s office. Otherwise, its focus is on breeders, an unusual stance in the animal welfare world where the word is synonymous with “puppy mills.” Most rescues won’t work with breeders.

“We’re taking a holistic approach to dog welfare, and to do that, you have to work together with breeders,” says Katz. “People are always going to want purebreds.” Dogs need to be matched with the right home. Katz uses the example of someone who needs a hunting dog. It’s highly unlikely you’ll find a pointer in a shelter. Or a Lab for a young family. Or a Cavalier King Charles spaniel for the senior who wants a calm lap dog.

While some breeders only see a quick buck, most truly care about dogs. But many don’t know what they don’t know. When they do realize they need help, it’s unclear where to get it. “Nobody is willing to take the shame away,” says Katz.

But she is. After examining their adult dogs, Katz teaches breeders how to best ensure healthy puppies that will easily find homes. This may mean surrendering dogs who can pass on genetic conditions like deformities, heart defects, dental and ocular issues, extreme shyness, and parvovirus. Sometimes, a mother lacks maternal behavior, often caused by being bred too young, and shouldn’t have more puppies. Katz recalls one breeder willingly relinquishing seven dogs.

Once such dogs are in the care of TLPP, Katz and her team spay and neuter them, give heartworm and flea treatments, and resolve medical issues to the extent possible before offering them for adoption. Many are popular smaller breeds, from Havanese, Yorkies, and pugs to Pomeranians, dachshunds, and Chihuahuas. TLPP gives potential adopters a clear picture of a pup’s condition to avoid it being surrendered later due to unexpected costs. For instance, hopeful Frenchie parents are told hefty vet bills are likely ahead, since the breed is prone to health issues.

Luxating patellas (kneecaps that easily dislocate) are fairly common in toy breeds. Katz noticed the condition seems to show up in females after their first litter. TLPP is working on a study with Purdue University to find out why. As such discoveries are made, they’re shared with breeders. “I’ve made friends. We’re bringing them along,” shares Katz.

Recently, the American Kennel Club dispatched her team to Tennessee, where a woman was breeding Norwegian elkhounds—97 of them, all of which left with TLPP. “This lady had financial and other issues and had gotten in over her head. She wasn’t this horrible person,” recalls Katz. It would have been easy to post on social media that she shut down a bad breeder and watch donations roll in. But that isn’t how Katz operates. “It’s not my place to judge. It’s to teach breeders how to do it right. We’re here for the animals.”

The post Pet Project appeared first on Indianapolis Monthly.

BUYING A HOUSE is already a stressful experience. Now, imagine making that enormous decision based solely on video tours while living more than a thousand miles away. Such was the case for Jeff and Eliza Widelski. The Colorado residents of eight years decided last winter that the time had come for them to stop renting. They wanted to purchase a home, but they felt the Centennial State wasn’t a good fit. “Colorado real estate had skyrocketed,” Jeff says. “That led our circle of friends to leave, and we were left there alone. We found that familiarity and people we knew were very important to us.”

Landing on Indy as their new home wasn’t totally random. Jeff was born in Northern Indiana, and he had lived downtown in the late ’90s. With Eliza’s family north of Chicago, Indy made sense. The comparatively low Hoosier home prices and cost of living were also appealing. Conducting the home search from so far away, they put a lot of trust in their Realtor, Natalie Clayton of Maywright Property Co., who went above and beyond by capturing detailed videos of prospective homes and sending them to the Widelskis back in Colorado.

And then they saw it—a 1910 Holy Cross beauty with tasteful updates, a great front porch, and classic curb appeal. The couple share an affinity for older homes, so “it popped off the page to us,” Jeff says. They spent hours “touring” the neighborhood on Google Maps and falling in love via Street View. The stress was worth it, according to Eliza. “It all came together perfectly,” she says. “Holy Cross feels much more suburban and closeknit, and it has good walkability.” And compared to Colorado? “People are a lot more friendly here,” Eliza says.

FAVORITE FEATURE
The front porch

PURCHASE DATE
February 2024

NEIGHBORHOOD
Holy Cross

SQUARE FOOTAGE
2,526

The post A Long-Distance Relationship appeared first on Indianapolis Monthly.

• Book a private golf simulator bay with a 15-by-10-foot 4K HD screen.
• Renting an e-bike and hopping on the Cultural Trail a block away is an easy date night. (Get the picnic basket add-on.)
• You can even take a wood-burning or glass-painting class.
• Grabbing a drink and taking in the skyline from the patio is always an option.
• All craft cocktails have local ingredients, like the Indy Fashioned with Hotel Tango bourbon.
• Ask what the seasonal slushie is before you order, though. Peckish? Go for the Spare Tire Rolls.
• They host Colts away game parties. Make a reservation.

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