Hipster Hawaii: Honolulu’s Art and Music Scene Evolves
Today Honolulu is a destination for more than just the standard sun seekers.Hipster Hawaii? You heard that right. Playboy editor Adam Skolnick thinks the Surfjack’s the spot to hang in Hawaii this summer. Here’s what he had to say:
Ask any local creative and they’ll tell you the art and music scene in Honolulu was stuck in 1990s over-drive until 2011, when artists Jasper Wong and Kamea Hadar discovered Kaka’ako, a forgotten industrial district between the city’s downtown and Waikiki neighborhoods, and set to work building a Hawaii outpost for Wong’s Pow! Wow! art festival. As the brand has grown (there have been Pow! Wow! festivals in half a dozen cities around the world), so too has Kaka’ako. The once desolate hood now bustles with small businesses, and the cadre of artists and musicians who transformed it is making Honolulu a destination for more than just the standard sun seekers. The Surfjack, a luxury boutique hotel in Waikiki, features works by Pow! Wow! artists. Makers & Tasters events attract happy foodies almost every night of the week, as does the Pig & the Lady (pictured), a Vietnamese fusion kitchen and cocktail bar. Honolulu still has its fair share of latter-day kitsch, and that 1990s sensibility isn’t entirely gone, but thanks to locally grown creative minds, it’s evolving from the inside out.