Looking Back...

At The Back Porch Café, we have offered various T-shirts over the years. They always seem to be popular with our friends, families, and customers, but it is not every year that we find the inspiration - or the spare time - to come up with a new design. For our 25th Anniversary Season (1999), we wanted to have a really great shirt.

The adaptation in batik of our logo was done by Susan and Sarah, local artists and entrepreneurs, whose Dragonfly Designs Shop/Studio is located in the Village by the Sea Mall on Baltimore Avenue. These two sisters work together to create inspired batik clothing, wall hangings, and pillows. The beautiful combination of colors in this rendition makes our 1999 T-shirt something very special.

[Click here to view larger size 640 x 886]

This painting was created by local artist Marilyn Bauman in 1987. We are presently using it on a promotional postcard.

[Click here to view larger size 640 x 384]

We'd like to show you some of the other art we at The Back Porch Café have commissioned throughout the years. For our 15th season in 1989, Paul Honake collaborated with our head waitress Susan Nethan to create this t-shirt design. The number "15," which is partially obscured in the sauce under the pears, is the only reference to the anniversary.

[Click here to view larger size 640 x 694]

Jim Zulauf, like many of our wait staff, was multitalented. In 1982, (our 8th season) he did this beautiful pen and ink drawing of our back and upper decks. We used it that year as a t-shirt design. The original hangs in our bar.

[Click here to view larger size 660 x 425]

We used this classic design in 1984 for our 10th anniversary party. We were still young and crazy enough to throw a big party like that. Libby York and her band played until 1:00 a.m. We had complimentary hors d'oeurves and a cash bar. It was a genuine bash.

[Click here to view larger size 400 x 713]

Many of you may not remember this logo design done for us in 1981 by Gary Zimmerman, a Key West windsurfing friend. He painted this design on a mirror which hung in the restaurant until it finally bit the dust. It was also used on our match boxes and assorted menus.

[Click here to view larger size 640 x 506]