Quote of the Day: “Tears are the summer showers to the soul.” – Alfred Austin
Photo by: Joshua Earle for Unsplash+
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
Tucked away in the parks and alleyways of East London lies one of the city’s most vibrant collections of public art.
What makes it all the more special is the mending of mental health maladies that transforms its volunteer artists.
The sometimes sprawling, Roman-inspired masterpieces are the work of the Hackney Mosaic Project and its founder Tessa Hunkin.
Her chance encounter with a mental health recovery group in Westminster sparked a realization: the meticulous, slow, and repetitive act of building a mosaic can offer profound therapeutic value.
Over the last 15 years, the project has not simply make colorful public murals out of broken fragments. It has restored pieces of lives broken by depression, PTSD, and addiction, while bringing together people of all backgrounds in a shared vision of beautifying corners of the community.
For the participants, sorting glass shards, nipping ceramic tiles, and carefully pressing each piece into mortar demands intense concentration.
Like embroidery or knitting, this steady rhythm offers a therapeutic calm, and helps interrupt negative thought patterns, quieting the internal noise of trauma and stress while building confidence.
“I spent a lot of time walking around Hackney, which has more parks than any other London borough,” Tessa recalled in an interview with Spitalfields Life. “A hidden little corner in Shepherdess Walk (park), off the City Road—that was the first.”
“Eventually, we had children running around, recovering addicts, some not-so-recovered people with quite serious mental health problems and people who lived close by, all sitting together making mosaics.
“They finished the mosaics much more quickly than I was anticipating and we have never stopped since.”
“It gives people a holiday from their head,” said the 72-year-old architect turned artist. “It is a simple task that requires concentration and produces something at the end, so it is never time wasted because you can see where your time has gone.”
One recent project was launched in 2023 following the COVID-19 pandemic to combat employee burnout for healthcare workers and staff at the River Place Health Centre.
The large new mural on the building showcased the name of the practice along with various plants and animals, like ducks, cats, and a fox.
In a second phase, the outdoor concrete benches of the health center were transformed with vibrant floral designs, with weekly workshops that also engaged the local patients in creating the artwork unveiled a year ago.
The Shepherdess Walk in Hoxton: These expansive, Roman-style mosaics cover both walls and pavement.
Several depict intricate details of East London life, from local flora and fauna in every season to modern figures with mobile phones.
All the parks in the borough are depicted on two of the huge walls (see top photo), as in this detail (below) listing Clissold Park.
All the artists who helped create the panels designed their names to fit on a column of brick.
River Place Health Centre Benches in Islington: Situated right off Essex Road, over 100 local patients, including those recovering from mental health conditions, helped revamp drab concrete benches into vibrant floral mosaics (see the photo above).
The Hounds of Hackney Downs in Hackney Downs Park: A spectacular collection of vibrant dog portraits in a wall mosaic features highly detailed portraits of local neighborhood dogs to celebrate the community’s daily life. The 50 whimsical dog portraits sit near further mosaics of native flowers that are in the park’s wildflower meadow.
Also in the same park are circular benches designed by Tessa and meticulously hand-tiled by the group’s volunteers, with vibrantly patterns topping the brick and concrete benches to provide a colorful gathering space.
Canalside Square along Arlington Avenue: A large circular mosaic decorated with animals is built into the pavement surrounded by the park benches and playground near a canal.
Building Markers in Hoxton: small circular markers have been installed into sidewalk cobblestones in Hoxton, too, outside the Shoreditch Library and the historic performing arts theater and community center called Hoxton Hall.
The website for the Hackney Mosaic Project offers a full map of all the installations.
The weekly workshops, normally held on Wednesdays and Fridays 2-5pm, and on alternate Saturday afternoons, are in flux this year due to changes facing their current home in the Pavilion on Hackney Downs, which may become a cafe.
But over the years, the assembling of thousands of broken pieces of tile into resilient works of art by Tessa Hunkin and her dedicated volunteers will forever offer a profound and lasting metaphor for the journey of healing within dozens of Londoners.
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A researcher discovered a ‘rare’ wildflower that only grows in New Jersey—after studying a plant that everyone assumed to belong to another species.
In the Pine Barrens region of southern New Jersey, Temple University researcher Sasha Eisenman helped identify the long mistaken plant as unique to the state—a discovery that could help protect it for years to come.
In research published in Phytotaxa, Eisenman confirmed the plant is distinct from its closest known relatives, and formally named it Triantha × novacaesariensis—a Latinization of New Jersey.
“It’s very special, very rare (and) only exists in this one place in the entire world,” said Mr. Eisenman, an associate professor in horticulture.
That place is part of what makes the finding so compelling.
Stretching across nearly a million acres in southern New Jersey, the Pine Barrens National Reserve is one of the region’s most ecologically distinctive landscapes, home to rare habitats and plant life. Eisenman said the discovery is especially striking because the northeastern United States has been studied so extensively.
“To really identify something as new and unique is pretty rare these days,” he said.
For years, the plant, which features clusters of thin, strap-like leaves and white 6-petaled flowers that rise above the surrounding grasses, had been identified as Triantha racemosa, a species typically found much farther south or suspected to be a hybrid of Triantha racemosa and Triantha glutinosa.
To reach that conclusion, Eisenman combined genetics, fieldwork, and historical plant records, and studied plant samples preserved for long-term study, from across the US and Canada. He then compared them with field samples from New Jersey and related populations in Maine; New York; New Brunswick, New Jersey; Alabama; Georgia and Florida.
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The study found that all three New Jersey plants carry a unique genetic signature and have distinct physical traits that set them apart from each other. The two previously known plants are also geographically isolated from the newly named wildflower.
“There’s genetic differences, there’s structural and morphological differences, and there’s also isolation,” Eisenman told Temple News.
That isolation is central to the story. According to the research, the nearest known populations of T. glutinosa and T. racemosa are hundreds of miles away. Eisenman said the evidence suggests the New Jersey plants likely originated long ago when the two species intermingled but have persisted on their own for thousands of years.
“It’s been a stable population or group of populations for a long time,” he said. “It’s not just a chance accident.”
PLANT NEWS: Quarter Century of Collecting Seeds From Around the World Safeguards Them From Extinction
The finding also carries real conservation value. Because the plant is now officially identified, researchers and land managers have a clearer basis for recognizing its significance and planning for its care.
“It’s really important to have a name on a plant in order for it to be conserved and protected,” Eisenman said. “Until it’s been identified as unique and named with a unique identification, it doesn’t have as much opportunity for protection and stewardship.”
The project began more than a decade ago and drew on support from a wide network of researchers, herbarium curators, and conservation partners across the U.S. and Canada.
For Eisenman, who studies naturally occurring and cultivated plants, the discovery reflects both a longstanding interest in plants and a broader commitment to sustainability.
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The next step is for New Jersey to figure out how best to protect it.
“For a rare plant tucked into one of New Jersey’s most distinctive natural landscapes, being formally recognized and given a name could make all the difference,” he concluded.
SEND SEEDS OF THE DISCOVERY To Friends in NJ By Sharing on Social Media…
Tiny samples of DNA taken from a wide variety of animal sources can pinpoint hotspots of the illegal wildlife trade, utilizing a new research technique—and eventually lead to dismantling lucrative poaching networks.
The study focused on pangolins—with their scales prized for traditional medicine. One of the most poached species, they account for almost a third of recorded international seizures in recent years.
Genetic data can be valuable for tracing trafficked animals to their place of origin, but the method has been hindered by difficulties in obtaining genetic samples of pangolins.
In the new study, French scientists overcame that barrier by employing a gene-capture method to recover usable genomic information from degraded pangolin samples.
The team sequenced DNA from more than 700 samples of pangolins from international trade seizures, museum collections, bushmeat markets, and in the wild.
Using the genetic data from samples of known geographic origin in museum and field specimens, the researchers built a genomic “reference map” which helped them to trace each trafficked pangolin back to its likely origin.
“We’ve shown that it’s possible to trace trafficked pangolins back to their geographic origin with remarkable precision—sometimes to within just a few kilometers,” said Dr. Sean Heighton of the University of Toulouse.
The data revealed several hotspot locations of illegal pangolin collection, including south west Cameroon, Myanmar, and several locations across Africa.
The genetic record also tracks major trade routes for the three pangolins types studied—Sunda, Chinese, and white-bellied—which cross the borders of China and between Indonesian islands.
The findings, published in the journal PLOS Biology, also pinpointed wild populations that are exploited for both domestic and international trade, revealing the interconnectedness of the markets.
The team says their sampling technique has “great potential” for tracking the illegal wildlife trade, but genetic material remains limited.
They propose that a more detailed DNA database of trafficked animals could be developed with the establishment of standardized genetic sampling protocols, shared tools, and greater data integration between wildlife trade tracing initiatives worldwide—for pangolins as well as other trafficked species.
MORE PANGOLIN GOOD NEWS:
• Chinese Pangolin Numbers Growing Steadily in the Wilds of Southern China for the First Time This Century
• The ‘Pangolin Men’ Are Protecting The World’s Most Trafficked Mammal
“Integrating archival museum material with newly collected field and seizure samples enabled us to bridge long-standing gaps in geographic coverage and strengthen the accuracy of pangolin trade tracing,” said the University’s Dr. Philippe Gaubert.
“This enables more efficient, intelligence-driven conservation by directing limited resources toward key poaching hotspots, whereby a range of targeted interventions can be employed to disrupt illegal trade networks.
“One of the most exciting aspects of this work is that we developed a single gene-capture kit that works across all eight pangolin species and on degraded museum specimens, making genomic tracing more accessible, scalable, and practical for real-world pangolin conservation and forensic use.”
Dr Gaubert added: “One of the most striking findings was that domestic pangolin trade is largely local, but it overlaps with the same sourcing regions that supply international trafficking—revealing a connected supply chain rather than separate markets.”
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Our partner Rob Brezsny, whose latest book is Astrology Is Real: Revelations from My Life as an Oracle, provides his weekly wisdom to enlighten our thinking and motivate our mood. Rob’s Free Will Astrology, is a syndicated weekly column appearing in over a hundred publications. He is also the author of Pronoia Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How All of Creation Is Conspiring To Shower You with Blessings. (A free preview of the book is available here.)
Here is your weekly horoscope…
FREE WILL ASTROLOGY – Week of May 23, 2026
Copyright by Rob Brezsny, FreeWillAstrology.com
GEMINI (May 21-June 20):
When many people reflect on their early years, they focus on the alienation and wounds they endured. Few recall, in vivid detail, the moments of joy, triumph, and breakthrough. It’s a symptom, I suppose, of our era’s compulsive cynicism, and not necessarily an accurate account of the past. So many good things happened, too! This isn’t to dismiss the real pain that shaped us in our tender years. Still, I want you to know that you are in a season when it’s essential to recognize and celebrate the blessings of your beginnings—the fun, guidance, and grace that helped you flourish. Update your gratitude!
CANCER (June 21-July 22):
Of all the zodiac signs, you have the most potential to cultivate robust emotional intelligence that’s helpful in practical situations. More than everyone else, your feelings are less likely to render you vulnerable and fragile and more likely to make you a powerhouse. The coming weeks will be prime time to deploy these talents to the max. I encourage you to summon gleeful exuberance as you provide your sensitive, heartful nurturing. Practice the ingenious art of keeping the world emotionally literate and spiritually alert.
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):
I am pleased to predict that you will be less egotistical and narcissistic in the coming weeks than you have ever been in your life. In saying that, I don’t mean to imply that you’re any more egotistical and narcissistic than the rest of us. I’m simply saying you can get a liberating reprieve from the excessive pride and selfishness that regularly debilitates us all. Congratulations, Leo! This grace period should enable you to deepen your attunement with your soul’s blueprint, the design of destiny you chose before birth. I bet you will enjoy a period of vibrant, exciting tranquility.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):
Consider this a friendly heads-up to your inner critic, your gloomy side, and any voice in your head that expects too little from life. Upcoming astrological omens are influencing me to predict a stream of auspicious omens and fortunate events. So if you’d rather cling to tired stories about not being good enough or strong enough, you might want to skip my forecasts for a while. But if you’re ready to vivify your faith in your power to eagerly create what you desire, stay tuned. Karmic blessings are coming.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):
To be blunt, dear Libra, I think you need soul medicine that’s most available in frontiers, borderlands, and thresholds. Some of these might be bright, shiny places, and others may be akin to mazes and tunnels. Please keep in mind that your main motivation, as you seek adventures in the outskirts, should be the quest to have fun as you blow your own mind. For the sake of your lust for life and joie de vivre, you really must explore power spots untouched by trivia and pettiness: sanctuaries where vastness, freedom, and raw vitality can wash away at least some of your fixations and habits.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):
Giant Pacific octopus dens are identifiable by the “gardens” of debris outside. They include shells and bones, arranged like ornamentation around the entrance. Are the creatures trying to decorate? Scientists don’t know. But it’s clear they are leaving evidence of their appetites. The result is distinctive, artistic, and revealing. With this scenario as your metaphorical meditation, Scorpio, I invite you to look at what you have been pursuing and consuming in recent months. Contemplate the stuff piling up in your sphere. What do your finished experiences reveal about your quest for meaning? Does this pattern reflect your deepest intentions? Is this who you want to be? Make sure the story you’re teling about yourself is the right one.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):
Advising a Sagittarius to be patient is like asking a bonfire to burn slowly and politely. Still, I will give it a try. Because I love you, I will dare to be frank. So here goes: If you want to align yourself with astrological currents, practice being reverently at ease with life’s madness as you watch and wait. See if you can take genuine pleasure in resting within a field of calm trust. Imagine, with fearless delight, the rewards that will find you as you nurture a steady, unhurried confidence in your intuition, which will ultimately tell you exactly what you need to do.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):
In 1994, immunologist Polly Matzinger revolutionized her field with a radical theory. She discovered that our immune systems don’t focus on distinguishing “self” from “non-self,” but rather responding to threats. The body puts less emphasis on asking “is this me?” and more on “is this harmful?” Her breakthrough transformed our understanding of immunity, autoimmune disease, and transplant rejection. According to my analysis of the astrological riddles, you Capricorns could benefit from a similar adjustment. Don’t worry about whether any particular influence harmonizes with your identity or aligns with your history. Instead, ask, “Is it nourishing or harmful? Supportive or useless?” As you refresh your approach to guarding and protecting your precious self, new options will become visible.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):
According to my interpretation of the astrological signals, you have run into an obstacle to your creative flow, or may soon do so. Though this could feel discouraging at first, I think it’s a promising sign. It indicates that a hidden bug is surfacing. An inner saboteur is no longer operating in the shadows. You’re being given the opportunity to repair an unseen energy leak that has been sapping your vitality. To illuminate this process, consider the wisdom of author Joyce Carol Oates. She says that writer’s block arises when a writer subconsciously believes that what they’re trying to create is false, misguided, or harmful to themselves, which results in a temporary creative paralysis. Be brave and relentless in hunting down the glitch in your self-love, Aquarius.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):
Maybe you’ve been having thoughts like this: “I’m too scrambled to do what’s necessary to get unscrambled.” Here’s another snag that may be tangling your mind: “I’m too mixed up to know what questions to ask to sort out my confusion.” If this is true, Pisces, I’m here to offer advice. Imagine calling a timeout on the whole noisy world and slipping free of the habitual trance. Consider retreating to a sanctuary where time doesn’t oppress you and complications subside. Let your mind be empty, give your ambitions a rest, and immerse your tender attention in the deepest part of yourself you can find.
ARIES (March 21-April 19):
If you’re a professional photographer, now is an ideal moment to invest in the higher-end lens you know would expand your best work. If you’re a committed chef, it’s a perfect time to spring for a precision knife set that elevates your craft. If you’re a devoted yoga or meditation teacher preparing a new series, you might decide to purchase an upgraded sound system to share your vocal offerings more crisply. And if you are none of the above, consider this your sign to obtain a key instrument or tool that will help you move to the next level of professionalism in the work you’re called to do.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20):
When we hear people described as having fertile imaginations, we may assume they are artists, writers, or musicians. But the truth is that many creative visualizers are engineers, city planners, inventors, and the like: those who design and build functional wonders. Of this group, you Tauruses make up a disproportionately high percentage. Your tribe is often most imaginative when vitalizing concrete details and transforming practical matters. In the coming weeks, this will be a vibrant X-factor in your relationship with the world.
WANT MORE? Listen to Rob’s EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES, 4-5 minute meditations on the current state of your destiny — or subscribe to his unique daily text message service at: RealAstrology.com
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Quote of the Day: “Let the hurt open you instead of closing you.” – Bryant McGill
Photo by: Andrej Lišakov For Unsplash+
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
213 years ago today, South American revolutionary leader Simón Bolívar entered Mérida, leading the invasion of Venezuela, and was proclaimed El Libertador (“The Liberator”). Credited with leading the fight for independence in areas of Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Panama and Bolivia, he is revered as a hero in these countries and throughout much of Latin America. A great admirer of the American Revolution (and a critic of the French Revolution), Bolívar described himself in his many letters as a classical “liberal” and defender of the free market economic system. READ more about his philosophy… (1813)
Scientists in California are using heat-sensing AI to save grey whales transiting through San Francisco Bay.
More and more sightings of grey whales, a medium size baleen that can grow to between 40 and 50 feet, are being recorded in the bay, and conservationists are eager to develop methods to more consistently keep them safe from ship strikes—one of the largest causes of whale mortality.
To that end they are employing artificial intelligence to instantly identify the animals’ heat signatures and broadcast that data to passing ships.
“The problem has been getting worse,” Dr. Douglas McCauley, the director of the Benioff Ocean Science Laboratory told CBS News. “This is a problem we can solve right now, that this new data and the community came around it can solve.”
CBS San Fran reported that a group of marine mammal experts gathered in the city to launch Whale Spotter. The first of these devices was put on Angel Island, and the second on a routine transit ferry to Vallejo
“About an hour after plugging it in, we saw 180 blows,” said Dr. McCauley. “That’s not 180 whales, but a handful of whales being active in the bay. It blows, it’s a warm breath so the thermal sensing system sees the heat of the breath against the cold ocean.”
Those heat signatures are then uploaded to a digital map which mariners can access almost immediately and ensure their path of navigation will miss the whales.
MORE STORIES LIKE THIS: Rather Than Taking Jobs in Tech, 2 Young Software Engineers Use Talents to Crush Poaching in India
The Benioff Laboratory should be able to know within a few months if the devices are leading to fewer whale deaths. Not every new method for preventing ship strikes does—as evidenced by the continuing need to advance methods of detection for humans and deterrence for whales.
GNN has previously reported on methods to reduce ship strikes, including through powerful imaging satellites in the North Atlantic, and a trio of buoys in the Mediterranean that alerts passing ships to the coordinates of sperm whale clicks.
SHARE This Great Use Of AI To Save These Stunning Marine Mammals…
A call about suspicious activity saw a California police officer race to save a newborn’s life.
A woman was sitting between two bushes near a business in the Rancho Cordova, and Deputy Foster Tracy described the situation as “routine,” before it became anything but.
“It was zero to a hundred really fast. It was one of those calls you go to, run-of-the-mill,” Deputy Foster Tracy said. “This was definitely not something that I was prepared for at any part of the day.”
“‘Excuse me?'” Tracy remembers saying, as it didn’t really register, “‘you’re having a baby?'”
Indeed, the woman had been begging for help for “hours,” CBS News reported.
Calling for medical backup, Tracy got down on his knees and went to work as he realized there wasn’t time to waste: the baby’s head was already out.
Tracy’s partner arrived moments later and they both saw the problem as the umbilical cord was wrapped around the baby’s neck. “I was concerned the baby was deceased because it was purple and blue.”
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Yet their persistence was rewarded with a healthy baby and a relieved mother, who were both taken to the hospital to recover from the ordeal.
The deputies have been credited with a life-saving intervention, and were praised by the mom, the police chief, and the surprised shop owners whose call had inadvertently saved a life.
WATCH the story below from CBS News…
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5 years after its discovery and 2 years after preservation, the largest collection of Iron age artifacts ever found in Britain is revealing its secrets.
Found in the “rural backwater” of northern England’s county of Yorkshire, the mélange of horse tackle, carriage pieces, weapons, and home goods is proving the region was anything but.
Now, parts of the hoard will go on display for the first time ever at the Yorkshire Museum for an exhibition entitled: Chariots, Treasure and Power: Secrets of the Melsonby Hoard.
The hoard was discovered in a field near Melsonby by a metal detector in 2021. This unnamed individual immediately alerted archaeologists, to his eternal credit, who arrived and deduced that this was something that had never been seen before.
“Finding a hoard or collection of ten objects is unusual, it’s exciting, but finding something of this scale is just unprecedented,” Tom Moore, Durham’s head of archaeology, told the Guardian’s Mark Brown in 2025. “We were just lost for words.”
The Melsonby hoard consists of two groups of items: the first is a big stack of chariot components and horse tackle, including bridles and bits which look tantalizingly identical to the ones used today.
The second is called “the Block” and it is basically a mass of iron and copper-alloy artifacts fused together after they were probably thrown into a big pit fire. It was then pulled out of the fire, covered in a sheet, and buried nearby.
The Block contains iron spear points, harness pieces, and wagon parts visible on the outside, but what’s inside is largely a mystery, even after conservators at the University of Durham brought the mass down to Southampton for a detailed CT scan.
As for the horse tackle, the excavators’ eyes were drawn to the 28 wagon tire bands made of iron all stacked atop one another. In between were all manner of wagon components, including lynchpins, and elements of yokes and reins that seem to point to a 4-horse-drawn wagon or carriage, the first evidence of such a vehicle in Iron Age Britain.
Without a doubt the hoard’s most compelling objects are those which may point to a complex intercontinental trade route—perhaps with the Roman world, which consisted of a large ornamented cauldron, a wine-mixing bowl, blue glass beads, and a mirror.
“The bowl… is really interesting because it is a very unusual type: not something you’d find in Northern Britain,” said Professor Moore, who was involved in both the excavation and the examination of the artifacts.
“Its decoration combines both Mediterranean and British Iron age styles. It also has elaborate decoration of coral, so whoever owned something like that has probably got a network across Britain and across into Europe and even the Roman world.”
MORE ANCIENT BRITAIN: Archaeologists Discover a ‘Master Blacksmith’s’ Workshop Dating to the Very Dawn of the Iron Age in Britain
Though named after the nearby town of Melsonby, the closest contemporary settlement to the artifacts was a fort called Stanwick populated by a tribe called the Brigantes, who at one point were ruled by a queen called Cartimandua, the first documented female sovereign in the island’s history.
In England, as indeed so many lands the world over, a divide in culture and wealth has existed between north and south, and one of the most important aspects of the hoard has been the end of assumptions that this kind of wealth and, in the case of the horse cart, technology, was only found in the south at the time.
GREAT BRITISH HOARDS: English Teenager Discovers Hoard of 3,300 Year-Old Axes and Becomes Metal Detecting Celebrity
“Chariots, Treasure and Power marks the initial stages of research on the hoard, outlining the current understandings of Iron Age Britain and exploring life before the arrival of the Romans, and asking the questions, why was the hoard buried, why were the objects burnt and destroyed and who might have owned these lavish items,” the Yorkshire Museum advertises.
WATCH Professor Moore and his colleagues explain the hoard…
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In a stunning act of corporate responsibility, one of the world’s largest makers of smartphone cases has designed and built a seaborne drone carrier designed to clean up ocean-bound plastic waste.
Already deployed off the coast of Taiwan, the Circular Blue looks a little like an offshore oil or gas platform, but rather than pulling hydrocarbons out of the seabed, its aquatic drone collects plastic floating by.
According to a release from parent company RHINOSHIELD, the pair of AI-driven drones identify pollution hotspots in real time along coastlines before directing solar-powered collection vessels to the highest-impact areas, while onboard filtration captures debris of all sizes.
It took the company 18 months to design and develop and around $2 million to build. An aerial drone launches from the platform to identify floating waste and feed its position to a floating drone which collect it.
Facilities onboard can also accommodate marine research programs, and there are living areas for 4 crewmembers, although the platform doesn’t need any human to operate it.
“I look into ocean plastic a lot, and I realize that not a lot of people are collecting it,” said Eric Wang, the CEO of RHINOSHIELD.
Passionate about recycling, the company under Wang’s leadership has doubled down on monomaterial cases, that is, one single plastic polymer from the flexible interior to the rigid exterior, to make them as easy to recycle as a plastic bottle.
“Every year we make about 5 million phone cases, and if everything is made of one material, and everything can be identified, there would be so much less waste in the world,” he said in a video.
Company sources told GNN that a North American expansion of the Circular Blue is expected in the future.
WATCH Eric explain his vision below…
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Quote of the Day: “Love is our true destiny. We do not find the meaning of life by ourselves alone—we find it with another.” – Thomas Merton
Photo by: marcos mayer
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
180 years ago today, the Associated Press organized in New York City as a nonprofit news cooperative to reduce the cost of covering the events of the Mexican American War. The original AP was agreed upon by senior members and editors of The Sun, the New York Herald, the New York Courier and Enquirer, The Journal of Commerce, and the New York Evening Express. Today, AP operates 235 news bureaus in 94 countries, and covers the news in English, Spanish, and Arabic, winning 59 Poulitzer prizes along the way. READ more about the AP’s long history… (1846)
From CNN’s travel desk comes the story of a miracle passion project that goes down smooth—and tastes great with a bagel.
At the center of Hong Kong, it might seem a preposterous notion that anyone is engaged in agriculture in the world’s densest city, but on the relative frontier of the city-state’s Lantau Island, a remarkable experiment is being undertaken: coffee growing.
Despite lacking altitude and space, some intrepid java jockeys have managed to cultivate an Arabica coffee bean on Lantau Island. The island is about the only place you can find anything describable as “rural” in Hong Kong; it’s also where you will find LCC Roastery, and its owner Ringo Lam.
This rock star of coffee is part of the sales division of the Lantau Coffee Co-Op, an effort to produce something of real value and pride in a city where practically everything is imported. Despite the archipelago’s highest point being less than 1,000 meters, the kind of altitude where premium Arabica is grown, coffee can and does grow.
Katie Chick, assistant director at the University of HK’s Center for Civil Society and Governance, helps run one of the co-op’s coffee farms on Hong Kong itself. The islands sit 22 degrees north of the Equator—perfect coffee latitude. Chick’s farm yields around 50 kilograms of coffee beans from 800 trees.
The operation started when Lam, a former tech entrepreneur, visited Panama and was given 100 coffee seeds. Back on Lantau, he planted them and 80 or so sprouted, after which he began to look for farmers who’d be willing to cultivate them. 5 agreed, which turned into 25, while the 80 seeds would multiply into 400 shrubs.
Last year, these 400 shrubs yielded 10 kilograms of coffee, or 22 pounds, the largest harvest yet. CNN reports the coffee they thusly produce lacks the depth and nuance of Arabica coffee grown at altitude, but was still smooth and enjoyable.
Lam and Chick routinely meet with other growers and brainstorm ways about how to refine and evolve growing techniques, including through different washing methods that might stimulate changes in the plants which result in more complex flavor.
COFFEE GAZETTE:
They’ve also come up with interesting ways of using the coffee to improve lives and attitudes.
One grower uses her coffee farm as a sort of gardening therapy service; another enters it in tasting contests around the city’s 700 coffee shops to show that coffee can grow in Hong Kong. Lam actually runs workshops on producing Lantau beans for roasting, which gives residents a taste of the sweaty, dirty labor involved in producing the product they drink every day.
“We won’t have enough land to [grow coffee at scale], but at least after going through this workshop and exercise, they will be more connected to the origin,” Lam told CNN.
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The world’s most visited museum has made the wise decision to move the world’s most famous painting to a separate wing, where clamoring hordes pushing for a glimpse can stay separate from the rest of the art-loving public.
In a statement announcing major structural changes to the Louvre in Paris, administrators revealed that the Mona Lisa will have her own 33,000 square-foot exhibition space.
It means that people looking to see the famous Giocanda will not necessarily have to pass through or even visit the rest of the Louvre. They will be spared the extra time waiting in line, and can get in, take their selfies, and get out.
Meanwhile, those who wish to see the hundreds of thousands of other pieces among the galleries, will be spared the extra waiting time in line from those queuing only for the purpose of seeing the Mona Lisa.
It’s a superb compromise, and one that will also come with a $1 billion renovation aimed at reducing congestion all over the Louvre and modernizing the massive building’s infrastructure.
The Mona Lisa attracts roughly 20,000 admirers alone, day in and day out, and it’s not uncommon for visitors to leave feeling a sense of uneasiness and claustrophobia in the crush that pushes as much as polite society can handle to get close enough for a glimpse of the rather small portrait.
“Every day, this very room is the scene of intense agitation,” Laurence des Cars, the museum’s former director, said at the press conference announcing the renovations.
The Louvre has been a source of several high-profile failures, including the heist of the French crown jewels and an earlier water leak that damaged some 400 artworks.
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Selldorf Architects, a New York-based firm, was offered the contract out of 5 finalists whose designs and submissions were picked from a pool of 100 firms. Selldorf will partner with Studios Architecture Paris on the project which is centered around the expansion of the Grande Colonnade, the museum’s eastern facade, which was built in the 17th century in the classical tradition.
The contest-winning design addresses existing challenges to foot traffic by adding two new underground entrances, new, separate dining areas and gift shops, as well as expanded gallery space.
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“New pathways and greenery connecting the museum with the rest of Paris aim to solve the museum’s growing foot traffic problem by accommodating an estimated three million more visitors per year,” Smithsonian reports.
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Early in May, GNN reported how Australia and USA citizens have amassed 85 million acres of private land specifically for conservation.
From the Spokesman-Review comes the story of a man in Washington state who’s about to make it 85,000,885 by donating his own patch to the Kalispel Indian Tribe.
Having spent his whole working life in urbanity during a 30-year career with the Social Security Administration, Gary Verbrugge longed for the natural world he remembered from his youth, where he lived on land that was bought by his relatives after moving from Iowa in the early 20th century.
After taking an early retirement to help with his parents’ ailing health, he bought some more land and a cabin owned by a neighbor and went home to see what had happened to his father and uncles’ forest.
It turns out that the forester they entrusted the management of their land to was more interested in making money from timber sales than ensuring the health of the woodland.
A year later, in 2007, Verbrugge partnered with the Inland Northwest Land Conservancy to turn 605 wooded acres he owned into a conservation easement. In 2025, he bought another 280 acres directly abutting his own land from his nieces and nephews, and added them to the package.
The idea, explained by the INLC’s conservation director Michael Crabtree, is that the Conservancy acts “kind of like the third party that makes sure the rules are being followed,” on behalf of the owner, who has stipulated he wants to see the land preserved in a natural state.
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Though Verbrugge, who lives alone at 72 years old in the forest, has no heirs to pass the property to, he found a suitable inheritor in the Kalispel Indians, who said they would carry the responsibility of keeping the land in good health forward with “profound gratitude.”
As to the land itself, the Little Spokane River runs through it, along with several creeks home to bull trout. In a subdivided and developed area, Verbrugge’s woodland is a haven for elk, deer, moose, wolves, cougar, bobcat, and eagles.
“To see the wildlife, where they’re not aggressive, they’re not scared, they’re just at home, is the reward,” Verbrugge told the Spokesman-Review, who enjoys catching glimpses of his sylvan neighbors with trail cams.
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With every pass of his squeegee, a window washer in Kansas City reveals the personal story behind his favorite local businesses through his popular social media channel.
Davis Roethler is co-owner of Window Wolf, KC’s most trusted window washer, but that’s hardly all there is to his story.
With experience as a social media content manager, Roethler often offers free window cleanings to the great, struggling, or unique restaurants and businesses in the metropolitan area.
For the business owners, the free clean is a welcome relief to high costs and low margins of running a restaurant, but what they don’t know is that behind Roethler’s Meta glasses that record everything he sees is a master plan to send their bottom line sky high.
“When you just look at the data, opening up a restaurant, from a business standpoint, it’s a terrible idea. It’s a huge risk. The numbers are not on your side,” Roethler told Kansas City Star’s Rashad Alexander.
“When you realize that, you realize that there’s so much opportunity in KC to help out these small businesses to make sure that they’re not part of that statistic of closing down.”
Window Wolf has 8,700 followers on Instagram, and it’s growing every day. Followers tune in to see Roethler “flip” the traditional food content strategy—to tell the story of the people preparing the food which other influencers just nom and noise about.
Dunn Deal BBQ, run by pitmaster Gerald Dunn, who is also the director of entertainment at the American Jazz Museum in KC, is just one beneficiary of the Roethler recommendation. Tasty African Food KC, Kolaches and Coffee, and Simply Grand Kitchen and Creamery have all enjoyed the same.
Many of these longer-form video reviews receive tens of thousands of views, and in the case of Kolaches and Coffee, may have saved the business altogether.
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Dunn Deal and Simply Grand Kitchen are located practically next to each other, and each have lines around the block on Roethler’s recommendation.
In many of these cases, the content doesn’t stop, as Roethler will come back to keep washing—and keep talking, to the owners, cooks, and families—to keep pulling out the personal stories of struggle, passion, and triumph that make up the recipes served up at each location.
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And it all started with a window cleaning, which for all the impact of the food review channel, is still the principle activity of Window Wolf, which hopes to expand its offerings from gutter cleanings, window cleanings, and pressure washing to high rise window washing as well.
WATCH the Dunn Deal review below…
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Quote of the Day: “Set your goals high, and don’t stop till you get there.” – Bo Jackson
Photo by: Getty Images For Unsplash+
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
55 years ago today, Marvin Gaye released What’s Going On, a landmark LP in pop music history. The concept album flowed with songs written from the point of view of a Vietnam veteran returning to the US, and seeing only hatred, suffering, and injustice.
Regarded as one of the greatest albums of the 20th century, the artist himself produced it—a first for Motown which had resisted any protest themes—yet they finally released it, and it became Motown’s best-selling album to date. WATCH a segment from the Biography documentary, What’s Going On… (1971)
From Riviera Beach in Florida comes the story of a man returning $30,000 to a poor soul who’d misplaced it, saying “it wasn’t mine to take.”
The story is simple, yet powerful, and a reminder that there are good people all over the country; all over the world.
It starts with Luis Salazar walking into the bathroom of a Wawa convenience store and finding a fanny pack hung on the handrail inside the stall.
Salazar asked around inside the store to see if anyone had forgotten it, with no avail. His next thought was to open it up to look for an ID, but his mind went “numb” from what he saw inside: several huge wads of cash.
Yet being the good person prefaced in this story, Salazar never thought of taking a dime, and instead spent several days trying to locate the person who owned it. Eventually, the fanny pack’s owner contacted Riviera Beach police to report it missing, who used security camera footage to identify Salazar.
They told him the owner was waiting at the Riviera Beach Police Station, and Salazar went right over.
“So, I give him his bag. ‘This is yours.’ And he was crying. And he hugged me,” Salazar said.
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“I was pretty astonished that anybody would have done that,” said the owner, who chose not to be identified. “Think about it. That’s life-changing money. People would kill for that kind of money.”
For his part, Salazar didn’t seem astonished.
“It’s not my money to take. I was not raised that way,” Salazar said.
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