Inside of Knoxville

Love Letter to a Petro: Market Square Location Closing on Friday + Incoming Fashion Retail

Leslie Bateman·November 12, 2025

After six years on Market Square, the downtown Petro’s Chili & Chips location will close its doors for good at 3 p.m. this Friday. The Knoxville-born brand—birthed at the 1982 World’s Fair and known for its...

Keep Knoxville Beautiful Celebrates 2025 Orchids Award Winners

Leslie Bateman·November 11, 2025

What’s prettier than an orchid? I can’t keep one blooming longer than a season (yes, I’ve tried the ice cube trick and watched YouTube videos), but I appreciate those who can. A city is a little...

Make Room: ‘Her’ Opens at Lilienthal Gallery, Showcasing Women Who Take Up Space

Leslie Bateman·November 7, 2025

Ilana Lilienthal, of Lilienthal Gallery, is easy to spot in a crowd. Across the foyer of the Knoxville Museum of Art, I see her, looking tonight like art itself: asymmetrical, architectural, cinematic. It’s the annual Keep...

Dogwood Arts Unveils New Signature Event: Knoxwalls Murals & Music Festival

Leslie Bateman·November 6, 2025

Dogwood Arts is adding a new entry to its growing list of community art traditions. The first Knoxwalls Murals & Music Festival will take place Saturday, May 30, 2026, from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. in...

Your Field Guide to FILM FEST KNOX 2025

Leslie Bateman·November 5, 2025

FILM FEST KNOX returns Nov. 6-9, transforming the Regal Riviera into a showcase of independent film. Now in its third year running, the festival features three full days of film programming as well as regional and...

The Improvisational Life of Todd Steed

Leslie Bateman·October 27, 2025

Todd Steed is cleaning out his office. This Friday will be his final day as WUOT 91.9 FM’s program director, as well as longtime host of evening jazz show Improvisations, after 27 years of service to...

Knoxville Opera Presents ‘Carmen,’ the Original Bad Romance

Leslie Bateman·October 23, 2025

Knoxville Opera presents two performances of Georges Bizet’s Carmen this weekend, on Friday night and Sunday afternoon. The four-act opera is iconic in all the ways: banger after banger — even if you know nothing about...

Downtown-ish Development Updates, Part 1: RiverHill on the Rise

Leslie Bateman·October 21, 2025

I had coffee with Alan yesterday morning, in the cool shade of his balcony overlooking Krutch Park. I’m grateful to have IOK’s founder as both a sounding board and an encyclopedic resource for all things downtown...

Could Knoxville be the Next Tennessee Market to Add Another Pro Sports Team?

Leslie Bateman·October 20, 2025

While Knoxville is not known as a pro sports hotbed, it has gained more attention in the space over the past few years. As the third-largest market in Tennessee, trailing only Nashville and Memphis, might this...

Big Ears’ ‘Knoxville Broadcast’ Invites the City to Listen Differently

Leslie Bateman·October 16, 2025

It’s Wednesday morning, and composer Lisa Bielawa is leading a group of middle school band students around World’s Fair Park. In one hand she holds a megaphone, in the other a clutch of papers mapping all...

Waymakers, Not Gatekeepers: How a Knoxville-Led Collective Is Rewriting Arts Funding in Appalachia

Leslie Bateman·October 14, 2025

If your nonprofit friends look tired, they are. Priorities in big-box philanthropy shift. Funding can evaporate overnight. “DEI” has become a dirty word. Most don’t have a six-figure development department. And gatekeeping is real, especially if...

ETCDC Celebration of Design: A Toast to 55 Years of Volunteer Impact

Leslie Bateman·October 13, 2025

For 55 years, the East Tennessee Community Design Center (ETCDC) has run on a simple engine: generous people giving their time and talent so great ideas can find their footing. On Wednesday, the annual Celebration of...

Visit Knoxville Unveils New Branding Campaign: ‘Calling the Curious’

Leslie Bateman·October 8, 2025

How do you brand a whole dang city? Tourism taglines are part marketing, part micro-poetry. At their best, they fuse so tightly with a place they become shorthand for it: think “What Happens Here, Stays Here”...

Real Good Kitchen Grows Its Mission With Magpies Acquisition + Real Good Gathering Invite!

Leslie Bateman·October 2, 2025

Some days, Real Good Kitchen is wall to wall with chefs, bakers and caterers hustling side by side. But on this early autumn afternoon, one baker from Mama Bear Sweet Treats has the whole place to...