Once upon a time, automobiles were built inside the 65,000-square-foot former factory at 6555 Carnegie Avenue. Or so current owner Giancarlo Calicchia surmises from elevators large enough to move finished cars from the upper levels to the parking lot outside.

Today Calicchia, an accomplished sculptor, sees a new use for the long-dormant building — a center for artists' workspaces and offices. He and architect Paul Beegan are busy designing that future, while preserving the towering columns, tall windows and "great views of Cleveland" left over form the building's industrial past.

"We're also looking for new companies that may be related to art or design and want to be closer to downtown," Calicchia adds. He's already talked with a book publisher and a film company, as well as many artists, and hopes to have at least portions of the building ready for use by next summer. He can be reached at 216-402-2009.

Calicchia's works can be found around the city and state, from the Cleveland Museum of Art and The Avenue at Tower City to Miami University. His Athleta & The Witnesses sculpture garden was installed at Kent State University in July.


Source: Giancarlo Calicchia
Writer: Frank W. Lewis

For almost two years, neighbors of the former Coventry School in Cleveland Heights looked forward to welcoming The Music Settlement to the community. The University Circle-based institution had planned to raze the Coventry building, which was closed in 2007, and build "a state-of-the-art early childhood learning center and training center."

That plan was abandoned in August, after Music Settlement concluded that it could not raise the $16 million to $19 million needed for the project. But the building — just off Coventry Road and adjacent to the popular Coventry Peace playground — won't necessary remain vacant forever. Nancy Peppler, president of the Cleveland Heights-University Heights Board of Education, says that the school district and Music Settlement continue to discuss the latter's leasing space in the building.

Another possible tenant is Ensemble Theatre, which currently performs at Cleveland Play House. Managing Director Martin Cosentino says that Ensemble would like to use Coventry for shows and for classes, like the dramatic writing workshop that it now offers at Heights libraries.

The property is nearly surrounded by single-family homes, so zoning is an issue, Cosentino notes. Talks with the city and school board continue.

Ensemble is leaving the Playhouse next year, Cosentino says, adding, "We'd like to come back to the city. We're a Cleveland Heights company. It seems to me that [an arts center] is a use the neighbors could support. It's a win for us, a win for Music Settlement and a win for the neighborhood."



Source: Ensemble Theatre
Writer: Frank W. Lewis

We managed to squeeze three days of mind-bending, jaw-dropping art, technology, music and performance art at the Ingenuity Fest into one teeny little photo slide show. Let Fresh Water managing photographer show you around.

For decades it was merely a dream, but soon, the Syrian Cultural Garden becomes a reality. Part of the Cleveland Cultural Gardens that wend along Rockefeller Park, the Syrian Garden is in progress on Martin Luther King Boulevard across from the Indian Garden. Upon completion, it will be the first of the Cultural Gardens representing an Arab country.

About 80 years ago, Cleveland's Syrian community received a garden site on which to commemorate its culture and heritage. Plagued by lack of funding followed by waning interest, the plot of land sat undeveloped for many years. But around 2007, the notion of a Syrian Cultural Garden began to once again take shape, with members of Cleveland's Syrian community becoming involved in design and fundraising efforts.

Sponsored by the Syrian Cultural Gardens Association, in collaboration with the Syrian American Cultural Council, the garden will have at its focus a series of classically inspired arches designed by University of Damascus architecture students Raghda Helal and Nagham Nano. The Arches of Palmyra, the Amphitheater of Basra, the Syrian Arch and the Arabic Fountain all served as inspiration. The history of Syria will be displayed on several granite stones along the amphitheater, according to Layla George-Khouri, one of the founders of the garden committee. Damascene roses will surround the architectural feature.

"It's going to be beautiful," says Khouri, adding that the goal is to unveil the finished garden to the public in April of 2011.

The Cleveland Cultural Gardens date back to 1926, when the Shakespeare Garden (which later became known as the British Garden) was dedicated to honor the Bard. Through the years, many other ethnic groups have planted flowers and built monuments as a tribute to the land of their ancestors. Check out this link for detailed information about all of the gardens, as well as a map.


SOURCE: Layla George-Khouri
WRITER: Diane DiPiero

It has always been a bit of an oxymoron: The Museum of Contemporary Art, Cleveland (MOCA) housed in a building with as much contemporary flair as an old-fashioned Cracker Jack box. And while visitors still came to the Carnegie Avenue location to admire the museum's growing collection of contemporary art, many surely wondered why such a gem wasn't located in University Circle with other great museums, especially the Cleveland Museum of Art.

Turns out, MOCA was wondering the same thing. The museum had been planning for ten years to leave its Carnegie Avenue location for a permanent home that reflected the cutting-edge and forward-thinking image for which MOCA has been known. That vision will soon take shape at the corner of Euclid and Mayfield in University Circle.

The new museum building will be part of a long-planned project that will bring restaurants, stores and housing to that section of Euclid Avenue.

In addition to a comfortable place to exhibit and store the museum's collections, the new MOCA building will help the museum increase its educational and public programs.

Farshid Moussavi with Foreign Office Architects of London designed the building, which will rely on clean lines and sharp angles made from glass and black steel to create a structure that promises to be as intriguing as the art displayed inside. According to the MOCA website, "The lobby is designed as an urban living room, a place for visitors to mingle, eat, shop, attend events, over the course of hours, or for brief interludes in a busy day. The building itself is a learning environment, infused at each level with education offerings that range from low tech to high tech, from contemplative to interactive, from solitary to group encounters. This building is an opportunity to provide a 21st century model of an art museum that anticipates dramatic shifts in how we learn, how we see, and how we socialize."

Jill Snyder, director of MOCA, is pleased with the multipurpose design an aesthetic appeal of the new building. "FOA's design for our building is the perfect expression of our program--one that will not only enable us to operate at the highest level, but that will also be beautiful, intriguing and sensitive to our urban surroundings and community."

The Cuyahoga County Planning Commission reports that MOCA hopes to break ground on the new museum building in late fall. The project is estimated at $26 million.


SOURCE: Jill Snyder
WRITER: Diane DiPiero