Prada Plants One in Texas

Prada Marfa

The building mimics a Prada store…but, out in the backside of the West Texas desert. I’ve driven out that way, so I know what I’m talking about when I say there ain’t nothing out there but lots of sand.

The sculpture is meant to look like a Prada store, with minimalist white stucco walls and a window display housing real Prada shoes and handbags. There is no working door; it's locked.

Just don’t tell that to them Texas gals with the ten gallon bouffants ‘cause it won’t stop ‘em. They’ll stampede right through those doors like the bulls of Pamplona.

The shoes start at more than $500 and the price of purses easily climb into four figures. Marfa now has some braggin’ rights because Texas does not have a Prada store anywhere else. So, stick that in your craw and smoke it, Dallas!

To be sure, the Prada Marfa sculpture will provide countless hours of conversation for motorists driving through West Texas like: "What the hell is that?!"

Some of the locals have suggested that Prada Marfa isn't a sculpture at all, but a time warp, kinda like a wormhole for rednecks – to transport those who break into the building out of their dreary hillbilly lives and into a more modern & progressive life of dreariness. One has to admit that even though this is an implausible crack-pipe theory, it has a certain charm (think of a Twilight Zone episode: Deliverance meets Breakfast At Tiffany’s).

The Marfans (i.e., citizens of Marfa, for you Ivy League types) commissioned a protégé of Frank Lloyd Wright to rework the sculpture in a way that would reflect the eco-sensitive, environmentally-safe, green-friendly consciousness of the 21^st Century. Take a look-see below.

I think it befits the sign of the times, no?

Flush Twice - Houston Needs the Water

HOUSTON - Turn the tap or flush the toilet in North Texas, and every drop down the drain ends up at a sewage treatment plant like the large facility in West Dallas, operated by the Trinity River Authority.


"We're handling right now about 135-140 million gallons [of raw sewage] per day," said Bill Tatum, the manager of the Trinity River Authority.


This plant is one of the biggest in the area, which separates solids and removes paper and other objects before turning it into clear water in a 12 hour process.


"Flush twice - Houston needs the water," said Glenn Clingenpeel with the Trinity River Authority. "It used to be a joke. Now it's more of a water strategy. The folks in Houston will say, 'Yes, please do.'"


It's a little-known fact outside science circles, but a truth in Texas for decades.


Wastewater from the Metroplex flows downstream 250 miles in the Trinity River and into Lake Livingston, where Houston gets most of its water.


from KVUE.com, Austin, TX

Houston, we have a problem...