Pink House Forever

The Pink House was like an underground United Nations. Chapel Hill's aspiring artists, musicians, poets, DJ's, activists, actors, writers, nudists, flutists, knuckleheads, and couch-surfers, all living together in (relative) harmony, united by their common bohemianism. Life inside the Pink House often consisted of weird shit happening at all hours, every day, it rarely stopped. And there's something about that place that won't allow the vibe to ever fully dissipate. / PinkHouseForever.org

Pink House. 130 North Street. Back In The Day.

Fellow residents from the 1991-94 years were Clint Curtis, Shyam Patel, Raj Krishnasami, Lydia Craft, Jess Deltac, Kyle York Spencer, Caroline Rivers Hall, Mel Lanham, Michelle Sinnott, Jay Murray, N'Gai Wright, Scott Bullock (who crashed on the couch for a year before finally moving in), Bryan Ellerson, Karen Hurka, Sally Stryker, Ryan Mathias, Charlie Speight, Chris Palmatier, Trent McDevitt, and Steve William.

Besides holdovers and returnees Jay, Scott, Mel (& Laverne!), Chris, and N'Gai, residents during 1995-97 included Ian Williams, Greg Humphreys, Allen Sellars (who, like Jay, lived at both the Pink House and 401 Pritchard), Zak Bisacky, James Dasher, Linden Elstran, Jiffer Bourguignon, Grant Tennille (who first made the scene as a fixture in N'Gai's room circa summer '93), Zia Zareem, Ben Folds, Tom Holden, and Chris "Chip" Chapman.

- Erik Ose

Thursday, June 15, 1995

Mel and Martha's pleasant living

Mel left the Pink House in '95, right as she and Martha graduated from UNC-CH and the Plastic House was shutting down.

The two of them (plus Laverne) joined forces in a little brick apartment complex off Pleasant Drive in Carrboro, which was always a fun place to visit.

Mel and Martha kept a steady stream of yummy snacks on tap, cool movies available to watch, and interesting games to play. That apartment was full of laughter and good times.

While plotting her next career move, Mel served a stint delivering pizzas around Chapel Hill and Carrboro. It was around the same time that N'Gai returned to town, bounced from Cole Street to the Dungeon, and starting throwing an early morning paper route in addition to his work laying out the Chapel Hill News. So 1995 was a year that Pink House alums took it to the streets, except for Jay, whose giant white Beast of a truck died and began a permanent residency blocking the Pink House driveway. Taking up where the hippies left off.