Richmond's restored arts center offers inspiration

John King, Chronicle Urban Design Writer
Monday, January 30, 2012
It's no wonder Richmond officials celebrated last Monday when Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory selected their city as the site of a bayside research campus that could house 800 workers.
But the recovery of this long-troubled city of 103,000 ultimately must rely on more than outside boosts, no matter how newsworthy. The real work lies in neighborhoods where small triumphs can have a big impact - such as the culturally affirmative restoration of an 89-year-old downtown building to serve as the better-than-new home of the East Bay Center for the Performing Arts.

Key source of inspiration

The $16 million project is a head-turning treat, with a black metallic snap along the sidewalk and florid white arches and moldings above. More than that, it shows architecture and the arts can fashion an attraction that, with luck, will stir other embers to life in the historic and geographic heart of the city.
The structure at Macdonald Avenue and 11th Street is one of a dozen pre-World War II buildings that remain on the blocks west of BART, but it would stand out anywhere because of its unusual dimensions. It was built in 1923 as a ballroom emporium, with a standard row of storefronts topped by a 25-foot-high second floor that contained a dance floor and a horseshoe-shaped mezzanine.
By 1977 the galas were memories, and so were most of the original neighbors. That's when the East Bay Center moved upstairs and, despite a leaky roof and decrepit utilities, conjured a nationally known youth arts program in a part of the city that most outsiders still avoid.

Wide-open spaces

Now, after a two-year makeover completed last fall, the old Winters Building is the equal of the talented children who arrive after school and on weekends.
The bulk of the construction budget went into structural basics. Seismic cross braces are on display behind the glassy ground-floor facade; so are the original concrete columns, each one now framed in rough steel. Not on view: the tons of concrete poured beneath the new basement to shore up and stiffen the building.
The details that count are the ones that embody the center's mission to give youth the resources "to grow and excel as learners, creators of art and contributors to their communities."
On the ground floor, the design by architecture firm Mark Cavagnero Associates cleared out a warren of walled nooks to create a single rehearsal and performance space. Upstairs, the mezzanine is gone and there's fixed seating on risers for 125 patrons, the tall arched windows adding a festive air that more than offsets the use of chairs found in the basement of the city's municipal auditorium.
Cavagnero's ingenuity also is on display in such touches as the oversize windows cut into the north-facing wall, one for each floor. The one outside the dance-hall-turned-auditorium is large enough to transfer a grand piano from an outside lift, removing the need for a space-gobbling freight elevator.
The lone bit of flash is the first floor's transparent skin. The syncopated black mullions add energy. The taut clear glass showcases what is inside, aged concrete and all.

Big problems remain

The building was in use before, true. But since reopening in October, there has been more activity on more evenings, not just arts events but also community meetings and private gatherings.
This isn't to minimize the reality of how much work remains to be done in a city where the unemployment rate is 15 percent. Across from the Winters Building to the east is a two-block-long empty lot. A boarded-up building occupies the corner to the west.
You won't find a Starbucks downtown, much less a Peet's.
What's heartening is that the Winters isn't an isolated success. It's the latest example in recent years of a battered Richmond treasure getting a new lease on life.
The Civic Center built in the city's heyday after World War II has been restored. The immense 1930 Ford assembly plant on the bay, which stymied developers for more than a decade, now holds a mix of 21st century industrial uses with a green bent.
Investments of this sort go beyond historic preservation. They're flashes of hope in a city where change for too long was synonymous with decay. They fold back one on another, strengthening the odds that more good things will happen.
When Richmond was courting Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the public assembly at the municipal auditorium included dance performances by troupes from the East Bay Center.
Richmond's different worlds came together. And that is how things must be if the city, as a whole, again is to thrive.
E-mail John King at jking@sfchronicle.com.
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