It’s been more than a year since Park City closed on the $19 and half million 5 acre parcel of land off Kearns Blvd. and Bonanza Drive on which the city plans to create an Arts and culture District featuring two anchor tenants – the Kimball Arts Center and Sundance Institute. Leslie Thatcher has more.
Master planning on the 5 plus acres in Bonanza Park hasn’t been publicized at this point as both the Kimball Art Center and Sundance Institute meet with their staffs and board members to decide what they want their new buildings to be and how to pay for them.
The Park City council recently discussed creating an arts and culture department, but at this point, will likely just hire a staff member to oversee the district.
Betsy Wallace, Managing Director for the Sundance Institute told KPCW, she is part of a master planning committee for the new headquarter and continues to meet with city staff and members of the Kimball Art Center to plan the area. Right now, she says they’re focused on raising the money to pay for the. new building.
“We’re still trying to get our capital campaign going. It takes a lot to get that going for us. So, we’re going through the nuts and bolts of just must making sure we’ve got everything aligned and as soon as we really get that started, then everything starts to move forward for us.”
She says leadership and employees have gone through a visioning cycle.
“We’re at that point that where we want everything in it. That’s a great way to start because at least you know you have everything on the table as things that you want. But we have to go through sort of a downsizing task too or this building would be way too large for us. But things that we’re considering are a theater of some size. We haven’t really decided on that. Black box space that we can use for production. Obviously, our employees are the most important to get seats and office space for them. We’re hoping to have an archive or museum section. We’re hoping to have a place for merchandise to be sold year-round. So, we’re really trying to make sure that this space starts to bring us out year-round. Where before it seems like we sort of fold our doors up - even though we’re in business 12 months a year. This is really so important to us that people get a sense of what we’re about year round.”
At this point she estimates the building could be about 40-thosuand square feet.
