We’re throwing ourselves a party on November 1, 2023
Join Us to Celebrate Our 5-Year Anniversary
Artistry of Karen Kent: Quirky Owls and Colorful Still Lifes
Local Artist’s Oils, Acrylics and Mixed Media Art on Exhibit at Greiser’s Thru Year’s End
OPENING RECEPTION THURSDAY, OCTOBER 19, 6:00 PM
Twenty recent works by Fairfield artist and Greiser’s customer Karen Kent will brighten the store’s rooms and walls through the end of 2023. Kent is a lifelong artist who earned a bachelors degree in fine art and architecture before embarking on a career as an interior designer crafting homes with balance through fabric, color, furniture, and accessories. After nearly three decades, Karen turned to focus full time on creating striking, vibrant large scale paintings.
Works on display and for sale at Greiser’s include vibrant floral still lifes ranging in size and complexity from Kent’s 12×12-inch acrylic-on-board still life “Garden Roses” ($100) to her 36×36-inch acrylic-on-canvas “Buzzing Bee” ($2,400). Her delightful mixed media owl series includes, pictured above from left to right, “Grumpy,” “Bashful,” and “Sneezy” each 24×18 inches ($750). Other pieces featured in the current exhibit at Greiser’s include landscapes, figurative studies, and animals including a heron, a Golden Retriever, and a pair of elephants.
Karen is an exhibiting member of Rowayton Arts Center and New Haven Paint and Clay. She is also a member of Carriage Barn Arts Center, Westport Arts Center, Westport Arts Collective, Greenwich Art Society, the Cultural Alliance of Fairfield County, and Ridgefield Guild of Artists.
Join us and the artist at 6pm October 19 for an open house and reception. See all works for sale online at Greiser’s and learn more about the artist on her website.
Greiser’s Summer Nights Community Cookouts 2023
Join us for our fourth outdoor summer concert and supper series in the NEW lower parking lot of Old Easton Center Gasoline and Antiques!
SEPTEMBER 21 COOKOUT MENU: Jumbo shrimp and local farm vegetable kabobs with Greiser’s killer herbed pasta salad and one of Isabel’s fabulous homemade desserts.
Thanks to our sponsor BCK ARBORIST of Easton, we will kickoff our Thursday evening series on June 22 followed by events on occasional Thursdays throughout the summer. Each cookout will feature local, unsigned musicians performing ALL ORIGINAL music. And all of our cookout and barbecue menus will include vegetarian, vegan, and gluten free choices. Please request those preferences at time of ticket purchase.
Events begin at 6:30 PM and end at 8:30 PM. Lineup and menus are as follows. Please request vegan or gluten free options when purchasing ticket.
Thursday September 21: Phoebe Merrill indie rock singer songwriter
Phoebe Skye Merrill is a singer songwriter whose thoughtful lyrics reflect the stories of her own life … and imagined ones.
This gifted and multi-talented young woman sings, plays guitar, and writes music that has its heart in the traditions of indie folk music. Think: wanderlust, romanticism, and a soulful introspection. Her songs are storytelling and dreamtelling punctuated by a melancholy yodel and an enchanted whisper with the spirit of an old soul.
MENU: Jumbo shrimp and local farm vegetable kabobs with Greiser’s killer herbed pasta salad and one of Isabel’s fabulous homemade desserts.
Tickets are available for music & cookout ($25 adults & teens; $14 kids age 12 and under) or for bring-your-own-chair-music-only ($10 adults; kids free). As the event is catered by Greiser’s, outside food is not permitted, and our table seating will be reserved for our diners. BYOB is permitted. Ample space in front of the stage for byo chairs!
Parking will be available in the gas station parking lot and in front of Greiser’s Coffee & Market starting at 6:15 PM and not earlier due to gas sales.
To help us plan menus, seating, and parking, we require advanced ticket purchase by the day before the event. In case of rain, each event will be rescheduled for another date and refunds or exchanges will be made.
Tickets may be purchased in-store at Greiser’s or on our website at greisers.com.
Pre-Mother’s Day Artisans Popup Market
Visit our annual outdoor fair featuring the work of 14 local creators of handmade jewelry, pottery, candles, wood vessels, cutting boards, handbags, sculpture, paintings, greeting cards, leatherwork, container plants, and hand blown glass. Stop in the store to grab a coffee before you browse the booths!
Discovered Light: The Final Photographs of Geri Gould
Opening Reception Thursday, May 4, 2023 at 6:30 PM
Geri Gould received her first camera at age eight from her father, Joe DiCuffa. He was a professional portrait photographer in New York City and provided a solid foundation of training and inspiration.
Her photography has been exhibited and recognized by the Easton Arts Council, Citizens for Easton, Black Rock Art Guild at Burroughs Community Center, Harborview Market and Framemakers Gallery.
Greiser’s Coffee & Market is privileged to partner with Kit Briner, Geri’s longtime love and companion, to show the final series of Geri’s work, “Discovered Light.”
After Geri passed away in January 2023, fellow Easton artist Robert Brennan assisted Kit in curating Geri’s this exhibit, which will be on display from May 4 through late June. All images are for sale in the store and online here.
This is how Brennan described Geri’s images and talent:
Geri Gould was an artist who happened to use a camera. Like Claude Monet and so many other painters, Geri was on a continuous and relentless search for the light, and in the process, she discovered the shadows, thus starting a visual dialogue of elegance, intrigue, mystery, and poetry.
The light streams in through the window, is interrupted by the leg and side of the gate leg table. The shadow is cast on the wall as a silhouette. The artist chooses what to save and composes by distilling the visual elements of shape, line, texture, and value into powerful, simplified abstractions, not unlike Robert Motherwell’s paintings, inspired by the shadows cast by the “El” upon the Manhattan streets below.
Engaging in some kind of alchemy, Geri makes shapes dissolve into mystical visions, works of ambiguity, mystery, and beauty wherein the viewer is treated to a most sophisticated visual, mental, and emotional journey in which the artist simply but not simply, shows us what she found in the most common everyday occurrence of the sun shining through the window.
The interplay of the light and the dark has been the “stuff” of painters, poets, musicians, philosophers, and all variations of mankind since the first questions posed regarding the night and the day. As there can be no music without silence between the notes, there can be no elegant shadows unless the light is also present.
Geri Gould’s gift to us is in a plain, but not so plain symphony of shadow and light, composed over time in the finest tradition of art making, the passionate search to find beauty and meaning in the often missed light that may cast itself even across our bathroom wall.
Please join us for an opening reception to celebrate the art and life of Geri Gould at Greiser’s on Thursday, May 4, 2023 at 6:30 PM.
Local Wisdom: After-Hours Gatherings at Greiser’s
APRIL 19: DISCOVER THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF EARLY EASTON WITH FRANK PAGLIARO
Running a small-town coffeeshop, we’re exposed every day to fascinating folks in our community.
An Olympic luger, a nonfiction-thriller writer, the creator of a leading clean-beauty makeup brand, a Barolo-trained prodigy chef, a designer of couture wedding gowns, a Broadway producer, a former big city Mayor, a painter of artwork collected by Beyoncé — they’re all among our Greiser’s regulars.
Easton is a hive of accomplished people with unique talents. And if you frequent our shop, there’s a chance you’ve enjoyed a conversation with one of them on your visits here.
Ever since our November 1, 2018, opening day, we’ve aspired to provide a place for all the interesting and interested people in our community to connect. Lately, we’ve been thinking about how to do that in more deliberate ways.
So, we’re excited to launch Local Wisdom, a new occasional after-hours event series at Greiser’s. On these evenings, we’ll provide small bites, beverages (non-alcoholic, but byob is permitted), and a relaxed forum where you can get to know your neighbors, including some of Easton’s most creative and innovative residents. Each event will include a short “lecture” — think TEDTalk or PechaKucha presentation — and plenty of time for conversation with our featured guests — all of whom will be plucked right from our customer list.
Join us for the third event in our series, “Discover the Hidden History of Early Easton” with Frank Pagliaro!
Local historian (and Greiser’s barista) Frank Pagliaro will join us from 6:30 – 8:00 pm on Wednesday, April 19, to present his own fascinating research and entertaining stories about the olden days of our lovely little town.
If you were dropped off in Easton 150 years ago, what would you recognize? In the 1870s you’d find several general stores, one-room schoolhouses, shoe shops, sawmills, grist mills, tanneries, blacksmiths, taverns, and hundreds of acres of fertile farmland crisscrossed by stone walls.
Today, our town hosts just a handful of commercial enterprises and 28 square miles of woodlands, reservoirs, farms, and more than two thousand homes on one- and three-acre lots.
Where did the past go? Frank quotes William Faulkner — “The past is never dead. It’s not even past”– and he says the history of Easton is all around you if you know where to look.
In this month’s Local Wisdom lecture, “Discover the Hidden History of Early Easton,” Frank will take us on a virtual walkabout of the Easton that was and, in some cases, still is.
What has changed, what has remained the same, and what is hiding in plain sight? What treasures are lying all around us, waiting for the curious to find? How does a walk in the woods become a tour of the past?
Join us this evening at Greiser’s to Discover the Hidden History of Early Easton with our in-house historian and morning barista, Frank Pagliaro.
A light buffet dinner and softdrinks will be served. BYOB welcome.
Space at Greiser’s is limited. Advanced registration is required. Tickets, $20, are available in-store or online here.
To learn about future events in our Local Wisdom series, please subscribe on our homepage to our email newsletter, the Flying A.
Artist About Town: John Forgione’s Plein Air Paintings Return to Greiser’s
Opening Reception Thursday, February 9, 6:30 – 8:30 pm
Easton is and has been home to many a famous artist.
Louise Bourgeois so loved her country home here that she sculpted a marble replica of it. Another globally known sculptor, Frederick Shrady, lived in Edna Ferber’s former estate on Maple Road. Naturalist painter and writer James Prosek developed an intense interest in fish as a child here and has since made a home in Easton with his own family. And now, NYC street artist Paul Richard rides around town on a vintage bicycle.
Yet part-time plein air painter John Forgione is arguably the most visible artist in Easton.
Weekdays, Forgione runs a digital marketing agency. But on weekends when the weather cooperates, he is a fixture of Easton’s open spaces. With his easel, oils, brushes, and canvas, you might find him in the orchard at Trout Brook Valley, amid the sunflowers on Adams Road, or capturing scenes at one of Easton’s bucolic farms; Gilbertie’s, Maple Row, Sabia’s, and Sport Hill Farm are among his beloved subjects. And he has been commissioned to capture on canvas several historic local homes.
Forgione also enjoys setting up his easel in other scenic Fairfield County spots, as well as on the water in Rhode Island, Barbados, Hawaii, and Positano. He’s even painted standing in the middle of the Brooklyn Bridge.
But Easton is his home, and, contrary to the stereotype of the solitary, reclusive painter, Forgione is notably social. He and his wife Cara, parents of three JBHS grads, rarely miss an event at Greiser’s. They both participate in Easton Arts Council shows. And he’s been known to arrive at local parties and bars with his latest painting in tow for show and tell. He loves to talk about art and process.
On a recent Sunday afternoon at Greiser’s, Forgione engaged fellow painter Paul Richard in an animated conversation about canvas stretching techniques and employing the golden ratio in landscape painting. Richard said he thought he recognized Forgione from an Instagram post that pictured a painter on the street in NYC. Indeed, Forgione had attracted attention from passersby in October when he painted a scene at the corner of 21st Street and 9th Avenue in Chelsea.
On the day he bumped into Richard, Forgione was at Greiser’s to take some measurements. He’s getting ready to install a new exhibit here in February. It’s been nearly four years since he hung his paintings on the walls of the “new” Greiser’s, during our first year in business.
Back then, when space was even more limited than it is today, he hung his art on a wall in the kitchen — our “Galley Gallery” — and we invited guests to squeeze past the chest freezer and hand sink to view it. This time, we’re thrilled to be able to offer him professional hooks on art moulding in our dining room.
Come see how much we and the artist have grown over the years!
Opening reception Thursday, February 9, 2023, 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm, with musical entertainment by Mike Miles. Free admission. All artwork will be for sale. Overflow parking will be available across the intersection at the Congregational Church.
A Galentine’s Gathering at Greiser’s
Join us at Greiser’s on the Sunday before Valentine’s Day for an afternoon celebration of the female friendships that sustain us.
Get out of the house while others are absorbed in Super Bowl pre-game TV! Bring girlfriends or come alone to connect with other women and enjoy a few hours of soulful music, love poems, sweet and savory treats, and bubbles from 2pm – 4pm. You’ll be home in time for kickoff!
Singer and keyboardist Maggie Ferrari of the Newtown band Iris Lies will entertain at the piano in our back room.
And Easton resident Samantha Sleeper, Chief Marketing Officer of Rosebud Woman, will provide us all with some self-love goodies. Her business is renowned nationally for a luxurious line of intimate wellness skincare products made with impeccable plant-derived ingredients. We have a few of her self-love products and books in stock, and Samantha will bring samples to share.
It’s also a chance to pick up a card or gift for your Valentine or your lovable self!
Advanced registration is requested. Signup in store before February 10, or register online here.
Easton History Chats with Frank: Winter Series
Beat the winter blues with this fascinating educational lecture series at Greiser’s
Learn something new about your surroundings this winter! Sign up to join any one or all four of our Easton History Chats with Frank.
Frank Pagliaro is a 27-year Easton resident with a passion for history and what he calls a “wikipedic” knowledge of all things local; that is, “constantly evolving and sometimes wrong.” Frank is a member of the Easton Cemetery Committee and was co-author of the definitive study of the 1807 Weston Meteorite fall sites. He’s a former Historical Society of Easton board member and presently works part-time at Greiser’s as a barista.
Frank will present each topic with pictures and maps, lead a casual discussion, and answer all your questions about Easton history.
Each 90-minute event will take place in our art gallery/back room on from 9:30 AM – 11:00 AM. The $12-per-event ticket price includes a light breakfast buffet of coffee, tea, and juice, plus fresh baked croissants and scones, donut muffins, and yogurt. Seating is limited. Advanced registration is required.
Register now online or at our register in the store for all 4 events at once and save $10! $12 per event or $38 for all four.
Tuesday, December 13: The Weston Meteorite
Learn everything you ever wanted to know about the first recorded fall of a meteorite in North America, who saw it, where they found it, and how it affected the nascent American science community. We’d like its name changed to the Easton Meteorite!
Tuesday, January 17: A General History of Easton
Once considered the northern wilderness of the town of Fairfield, Easton is now known as the Jewel of Fairfield County. We’ll talk about the Native Peoples who first lived here, the mapping of the Long Lots, the first colonial settlers, the parish of North Fairfield, the Revolution, the town of Weston (including a meteorite tease), the establishment of town of Easton, the creation of the reservoirs, and Easton’s decline and rebirth.
Tuesday, February 14: Easton’s Old Burial Grounds
Our cemeteries tell the stories of life and death in 18th and 19th century Easton and give clues about the practices and rituals of people who lived here. We’ll also talk about gravestone styles over time and the places where some of our notable residents lived and now rest.
Tuesday, March 14: Lost (and Found) Easton
It’s still winter, so Frank will treat you to a virtual walk about town from the comfort of our coffeeshop, visiting the locations of former mills, houses, schools, farms, and more.
Signup to attend one or all events in the series here today!