Big Day in Delridge

Mrs. F has been working like a Whirling Dervish the last couple of weeks to put the finishing touches on what may become the biggest impact of our Delridge subset of the West Seattle neighborhood--the Youngstown Cultural Arts Center, which brings together a variety of arts/nature/cultural organizations as well as provides affordable live/work studio spaces for artists. She's been project managing the latter stages of construction for this renewal project of a long-closed elementary school since late last year, and it's looking fantastic. We went to a special thank-you ceremony for donors, which culminated in a performance by the Seattle Symphony (a smaller ensemble than the full symphony, and minus leader Gerard Schwarz, but still wonderful) in the new theater (where our names are attached to two of the best seats in the house, thanks to our donations). And it sounded fantastic.

Tonight is the bigger celebration for the entire community, starting at 6pm. If you're in Seattle, please consider coming down. But it seems that Youngstown isn't the only cultural-arts center celebrating an opening. The Seattle Times and Seattle Weekly have articles that group Youngstown with two other impending openings (in Bothel, at the north end of Seattle, and at Seattle University, near the epicenter of the city). Here's a bit from the Times story:

More than a dozen rooms share the space of the sprawling 25,000-square-foot ground floor of what used to be the Youngstown/Frank B. Cooper School, including a 150-seat theater, a movement studio, a recording studio, a media lab, a workshop and two classrooms.

Youngstown is just one of several arts complexes opening in the Puget Sound area this month, evidence that the trend of building new performance venues — dating to the 1990s with projects such as the Everett Community Theater and Bellevue's Theatre at Meydenbauer — is going strong.

The $6.75 million Lee Center for the Arts at Seattle University — with a 150-seat theater set to house the Empty Space Theatre and student productions — threw its grand opening on Valentine's Day. And the $8.8 million Northshore Performing Arts Center welcomes guests with a gala celebration at its 607-seat theater Sunday evening.

But unlike the others, the Youngstown Cultural Arts Center never rests. Lights peer out through a myriad of repaned windows, while eager voices skip down a long hall where the scent of fresh paint still lingers. With a creative heart that pumps 24 hours a day, the place remains inextricably tied to the people who live and work here.

The four-story building is home to an alternative school, a handful of arts organizations and even artists themselves. A hard rocker from New Jersey and a couple of trapeze artists from Seattle are among those who dwell in the 36 low-income studios atop the first-floor public space. Artists must earn less than half of the Seattle-area median income — — for a single person, that's $27,250 a year — to qualify, said Philippa Nye, former project manager of the Youngstown Cultural Arts Center.

[...]

Delridge residents spurred its reincarnation by incorporating a renovated school in the 1999 Delridge Neighborhood Plan, and later affirmed the cultural-center plan with a vote.

And because the community wished to preserve the building, it's even listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

It's a good, informative local-news article that gives a good feeling for the project with a brief history and some flavor for what the place is becoming. But I gotta say, I'm frankly a little dumbfounded by the Seattle Weekly's coverage--and not just because Youngstown barely gets a mention in the article. The crux of that article is that the spreading out of arts organizations is a worrying trend:

Finally, one has to wonder what the increasing decentralization of arts activity means for the civic life of Seattle. Says Jacqueline Moscou, artistic director of Langston Hughes Performing Arts Center in the Central District: "Seattle is a mirror of what is going on nationally. Many groups are trying to go it alone. We are becoming divided, when arts organizations are supposed to be there to bring together and bridge communities."

What a bunch of malarkey (aka, bullshit). Mrs. F recently turned to me and said, "Youngstown is gonna change our lives," and I believe that for the two of us as well as for our Delridge community at large. It's going to offer opportunities for gathering and learning and appreciation of the arts that could only be accessed by driving or busing to the more approved-of arts centers downtown, which could certainly hinder desire to go a-hunting for cultural experiences if you don't have a lot of time or money (Delridge and the White Center area to our south are definitely on the lower end of the middle class income spectrum).

Alright, I'll stop the Mr. Angry routine. Seriously, if you're a Seattleite, check out the opening tonight--it's got tours of the place (including some of the cool live/work studios that have been spiffed up already by their tenants), trapeze artists, belly dancers, and a whole lot more.

Way to go, Mrs. F (the love of my life) and congratulation to DNDA!