Cover Story
Best of Tucson 2022
Get it fixed, get it tattooed, get it served: You know what you love, but does everyone else? Find out in this year’s edition of Best of Tucson!
Best Spirits & Nightlife 2022
Best Musical Act Miss Olivia and the Interlopers missoliviaandtheinterlopers.com Voted the best, Miss Olivia and the Interlopers may also be the most versatile musical act in town. You’ll find her band at trendy Downtown venues like Revel Wine Bar and Tap and Bottle, or at the Fox Tucson Theatre for its popular Second Saturdays Downtown…
Best Comida 2022
Best Signature Dish Carne Seca at El Charro Multiple locations, elcharrocafe.com Established in 1922, El Charro Café celebrates its 100th anniversary this year. Certified as one of the oldest Mexican restaurants in the nation, El Charro has been under the same family operation for generations. A local staple on a national scale, the family is…
Best Restaurants 2022
Best Vegetarian/Vegan Tumerico 2526 E. Sixth Street, 520-240-6947 402 E. Fourth Avenue, 520-392-0224 tumerico.com Tumerico serves up fresh, organic Latin-inspired vegan and vegetarian food using local and pure ingredients to make a great meal. Using locally sourced ingredients results in the daily changes to the menu, keeping everything fresh and flavorful each day. Past creations…
Best Casual Dining 2022
Best Ramen Raijin Ramen 2995 E. Speedway Boulevard 520-795-2123, raijinramentucson.com Soup season is upon us: Raijin Ramen has the fix you’ve been looking for. For a consecutive year, this tiny local restaurant offers the most comforting ramen in all of Tucson. Its menu offers something for vegans, vegheads and meat-eaters alike. For starters, sample the…
Best Media Mix 2022
Best Instagram Page This is Tucson @this_is_tucson, thisistucson.com Helping you discover what to love about Tucson, #ThisIsTucson offers everything you need to know about what’s happening, where to eat, where to hike and best-of guides that may surprise even the locals who live here. For all-things monsoon, murals but not malarky, you can keep up…
Best Kids Stuff 2022
Best Playground Reid Park 900 S. Randolph Way 520-791-4873, tucsonaz.gov In September 2019, Reid Park’s new playground opened to much fanfare for children ages 2 to 5 and 5 to 12. ADA-accessible features include ramps and a rocker. Shade covers parts of the play equipment. The old playground (nearest the DeMeester bandshell) only had pockets…
Best Outdoors 2022
Best Bike Riding The Chuck Huckleberry Loop Natural Resources, Parks and Recreation 3500 W. River Road 520-724-5000, webcms.pima.gov Known as the Loop for short, the Chuck Huckleberry Loop is a paved shared-use pathway system connecting the Cañada del Oro, Rillito, Santa Cruz and Pantano River parks that makes a complete circuit of 53.9 miles. Pima…
Best Fashion & Style 2022
Best Clothing Creations Boutique 444 N. Fourth Avenue 520-622-8251, creations24.com Deeply rooted in Bohemian influences, Creations Boutique specializes in modern apparel, including Angie Brand clothing, as well as a curated selection of labels we all love. Its goal is to provide a memorable experience. Its designers search the world for incredible art to bring clothing…
Best City Life 2022
Best Place to Donate Your Time and/or Money Community Food Bank of Southern Arizona 3003 S. Country Club Road 520-622-0525, communityfoodbank.org The Community Food Bank of Southern Arizona has served Southern Arizona since 1975 in response to the root causes of hunger and seeks to restore dignity, health, hope and opportunities to the communities it…
Best Arts & Culture 2022
Best Gallery DeGrazia Gallery in the Sun 6300 N. Swan 520-299-9191, degrazia.org What started as a small construction project in the early 1950s is now the DeGrazia Gallery in the Sun, designed and built by artist Ettore Ted DeGrazia. The first building to go up was an adobe mission chapel out of bricks made from…
Southern Arizona NORML: Younger and more diverse
In August, the Arizona chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws director and Southern Arizona NORML founder Mike Robinette resigned from his volunteer position after more than four years of successfully leading the organization. In the vacuum left by his departure, the SOAZNORML contingency has become younger and more diverse as…
Art Laboe was an oldie, but a goodie
A few weeks ago, I happened to meet a friend of a friend named Manny. He is about my age and he was originally from East LA, while I grew up in the ghetto part of the San Fernando Valley, in The Projects not far from where Rodney King was beaten. Manny and I talked…
City Week: Weekly Picks
Glowing Pumpkins: Made to Awe All Ages Imagine all of your pop icons made of pumpkins — whole pumpkins, lit from the inside, each doing its part to become, say, Han Solo. Elaborate, often enormous, wire frames contain the pumpkins in displays of, for example, life-sized dinosaurs, a giraffe, a sunken ship surrounded by sea life.…
TIM turns 10: Parties and plans
Justin Lukasewicz, owner and director of Tucson Improv Movement and the TIM Comedy theater, always seems to be beaming when he is there. Lukasewicz is proud of creating and stewarding his vision for an improv company through its first 10 years, as of this month. He started with five improv students a decade ago and…
Artist amplifies positive images of Black Americans
As much as she loved art, Alanna Airitam felt she didn’t belong in museums. There were few people who looked like her on the walls and those who did were often portrayed in traumatic or violent situations. When she left a 20-year career in advertising to become a full-time fine art photographer, she knew her…
Opera gives dramatic insight into wounded soldiers lives
When Tess Altiveros was debating whether to take on a new project at the Seattle Opera, the conductor, Michael Sakir, told her, “This opera will change your life.” She took the job — performing as the central character in a new opera, “The Falling and the Rising,” roles which she and Sakir will reprise for…
Juilliard String Quartet returns to electrify fans
Bringing into perfect harmony a dynamic combination of the well-known and the forward thinking, the Juilliard String Quartet continues to electrify concertgoers the world over. This do so through a shared commitment to presenting audiences with the time-honored wonders of the string quartet, through the ensemble’s rendition of classical masterpieces, while at the same time…
Savage Love: Crushing Loads
There is more to this week’s Savage Love. To read the entire column, go to Savage.Love. I’m a 71-year-old gay man married to a much younger man. That’s all fine, not relevant so much as just info. 15 years ago, I briefly took Prozac. While it dulled my sex drive, the orgasms I did manage to…
