Vail explores the possibility of a cultural arts hub
It will be a long process to bring the cultural center to fruition, but the town is ready to get to work
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Vail and the greater Eagle River valley are home to boundless opportunities for residents and guests to participate in and experience numerous activities ranging from outdoor recreation to cultural activations and arts performances.
However, for the numerous cultural arts organizations that work to bring these activations to the community, there’s one thing many are lacking: a home.
“In my mind, what are all these people moving to this community for if we don’t have a space that creates some sort of synergy and reason to grow in and be together, outside of the mountain,” said Ramsey Cotter, director of the J. Cotter Gallery in Vail, at the Oct. 18 Vail Town Council meeting.
This is why a recently-formed group called the Vail Cultural Alliance Group — in concert with the town’s community development department and contractor, architecture firm Zehren and Associates — has begun exploring the possibility of transforming the current Children’s Garden of Learning center and adjacent site to a multi-modal facility, currently referred to as “The Hub.”
Beth Slifer, the founder of Slifer Designs, has played a significant leadership role with this group and told the council that the alliance was “created spontaneously,” but grew to become a group that represents numerous local nonprofit cultural groups that call Vail home.
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“They all recognized that they had the same aspirations and top of the list was better and more facilities,” Slifer said. “They have proven their success as nonprofits in the town of Vail and they have demonstrated that they are successful and they need more space to continue their success.”
These organizations, she added, include the Colorado Snowsports Museum, the Betty Ford Center, Bravo! Vail, Vail Jazz, the Vail Symposium, the Vail Performing Arts Academy, and many more.
“There’s really huge representation and with those groups behind us, I think you’ll find that they can generate more information in the public and more support than maybe we’ve ever had for any one project, no kidding,” Slifer said. “It really encompasses an awful lot of people.”
As proposed, The Hub would serve to accommodate various community needs including spaces for community gathering, performing arts, museums, business incubators, retail and restaurants, civic functions (including the town’s municipal offices), workforce housing and more. All of which, Slifer said, would “fulfill needs that we have identified and had for years to provide better cultural activities in our own community.”
Cotter added that this group and its vision is “futuristic in how we’re thinking about what type of motion and activity and culture and pride we can bring to the community by bringing all these programs together in one place.”
At the Tuesday, Oct. 18 Vail Town Council meeting, Tim Losa from Zehren & Associates presented preliminary designs for the site. Losa said that the site and design started with the town’s Civic Area Plan from 2018-19, which created a “Civic Hub.”
The site, he added is central to both Vail Village and Lionshead as well as other civic sites like Dobson Arena, the library and more.
“We feel like we can create a synergy of uses for a real cultural hub and some real activity there,” Losa said.
The council heard from various members of the Vail cultural arts community, citing a need for this type of space in the town.
Connie Kincaid-Strahan, the president of the Vail Valley Theatre Company, said that the group was formed in 1987 and has become the longest-continuously running theatre company on the Western Slope. However, it’s done all of this without a permanent home, she said.
Having a place like The Hub is something the company has dreamed about for many, many years, Kincaid-Strahan added.
In addressing the council, Garret Davies, the current chair of Vail Jazz Foundation, said that many of the local nonprofits started at a time when Vail was a “different place,” citing more opportunities for spaces and more reasonable costs.
“Looking forward, finding fit-for-purpose facilities is getting more and more difficult. There’s more and more constraints of all kinds,” he said. “I do think that without investing, somehow, some of the cultural activities here are at risk.”
While the Town Council saw the immense value proposition of such a hub, there is much work to be done to bring the Cultural Alliance’s vision to life, a process, which Slifer said would “take years.”
Among the first steps identified by the council were engaging the community and stakeholders in the process, prioritization, finding a new home for the Children’s Garden of Learning, exploring funding options and more.
“We definitely need some stakeholder engagement. We also need to get together and do some prioritization,” said Council member Barry Davis. “I think the idea and the concept created are absolutely beautiful and I don’t understand exactly how we’re going to put everything together into one package.”
One of the challenges ahead will be funding such a large project. Slifer said that the preliminary estimates, not including changes proposed at Dobson Arena, were around $80 million, adding that it will reach over $100 million “for sure.”
“That’s a huge number, but it’s not going to get better. The longer we delay, the worse it’s going to get and I think the need can easily be defined,” Slifer said.
Among the funding possibilities, Slifer identified the millions of dollars in TIF funds that the town must spend by June 2030, issuing bonds as well as opportunities for philanthropy or capital funding campaigns and more.
While The Hub will require years of planning, engagement and funding, members of the Town Council expressed an overall desire to continue pushing the project forward.
“There’s a lot of research that shows that having a cultural arts center in a community really improves the economy of that community and often lifts the community in many other ways,” Slifer said. “Let’s face it, not everybody wants to ski seven days a week or hike seven days a week and it’s really nice to offer other alternatives … People like to feel good about themselves that they’re adding a little culture to their lives while they’re also experiencing the great outdoors.”
