Grand Rapids, Mich.

September 08, 2006

If furniture-makers and sculptors share anything beyond their flair for the creation of solid objects in space, its the unlikely lure of Grand Rapids, home of Amway and the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum. By the early 1900s, Grand Rapids had produced enough tables, desks and chairs to be dubbed the Furniture City. Though much of the industry has faded, Steelcase and American Seating are still based here, while Herman Miller, maker of the famed Eames chair, is based in nearby Zeeland. Sculpture, meanwhile, is everywhere, from city hall to the banks of the glistening Grand River. They include impressive large-scale works by such artists as Alexander Calder, Andy Goldsworthy and even Tom Otterness of New York, who joined the party this summer by presenting his whimsical bronze creatures in a special outdoor exhibit that will last through Sept. 10.

Friday

4 p.m.
1)GO WITH THE FLOW

Catch some late-day rays with a stroll along Riverwalk, two miles of peaceful paved paths that edge each bank of the Grand River. Whichever stretch you choose, youll pass leafy elm and cottonwood trees and a series of playful sculptures from local artists, like the massive red (and climbable) Lorries Button, by Hy Zelkowitz, which sprouts from the lawn like a Pop Art flower. The Grand River Sculpture and Fish Ladder, by Joseph Kinnebrew IV, was built to help spawning fish in their struggle to swim upstream. Its bridge draws scores of onlookers in spring and fall, when leaping salmon and steelheads put the creation to good use.

5:30 p.m.
2) THE ART BEAT

The Grand Rapids Art Museum (155 North Division Street, 616-831-1000; www.gramonline.org) is the place to be on Friday nights, when a cash bar and live jazz or blues bands add spark to the collection, which includes works by Ellsworth Kelly, Andy Warhol, Richard Pousette and Robert Motherwell. Next spring, the museum will open a sleek 125,000-square-foot space just around the corner. Friday admission is $3. From the museum, swing by the Urban Institute for Contemporary Art (41 Sheldon Boulevard SE, 616-454-7000; www.uica.org), an interdisciplinary complex where youre bound to find an art show, film screening, reading, music or dance performance or maybe a little of all of it at once. Admission is usually $7 to $12.

7:30 p.m.
3)GRAND HOTEL