TheHolidays
THE BIRKDALE BEARS CAN MAKE EVEN THE CRANKIEST SHOPPER SMILE
AT THE DEPOT!
Todd Alexander gets Honey the Bear ready to perform at Birkdale Village. DECEMBER 2017
28 LAKE NORMAN CURRENTS
WINNER 2017
Best Antique Ma ll Charlotte Magaz ine’s
Bob Award
Ellie’s Ellie’sDiner DinerNOW on OPEN site
Come visit the largest antique mall in the South 88,000Square Square Feet Feet •• Over Over 725 Booths 88,000 625 Booths Comfortably air air conditioned conditioned Comfortably
325 McGill Ave. NW Concord, NC 28026 704-787-9351 www.depotgibsonmill.com Mon-Sat 10-7• Sunday 1-6
his past Veterans Day, Todd Alexander sat hunched down in a newly constructed tiny cottage in the middle of Birkdale Village. It seems that Honey the Bear lost a bolt, and he was trying to get her up and running. If you don’t know already, Honey is the female singer in The Bear Quartet at the Huntersville shopping center. The quartet’s cottage sits across from the movie theatre, and these bears perform a 35-minute holiday medley on the hour every hour that Birkdale is open from mid-November through the first week in January. Blu plays guitar, Chuckles sings lead vocals and Grizzly Gus is on bass. “Most of what I do is prevention,” explains Todd, who co-owns Spintastic Sounds in Charlotte with his wife, Jessica. “I make sure all of the cylinders are lubed. …The air goes into the cylinder and opens or closes the motion of the bears.”
The Bear Quartet is one of six sets ever made, and it runs on 20-year-old technology. “It’s controlled by a box six inches square,” says Todd. “It’s one giant computer chip.” It takes a solid week to get the bears, including Beatrice — The Storytelling Bear who resides across from Birkdale’s fountain in her own cottage, secured and running. But once everything is in working order, shoppers flock to see the bears. Bales of hay sit in front of Beatrice’s location, as she constantly talks from 9 a.m. until 10 p.m. One of her favorite stories to tell is O. Henry’s The Gift of the Magi. “People come out with their kids and watch the bears,” says Pippa Brown, general manager of Birkdale Village. “It’s such a nice break.” Brown has worked at Birkdale for 10 years, and she says the bears were there when she arrived. “They’re [the bears] pretty famous in the area,” she adds. “It’s just so fun for the kids.”
Photography by Lori K. Tate
Where the OLD is the new NEW
I t’s beginning to Singing and Look a Lot Like Storytelling Christmas