St. Lawrence Arts Center

The St. Lawrence Church is located in the middle of the dense, residential neighborhood of Munjoy Hill in Portland, Maine, taking up an entire city block. As were many churches before television, the St. Lawrence was the social focus of the neighborhood, hosting scout troops, Saturday matinees, public suppers and amateur theater. The building’s decline physically affected the entire neighborhood, which was also in a blighted state. The subsequent rehabilitation of the St. Lawrence Church has been accompanied by a broader, neighborhood-wide revitalization. Fundraising was challenging and donations, numbering in the thousands, have come from a community, grass-roots effort. Many of today’s patrons still come from the neighborhood and walk to performances and local activities.

The sum of the St. Lawrence Restoration Project is larger than any of its three parts – it is more than just fixing an historic building, doing work in a neighborhood or building a theater space. St. Lawrence Arts creates a mutually dependent model by which these disparate social needs and interests support each other. The arts center gives the obsolete historic landmark a constructive and economically viable use while in turn the restored structure provides an aesthetically pleasing and affordable venue perfect for artistic expression. This model is designed to be long-term and self-perpetuating. The initial capital investment in historic preservation goes on to support the arts in providing not only an affordable artistic venue, but also an income-producing asset as theater revenues currently cover a large percentage of the St. Lawrence operating expenses. This capital investment subsidizes the theater operation and makes it possible for the St. Lawrence to realistically offer the venue at affordable rates and to diverse groups of artists and performers for well into the future.