CAMPBELL COUNTY RECORDER
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THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2020 | BECAUSE COMMUNITY MATTERS | PART OF THE USA TODAY NETWORK ###
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YO U ’ L L B E Delighted
NKY ‘glamping’ site set to open New Year’s Day Randy Tucker Cincinnati Enquirer USA TODAY NETWORK
If you’ve recently driven past the 31acre site in Williamstown, Ky. where the Camp Bespoke boutique campground was planned to open in October, you may be wondering whatever happened to that idea. Trees have been felled, the site’s rolling hills have been graded and you can see the hook-ups for water, sewage disposal and electricity. But the ornate tipis and private cabins and cottages made from repurposed shipping containers and designed to provide luxurious accommodations at the site were still nowhere to be seen Dec. 7. Don’t worry, they’re on their way, and
local residents will soon be introduced to “glamping,” a neology for a more glamourous form of camping that gives campers access to homelike amenities, such as hot running water and fl ush toilets. That’s according to Nicole Brassington, Camp Bespoke’s co-founder and CEO and one of four health care workers whom she said pooled their life savings to launch the estimated $3.4 million project in which they’ve already invested $700,000. “I know it doesn’t look like there’s anything there now, but that’s all about to change,” Brassington recently told The Enquirer. Eight fully-furnished cabins and cottages were scheduled to be installed at the site by the end of last week, when
on-site construction of the tipis began, according to Brassington, a Kentucky native and former nurse who co-founded the project with her friend and coworker, Misty Smith. Latasha Reid and Dr. Angelina Strickland round out the ownership group, with Reid acting as chief operating offi cer and Dr. Strickland as chief fi nancial offi cer. The campground - just east of the Barnes Road exit off Interstate-75, about 40 miles south of Cincinnati - will open New Year’s Day for select guests, including TV and newspaper reporters and social media infl uencers, Brassington said. It will open to the public in March
Camp Bespoke's owners stand near the brightly painted shipping containers being fabricated in Louisville as private cabins for their new "glamping'' campground. From left to right: Misty Smith; Latasha Reid; Dr. Angelina Strickland; and Nicole Brassington PROVIDED
See GLAMPING, Page 2A
The SkyStar riverfront wheel should be back. But when? Scott Wartman Cincinnati Enquirer USA TODAY NETWORK
Will Cincinnati get its giant, shining observation wheel back? Probably, at some point, Hamilton County offi cials told The Enquirer. Just not by March 2021 as originally anticipated. The owner of the wheel isn’t saying publicly whether the SkyStar wheel will return. “They have not given up on Cincinnati,” said Phil Beck, who is general manager for The Banks riverfront development in Cincinnati, about the St. Louis-based parent company for the SkyStar wheel. “They are bullish on Cincinnati. They loved the environment while they were here.” Another wheel planned in Newport is less certain.
Ah, the summer of 2018 The Cincinnati skyline changed overnight when in August 2018 a 150-foottall neon observation wheel opened on the riverfront in front of the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center. Cincinnatians fell in love with the glowing wheel. More than 250,000 people rode it in the fi rst 10 months. It was only meant to stay for three months but stayed for 19 months. The owner wanted it to be a permanent fi xture in the city, signing a 10-year lease in Sept. 2019 with Hamilton County. The new wheel would be 30-feet taller, a 180-foot glowing “O.” In March, the SkyStar wheel was dismantled and shipped to San Francisco to celebrate the 150th anniversary of Golden Gate Park. The SkyStar company had hoped to open the new wheel by March 5, 2021. The new wheel would be
An artist's rendering of the planned Newport SkyWheel at Newport on the Levee PROVIDED
built in China and shipped to its new home in front of the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center. Not to be outdone, Newport wanted in on the wheel craze, with another company planning an even larger obser-
vation wheel, the SkyWheel, at Newport on the Levee. Then the pandemic hit in March. The two companies behind the wheels in Newport and Cincinnati won’t say publicly whether their plans are still
a go. Neither returned messages seeking comment. Koch Development, also of St. Louis, was planning the Newport wheel, which was supposed to be 230 See SKYSTAR, Page 8A
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