Olympia City Council votes to invite Artspace

Developers build housing-workplace projects for artists

By Matt Batcheldor | The Olympian • Published October 29, 2008

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OLYMPIA – All seven members of the City Council agreed to invite an organization that develops affordable artist housing-workplace projects nationwide to look at building one in Olympia.

The council will send a letter signed by all of the members formally inviting Artspace, a nonprofit developer from Minneapolis that builds this sort of project.

"I want to court them from the start, and I say Olympia is really ready for this," said Councilwoman Rhenda Strub, who was part of a delegation of city officials that toured two Artspace projects in Seattle this month.

Councilman Jeff Kingsbury said Artspace conducts two-day visits to communities, assessing a city and potential funding sources for a project. Of course, Artspace hasn't accepted an invitation yet.

One of the most attractive parts of Artspace is that "they do everything," Kingsbury said, "from construction to ribbon cutting. They only come to communities by invitation."

Artspace's Web site shows 21 live/work spaces that the organization has developed or planned to develop nationwide, from Buffalo, N.Y., to Santa Cruz, Calif.

Kingsbury also was among the city officials who looked at the two projects Artspace has developed in Seattle. Pioneer Square's Tashiro Kaplan Artist Lofts was a $16.5 million project to rehabilitate two historic buildings into 104,000 square feet of live/work space for artists, according to the Web site. And Hiawatha Artist Lofts, also in downtown Seattle, has six commercial storefronts for artist-related businesses and 61 one- and two-bedroom affordable live/work studios.

Artspace has built solely commercial and studio spaces and consultancy services.

But it also has built in smaller communities such as Minot, N.D., and Council Bluffs, Iowa, said Keith Stahley, the city's director for Community Planning and Development.

"My perspective is if they can do it, perhaps we can," he said.

Matt Batcheldor covers the city of Olympia for The Olympian. He can be reached at 360-704-6869 or mbatcheldor@theolympian.com.