By Christina Fuoco-Karasinski Music has embraced Ed Heisler’s life. A Marine City, Michigan, native, Heisler traveled south to the Detroit area to perform in clubs throughout his teens and early 20s. He stepped away from music to start a family and, after six years with Chrysler, packed up and moved his family to the Valley. “I started playing seriously when I moved out here,” Heisler says about the relocat ...

By Christina Fuoco-Karasinski In 2022, North Valley buyers and sellers can expect to see more of what resulted from the pandemic-fueled housing market — skyrocketing home prices, increased competition between buyers, the speed of action necessary to snatch a property off the market, and the reasons people are moving to new cities and buying homes. Demand was high and supply was low, resulting in a hyper-com ...

By Sherri Plotke, Broker at Arizona Golf & Sun Properties Real estate was the hot dinner party topic in 2021, as the Valley led the country in population growth and annual appreciation increases.  Desert Ridge soon became Arizona’s largest master-planned lifestyle community. This multifaceted community includes single-family homes, luxury multifamily communities, residential golf estates, schools, high- ...

By Jordan Houston Barrett-Jackson in the last five decades has made a name for itself as a barometer of the car collector industry, attracting enthusiasts from across the globe to its World’s Greatest Collector Car Auctions and automotive lifestyle events. Dubbed America’s No. 1 Attraction for Car Lovers in the 2019 USA Today Readers’ Choice Contest, the Scottsdale Airpark-based auction company is revving u ...

By Christina Fuoco-Karasinski Kathy Colace Laurinaitis, with one side of her face drooping, struggles to relax and let her bright, natural smile shine through during a photo shoot in her luxurious condo. Interviews and photo shoots are important to Laurinaitis, as, for the last year, she had surgery for a blueberry-sized benign tumor on her brainstem and now deals with its aftereffects. She documented part ...

By Christina Fuoco-Karasinski As a child, Laura Brockel often visited her great aunt, who fell deaf after a case of the measles. She watched her struggle with amplification devices and doctors. “She found it difficult to find someone who was reputable and had the qualifications to handle someone with the profound hearing loss she had,” the North Scottsdale resident says. “She had had cords running up her dr ...

By Connor Dziawura The COVID-19 pandemic came at an unfortunate time for Avery Lane, a consignment store that specializes in items on the high end, from furniture, antiques and fine art to other home accessories. After seeing steady growth and expansion over the first several years in the Scottsdale Airpark, owner Darlene Richert signed for yet another expansion in December 2019, pushing the showroom past 3 ...

By Bridgette M. Redman Prestige Cleaners has been committed to doing the right thing by its customers, employees and community since 1964. It wasn’t about to let a thing like the pandemic change that. President and CEO Denise Testori says she’ll never forget when the news of the pandemic and the lockdowns hit. “It was St. Patty’s Day and there were a lot of rumors swirling around of what was going on,” Test ...

By Christina Fuoco-Karasinski Kaylavon Middleton is a proud, card-carrying Medicare member and, as a licensed Certified Medicare Insurance Planner, she enjoys helping others navigate the system.  “I’m there as a bridge when people get ready to retire,” Middleton says. She’s a retiree herself, well, sort of. She left BlueCross BlueShield after 16 years and knew how to tread the Medicare waters herself. Five ...

By Jordan Houston When it comes to leadership, Dr. Sara Vizcarra sets the tone, not only as a professional but as a woman, Latina and mother as well. Dr. Vizcarra, an esteemed dentist at North Scottsdale’s Pinnacle Peak Family Dentistry, has built a reputation for herself as a knowledgeable, personable and compassionate doctor in a variety of services, including cosmetic dentistry, pediatric dentistry, orth ...

By Sara Edwards JoyEful Gallery is growing with the expansion of its latest gallery space in El Pedregal at the Boulders Resort in Scottsdale. Owner Joye DeGoede says the bigger room will allow her to sponsor and host more artists she’s passionate about. “This gallery space was the Sonoran Arts League gallery for six years, and I was the resident artist,” she says. “I knew in December that it was going to c ...

By Keith Jones Construction is nearly complete, and a mid-year opening is planned for Abrazo Cave Creek Hospital near the intersection of Carefree Highway and Cave Creek Road. Abrazo Cave Creek Hospital is a new type of neighborhood hospital, designed with an emphasis on convenience, patient safety, surgical and emergency services. “We are excited to expand Abrazo’s services in the North Valley by creating ...

By Christina Fuoco-Karasinski   Life is funny, according to Cave Creek native Mark Grossman. The Cactus Shadows High School graduate rode dirt bikes and played sports until his mid-20s, when a modeling scout recruited him. Last year, things changed for Grossman. He was nominated for a Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Performance by a Supporting Actor in a Drama Series for his role as Adam Newman on “The Yo ...

By Christina Fuoco-Karasinski Dana Mule traveled the world with New Kids on the Block providing security for singer Jonathan Knight. Screaming girls, autograph hounds and concerts filled his days. When he met his wife, he quit traveling. So, he, in time, opened a restaurant — Hula’s Modern Tiki. “The only thing more insane with more hours than the restaurant business is the event business,” Mule says with a ...

By Sarah Haber At 10 years old, Larry Shore sat in the kitchen and watched eagerly as his mother prepared dinner. The kitchen was a beautiful mess with flour dusting the countertops, spoons scattered and an assortment of vegetables laying across the cutting board. By the stove, the dough was laid out ready to be kneaded. “Larry, why don’t you pretend this dough is a bully and help me make dinner,” his mothe ...