The Edmonds Arts Festival Foundation is a non-profit organization dedicated to education and the cultural enrichment of our community through the arts. In this light, the Foundation has donated $50,000 to the Edmonds Waterfront Center Building Fund as part of its commitment to our community. In addition to a cash donation, works of art from the Foundation’s collection will also be gifted and on permanent display in the Waterfront Center’s art gallery.
This week, the Edmonds Arts Festival Foundation Board got to take a hard-hat tour of the facility.
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Beginning of the tour of the Waterfront Center
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Foundation Board members gather for a hard-hat tour.
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Julaine Fleetwood points to where art will be displayed in the center's main corridor.
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The view from these 30-foot-high windows will be spectacular.
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The main staircase leading to the second floor, where health services and classes for seniors will be available.
The new Waterfront Center is a beautiful facility. As Board members walked through the main entrance, the first thing they saw was the Community Lounge, flooded with natural light from floor-to-ceiling windows. The Lounge is oriented to provide views of the ferry, Puget Sound, and Olympic Mountains.
The Center features a 3,800-square-foot banquet and meeting hall with western exposure and incredible water and mountain views. The banquet hall will be used daily for meals and programming, and in the evenings the Waterfront Center will host concerts, dances, fundraising events, Town Hall meetings, and other community gatherings. It will also be a great venue for weddings.
An architectural open staircase leads to the second floor, where there are four multi-purpose rooms that will be used for classes, lectures, and meetings, as well as a range of dedicated health services rooms. Naturally, there are also elevators, as the Edmonds Waterfront Center is designed to be fully ADA-accessible.
The Edmonds Waterfront Center is 26,000 square feet, and it will be a sustainable, LEED Gold building. It will be entirely electric—zero emissions, with a 305-panel rooftop solar array to power the building. The Waterfront Center Board voted unanimously to switch, mid-construction, to an all-electric building and full solar buildout, which added $500,000 to the cost of the building.
The extra cost is worth it, though, because the building’s carbon footprint will be drastically reduced and it will inspire others to consider what bold actions they can take in their own lives and businesses to mitigate climate change. Ribbon cutting is scheduled for November 2020.
The Center still needs to raise $2.5 million to complete the building campaign. Another campaign is in the works to raise the $300,000 needed to pay for the solar array; for a gift of $1,000, solar panel donors will be recognized on a Solar Champions plaque in the new Waterfront Center.
The Edmonds Arts Festival Foundation Board invites you to join us in supporting the Edmonds Waterfront Center. Make a donation through PayPal here; you can donate through your PayPal account or with a credit or debit card. You can also mail a check to Edmonds Senior Center, P.O. Box 717, Edmonds, WA 98020.