Taylor Alison Swift is an American singer-songwriter. She is known for narrative songs about her personal life, which have received widespread media coverage. At age 14, Swift became the youngest artist signed by the Sony/ATV Music publishing house and, at 15, she signed her first record deal.
Her 2006 eponymous debut album was the longest-charting album of the 2000s in the US. Its third single, "Our Song", made her the youngest person to single-handedly write and perform a number-one song on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart. Swift's second album, Fearless, was released in 2008.
Buoyed by the pop crossover success of the singles "Love Story" and "You Belong with Me", it became the US' best-selling album of 2009 and was certified diamond in the US. The album won four Grammy Awards, and Swift became the youngest Album of the Year winner.
D.C. Courts Pop-Up Businesses Ahead of WorldPride
metroweekly.comannounced at a vacant storefront at Connecticut Avenue and L Street NW, which will soon be transformed into a pop-up as part of Capital Fringe, an annual arts festival scheduled to take place from July 9 to 21.Japer Bowles, director of the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs, hailed the program as a potential boon not only for the city as a whole, but for the LGBTQ community, especially in advance of D.C.’s hosting of WorldPride in 2025.“This is going to be great for WorldPride, because LGBTQIA+ businesses and business owners — whether in D.C.
or in the region, or nationally or internationally, can come to D.C. and have a space to show their wares,” Bowles told Metro Weekly.
Bowles says the tax revenue generated from the pop-up businesses could subsequently be reinvested into initiatives benefitting the LGBTQ community, such as workforce development programs for transgender individuals, or LGBTQ-friendly housing programs.Bowles noted that with at least 20% of storefronts in D.C.
standing vacant, the city needs to take drastic moves to revitalize those neighborhoods and assist the city in fully rebounding from the devastating effects of pandemic-era lockdowns.That entails making significant investments in tourism, arts, and entertainment, including facilities for D.C.-area sports teams, such as the recently-inked deal the city made with Monumental Sports to keep the Washington Capitals, Mystics, and Wizards teams at Capital One Arena, in the Penn Quarter/Chinatown neighborhood, through at least 2050.Bowles said the PUPs program can provide plenty of opportunities leading up to WorldPride. “I’ve had conversations with folks who are based in New York City and do LGBTQ-themed clothing wear.
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