Vis Arts Expanding in The Fan

Over the past decade, the Visual Arts Center of Richmond has steadily been outgrowing its home at 1812 W. Main Street. Now, thanks to an anonymous donor, the arts nonprofit closed today on the purchase of the former Fan Tastic Thrift store property at 1914 W. Main St., half a block west of its current home, which will allow it to expand its offerings.

“Buying this building lets us grow our footprint by about 50%, which is really cool,” says Jordan Roeder, executive director of VisArts, as it is commonly known [disclosure: VPM Chief Content Officer Steve Humble is vice-chair of the Visual Arts Center board]. “We’re also excited that this Fan institution with some cool history, which has been a part of the neighborhood for so long, still gets to be a part of the neighborhood.”

VisArts is figuring out how it will use the new space, Roeder says, but they want to grow and improve their gallery, as well as their community programming space, and increase the amount of teaching studios. “We’re just trying to figure out how we’re going to split all that,” Roeder says, adding that they are working with the architectural design firm, 3North, on the redesign of the new building. A timeline for renovation and construction has yet to be determined.

Too good to pass up

Founded by preservationist Elisabeth Scott Bocock in 1963, VisArts was originally known as the Hand Workshop and located in Church Hill. It moved to its current location in the historic Virginia Dairy building in 1985, with the last renovation to that 30,000-square-foot space coming in 2008.

Statistics provided by VisArts underscore the need for more space: Since 2015, Vis Arts has more than doubled its tuition-based classes to over 9,500 students while tripling its roster of teachers to more than 250, and nearly doubling its class offerings to 1,922 classes. Classes offered can range widely from courses in ceramics and stained glass to photography, printmaking and writing, to name a few [On a personal note: I once took a screenwriting course there over 20 years ago which featured a class age range from 15 to 82; and which led to a longtime friendship with my teacher, Ted Salins]. Today, VisArts has more than 3,000 people sitting on annual class waitlists.

“It’s all very serendipitous, we have all these waitlists for our classes, our community programs keep growing, and we want to be able to welcome the people in who want to be there,” says Roeder, adding they heard about the Fan Tastic Thrift location early on and decided it was “an opportunity they couldn’t pass up.” VisArts has seen its budget nearly double over the last 10 years, from $1.7 million to $3.5 million.

“We’ve gotten a lot of feedback from the community about ways they’d like to see us grow,” says Roeder, though it’s too early to go into any specifics yet.

Built in 1975, Fan Tastic Thrift features 13,500 square feet of office and retail space as well as an additional 41 parking spaces. Many Richmonders know the former business for selling low-cost used clothing for decades, with some media reports called it “the end of an era” when the closing was announced last year.

The current VisArts building at 1812 W. Main St. will remain the nonprofit’s headquarters and operations will continue there as usual. On a typical day, that center can offer 30 classes and reach 300 people. Its community outreach programs now reach more than 5,000 Richmonders annually through free programs for youth, older adults, veteran and individuals with disabilities.

“Main Street has been VisArts’ home for 40 years,” said Jeffrey Wilson, chair of the Visual Arts Center of Richmond’s Board of Directors, “and it’s our responsibility to ensure we can sustain VisArts’ growth here over the next 40 years. We couldn’t have asked for better timing to take this step.”

To learn more about classes, visit the Visual Arts Center of Richmond’s website.