Earth Day festivals, Mariott's new Edition, more news

From the Associated Press
01:04 PM PST, February 05, 2008

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Earth Day events

Eight simultaneous Earth Day festivals are being planned across the country for April 20 with the flagship event on the National Mall in Washington.

Organizers plan to stage free outdoor concerts in New York, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Los Angeles, Miami and San Francisco. Producers of the Green Apple Festival, which began three years ago in New York, and organizers of the first Earth Day in 1970 are staging the events in landmark parks.

The D.C. event will feature political leaders, scientists, celebrities and bands.

Producer Peter Shapiro says more than a dozen music venues in each city will be enlisted to help carry the environmental message throughout the weekend. Details at greenapplemusicfestival.com.

Lincoln mobile museum

A mobile Abraham Lincoln museum will make its debut at the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historic Site.

The Kentucky Historical Society will debut the traveling "Kentucky's Abraham Lincoln" display -- a 300-square-foot exhibit inside a tractor trailer -- during the opening ceremonies of the National Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commemoration on Feb. 12. The Lincoln display has several visits scheduled across the state.

Best 'farm tables' list

Country cooking with ingredients fresh from the farm, and trendy, elegant menus are not mutually exclusive.

Conde Nast Traveler magazine is recommending top "farm tables" in its February issue. Some are in restaurants that buy heirloom tomatoes, organic chicken and other produce from nearby farmers; some are organizations that set up movable feasts at outdoor tables, often right in the fields.

Farm tables mentioned by the magazine include those found at Shelburne Farms, which is actually a historic mansion in Shelburne, Vt.; Inn at Baldwin Creek, Bristol, Vt.; Restaurant at Potowmack Farms, Lovettsville, Va.; occasional garden soirees at Paradise Farms, Homestead, Fla.; Arrows Restaurant, Ogunquit, Maine; monthly Sunday dinners at Celebrity Dairy, Siler City, N.C.; the famed Blackberry Farm resort in Walland, Tenn.; and the Gathering Together Farm in Philomoth, Ore., where diners get a field tour in a pickup truck before eating.

New boutique hotel chain

A new chain of boutique hotels planned by Marriott and upscale hotelier Ian Schrager will be called Edition.

Marriott and Schrager plan to open the first Edition brand hotels around 2010 in nine cities, including Paris, Madrid, Miami, Chicago and two in Los Angeles. A Washington hotel is planned for the 18th Street corridor, but details on the exact location and timetable were not available.

The Bethesda, Md.-based company said more than 100 of the "lifestyle" hotels could eventually be built worldwide.

Edition is a new tack for Marriott, a family-run hotel operator known for more traditional brands like Ritz-Carlton, Courtyard or its eponymous Marriott properties. For Edition, Marriott is teaming up with Schrager, one of the founders of the infamous but defunct Studio 54 nightclub in New York. The hotels will be relatively small, averaging between 150 to 200 rooms. Each hotel will be designed by different architects and designers to give them a unique look.

Schrager will oversee design, marketing and food and beverage for the brand while Marriott will handle development and operate the hotels when they are finished.

Tomb of Unknowns

Congress has blocked the possible replacement of the cracked Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery, deciding instead to study repairs to the existing marble monument.

A defense bill President Bush signed into law Jan. 28 included an amendment to prevent replacement of the tomb, pending a report to Congress. The cemetery had been leaning toward replacing the monument, which was installed in 1931, to maintain its dignity.

But now that replacement of the stone has been stalled, the cemetery plans to make repairs to the monument later this year, said John Metzler, the cemetery's superintendent. The last repairs were made in 1989.

The work -- with guidance from National Park Service stone conservators -- involves replacing the existing grouting on the monument and cleaning the stone with water and a soft brush.

Millions of people visit the tomb each year where soldiers guard the sculpted sarcophagus at all times. It overlooks Washington from across the Potomac River in Arlington and is the scene of Memorial Day wreath-laying ceremonies by the president.

A crypt beneath the monument holds the remains of three unidentified servicemen killed in the two world wars and the Korean war. A Vietnam War veteran buried there was later identified through DNA testing and removed.

An inscription on the 48-ton marble block reads: "Here Rests in Honored Glory an American Soldier Known But to God."

World's largest passenger aircraft

Singapore Airlines Ltd. plans to fly the world's largest passenger aircraft, the Airbus A380, on the Singapore-London route starting in March.

The airline will take delivery of the third of the double-decker planes into its fleet by mid-March, and will fly it daily between the city-state and London from March 18, the carrier said in a statement.

Singapore Airlines received its second superjumbo on Jan. 11, and said it would use it to complement the first A380 service on the Singapore-Sydney route.

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