Welcome to “My Perfect Birmingham Saturday,” a column where About Town asks Birmingham residents from different walks of life how they would spend a Saturday in the Magic City if they had it their way (and COVID notwithstanding).


Today’s Saturday was planned by one of the busiest and most influential women in Birmingham, Dr. Haley Medved Kendrick, who serves as director of the Bronze Valley Accelerator, a free accelerator program for local startups and a partnership between Birmingham’s Bronze Valley and nationally ranked startup accelerator gener8tor. The accelerator works with companies across a multitude of industries and specifically targets underrepresented founders, specifically people of color and women. When it comes to planning her perfect Saturday, Kendrick said “the opportunities are endless” here in Birmingham – but here’s what she’d do on a day with no limits.


On a perfect Saturday, I’d start with my home cup of coffee, and, in an ideal world, I’d go to Phase Gym and do some weight training or the Peloton.


Then I’d walk from the gym to Pepper Place, and then come back home, pick up my dogs, and go to Ruffner Mountain or Red Mountain Park for a walk or an active activity.

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Another thing recently I’ve been trying to get into – and bully my husband into joining – is climbing, so we’d go to High Point Climbing for a fun thing to do. Then I’d get lunch probably somewhere around 2nd Avenue South North – The Essential or El Barrio or somewhere around there. I also like General in Forest Park. They have sandwiches, salads, coffee – stuff like that – and they have a corner with plants everywhere that is my perfect little Zoom corner. In the background is a giant, beautiful palm plant, so I’d sit in that corner, or, if the weather is nice outside, I’d sit on the sidewalk patio. Then I’d walk next door to Shoppe and get some plants – and then I’d come home and take a nap.


Then I’d go out for a happy hour dinner at Shu Shop or Bamboo on 2nd, or Bettola. Then I’d catch either a movie at the Sidewalk Film Festival or a good band playing at Saturn, if COVID didn’t exist.


This is a very busy day – I usually go to bed at 8 p.m., so this is already a late night for me. And even if I’m not asleep [at 8 p.m.], I’m definitely in my pajamas, lying in bed.


This is pretty much what I do most weekends, anyway, so I’m living a good life I guess, hitting my ideal Saturday already.


  • As told to Rachel Burchfield



Lead Image: Bronze Valley