Profiles

Chocolatier Christopher Elbow: Neighborhood favorites need KC support to survive 2020 (and 2021)

By Tommy Felts / November 27, 2020

Hours before opening to hungry Black Friday customers, workers at Christopher Elbow’s Fairway Creamery were busy crafting decadent donuts and savory on-the-go breakfast favorites. Salted caramel gingersnap cake. Strawberry rosé and chocolate blackout yeast raised. Avocado toast with a sunny side up egg on top. The morning easily could go either way, staff members said:…

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Tom Corbin

Tom Corbin Continued: Famed KC sculptor shapes decades of creativity into a work of art

By Tommy Felts / November 25, 2020

Like many in the entrepreneur community, nationally renowned sculptor and painter Tom Corbin didn’t truly embrace his calling until hitting a wall at his uninspiring day job. “I was selling corrugated boxes, of all things, for a big corporation,” Corbin said of his first gig out of college — a “non-artful” diversion that nevertheless got him…

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Nicole Beals, Techmate

New in KC: Quarantine with family leads Techmate founder to open office in Kansas City

By Tommy Felts / November 24, 2020

Editor’s note: New in KC is an ongoing profile series that highlights newly relocated members of the Kansas City startup community, their reasons for a change of scenery, and what they’ve found so far in KC. Click here to read more New in KC profiles. Growing up in Nebraska, Nicole Beals felt like she needed…

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Jasmine Jones, Cherry Blossom Intimates

Boutique startup specializing in breast prosthesis for cancer survivors catches attention of KC healthcare investor

By Tommy Felts / November 24, 2020

As the new year rang in 2020, Jasmine Jones envisioned pop-up shops for Cherry Blossom Intimates — an accredited medical facility housed within a lingerie boutique that provides breast cancer survivors with customizable prosthesis.  Eleven months into the unpredictable year, however, Jones innovated the startup into a virtual brand. “I had to ask myself, ‘What would…

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Courtney Lane, Never Forgotten

Victorian hair artist resurrects dead art form; talks representation for asexual, disabled communities

By Tommy Felts / November 20, 2020

For as long as Courtney Lane can remember, she’s had a fascination with the ways people memorialize their deceased loved ones, the Kansas City hair artist said. “I had a family who didn’t shelter me from the concept of death,” Lane recalled. “When I was 5 or 6 years old, my grandmother took me on…

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