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By Robin Shannon, New Orleans CityBusiness

The Civic, oldest known theater building in New Orleans, has sat hidden and forgotten among a cluster of high rise towers within the Central Business District for more than 30 years. But developers are hoping that by year’s end, the 106-year-old performance venue can be put back into commerce.

A trio of partners — including developer Brian Gibbs; Bryan Bailey, who works in film production and real estate; and Solomon Group, an entertainment management company — is working to restore the 15,000-square-foot building so that it host to live theatrical and music performances, movies, corporate functions and receptions.

A meticulous nine-month, $10.5 million renovation project is now in the home stretch. Gibbs Construction is the general contractor for the project.

“We are definitely looking to fill a void in the city’s live entertainment scene,” said Stephen Fink, a partner with The Solomon Group. “Seating can fluctuate between 750 and 1,100, giving us the opportunity to accommodate shows that are too small for a Saenger or Mahalia Jackson theater, which hold more than 2,000 people, or too big for something that would have been at Le Petit or Le Chat Noir.”

In addition, Fink said the renovated Civic will also feature an adaptable modular flooring system that will allow for transformation from theater-style seating to a modern concert format or corporate conference setting in only a matter of minutes.

“The theater isn’t big enough to live off a traveling show, and it also is not situated near the other known theaters so we had to be creative with our business plan,” Fink said. “This allows us to be flexible. We will have the ability to hold a corporate event by day and a concert at night.”

Gibbs, who has owned the property since 2001 along with the loft apartments that flank both sides, said the project got a huge boost from multiple state and federal tax credits. The most crucial among them was the state’s Live Infrastructure Tax Credit, meant to help re-establish performance venues. The program provides 25 percent of the cost of the project in fully refundable tax credits, he said.

“When I bought the property in 2001, the value of the theatre was at zero,” Gibbs said. “I didn’t know what to do with it or how to go about doing something with it. The tax credits made it feasible because now we had a goal.”

Although the building’s structure was solid and completely fireproof, renovation came with its share of challenges, Gibbs said. The building needed a brand new roof and ventilation system, and the basement had to be drained of about 4 feet of water. The stage was rotten in some areas, and the balconies needed to be rebuilt with larger seating.

Gibbs said much of the plasterwork on the balcony façades was intact and just needed some minor restoration. Construction crews also had to work to expand restroom space, sacrificing seating on the bottom level.

Additional seating was eliminated for the installation of bars on each theater level. Fink said the partners are working with Neil Bodenheimer of the cocktail lounge Cure to develop the menu and service plan.

“We are looking at something simple, but we want to ensure that it is pleasing to the crowds we are catering to,” Fink said.

Another challenge came with designing the entrance. Architect Jack Sawyer with Eskew+Dumez+Ripple said in past incarnations, the main theatre entrance was on Baronne Street, where patrons would pass through an open-air arcade into the lobby. The old Civic marquee still remains, but the traditional entrance is no longer viable because of the condominiums that now occupy the buildings on either side. Theatergoers will now enter from the side through an alley off O’Keefe Street, where a new marquee was recently installed.

Although renovations are nearly complete, the owners have intentionally shied away from booking the theatre for events until it is ready to host them.

“People are tired of hearing about what people are going to do, and we did not want to be that way,” Fink said. “We wanted to come out and be real. We wanted to have the space ready and know it is ready before laying out a schedule of events.”

By Doug MacCash, Times-Picayune

Work has begun on what will be the world’s biggest mural made primarily from recycled Mardi Gras beads. Artist Stephan Wanger, known for his glittering, ecologically conscious bead art, is leading the project with cooperation from Arc of Greater New Orleans and St. Michaels Special School, organizations that annually recycle tons of Carnival throws (watch a video about Arc’s parade-following “catch and release” bead recycling trailer below). Wanger hopes to complete the mural by Mardi Gras 2013 with the help of school children from across the city. The mural, which will be 42 ft. wide by eight ft. high, will depict the Crescent City skyline. It is meant to break Wanger’s own Guinness World Record for largest beaded mural, his “Sanctuary of Alegria – Home of Happiness,” a 30-ft-wide New Orleans landscape completed in Jan. 2012.

Stephan Wagner at work on an earlier Mardi Gras bead mosaic.

“A lot of the work in my studio introduces local school children to art,” Wanger is quoted as saying in the project press announcement, “and I wanted to do another project to include even more children and to invite the entire city of New Orleans, my adopted home town, to help me top my last world record.” Wanger was born in Germany.

Read Renee Peck’s story about Wanger “Helping the world with Mardi Gras bead mosaics.”

The plastic mosaic is being assembled at Mardi Gras World (East bank), 1380 Port of New Orleans. To complete the project by Mardi Gras 2013, Wanger needs bead-gluing volunteers and lots of beads. Beginning Sun. (Nov. 17), volunteers are welcome from 10 a.m. to 5, Fridays through Mondays. Beads can also be donated at Mardi Gras World.

‘Catch and Release’ trailer allows instant Mardi Gras bead recyclingGet a video preview of Arc Enterprises’ new Mardi Gras ‘Catch and Release’ bead recycling trailer, designed to follow Carnival parades so parade-goers can instantly throw back their unwanted beads. The ‘Catch and Release’ trailer will appear in the Alla parade on Feb. 12 and Morpheus parade on Feb. 17. Also get a first look at Arc Enterprises new purple and gold bead recycling bins that will appear along a portion of St. Charles Avenue during the Pontchartrain parade on Feb. 11. As recycling coordinator Margie Perez explained, Arc Enterprises, located at 925 S. Labarre Rd. in Metairie, is a non-profit organization that provides jobs to citizens with intellectually disabilities. Arc Enterprises’ activities include landscape maintenance, janitorial services, soup preparation and bead recycling. Last year, Arc Enterprises employees and volunteers sorted 100,000 pounds of beads. Call 837.5105. Video by Doug MacCashWatch video

Read the story “‘Catch and Release’ trailer brings instant Mardi Gras bead recycling”

By Donna Fenn, OPEN Forum

When Gary Solomon Jr. moved back to his native New Orleans in 2008, the NYU grad wasn’t at all sure there was a career path for him in his hometown. Fast forward four years and his production company, Solomon Group, is preparing for one its largest projects to date: designing, fabricating and installing CBS’s sets for its week-long coverage of Super Bowl XLVII in New Orleans. “We pitched against the largest television and sports design firm in the world and we got the job,” says 26-year-old Solomon. So how does a scrappy startup with just three years of experience under its belt compete with and beat the big guys?

Timing is Everything

Solomon, who studied theater and technical production, says that when he first returned to New Orleans, the city was still in a post-Katrina haze. So he initially went to work for an existing production company, joining two friends whose technical expertise complemented his creative skills. But as rebuilding picked up steam and entrepreneurial activity increased in New Orleans, the three became restless and struck out on their own.

“We wanted to provide production services to the live event market,” recalls Solomon. “But we didn’t own our own gear and we didn’t have a staff, so we ended up being middlemen between service providers and clients. There wasn’t a big value proposition.” Still, it gave Solomon and his partners, Steve Fink and Jonathan Foucheaux, exposure to the marketplace and the experience they needed to move to the next level.

Leveraging Early Success

In early 2009, Solomon Group landed a job that opened its founders’ eyes. The National World War II Museum in New Orleans hired the company to re-create Stage Door Canteen, an actual New York entertainment venue that entertained soldiers before they headed off to war. The permanent installation included a live show and a documentary film, and Solomon Group not only marshaled the resources to create it, but integrated all of the A/V, automation and control systems so that museum personnel could operate it with the flip of a switch. “It exposed us to the museum market,” says Solomon. “And we realized we could make money on permanent installations.”  The partners also realized that they had a clear market advantage. Most other productions companies specialized in either cutting edge technology or the creative side of the business. With its three partners, Solomon Group had all bases covered.

The Next Level

In 2010, Solomon continued to land more business, but the company was still playing the middleman role, without the staff or resources to pull off big projects on its own. But that would change soon enough. After completing a $3.5 million technology and lighting project for an outdoor entertainment center called Champion Square, Solomon and his partners were admiring their work one evening. “We looked across the street at the Superdome and it was dark,” says Solomon. “And I thought that was silly.”

The renamed Mercedes-Benz Superdome, a symbol of New Orleans’ rebirth, was in the homestretch of a $300 million renovation and Solomon thought that lighting the perimeter would be a great finishing touch. So he came up with a solution that was both economical and energy-efficient and pitched it, bringing in both the management team at the Superdome, and the New Orleans Saints. Partnering with a Danish company, Solomon built an LED lighting system that now lights up the Superdome nightly with an array of changing colors and patterns. “That was the project that solidified us in people’s minds,” he says. “And that’s when we said, let’s do it right and start doing things in-house.”

Infrastructure for the Future

With a loan from a local bank, lines of credit, and some family savings, Solomon and his partners began growing the company by buying a small lighting and staging company in July 2011. The “middleman” role that the company had been playing would become obsolete as the partners invested in their own staff and equipment.

“In the last year and half, our volume has tripled,” says Solomon. “Our staff went from five or six to 80, and we’ll be at 100 by the end of this year.”  The company, which stated in a single 2,000-square-foot office, now has three facilities including a 40,000-square-foot warehouse. Every bit of inventory and gear, says Solomon, is tracked via a cloud-based system.

Challenges on the Horizon

With the convention, tourism, and live entertainment industries growing rapidly in New Orleans, Solomon has been well positioned as a local player and a one-stop shop. The company will post a hefty $11 million in revenue this year, but Solomon knows that he’ll hit a wall unless he moves beyond New Orleans.

“A big part of our model is to get clients while they’re in New Orleans and then follow them,” he says. For instance, the company now does several events in a variety of locations for clients such as the Coast Guard Foundation and regional energy provider Entergy. But Solomon will need more clients like that to ensure future growth. He’s hoping that the plum Super Bowl contract with CBS will help him not only maintain the momentum he’s built up locally, but put his company on a highly visible national playing field.

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By Doug McCash, The Times-Picayune

The Krewe of Endymion plans to dominate the Carnival route in 2013 with the world’s largest Mardi Gras float ever, a $1.2 million, 330-foot behemoth titled “Pontchartrain Beach, Then and Now.” The eight-segmented extravagance, designed to carry 230 riders, stretches almost the entire length of krewe’s Mid-City den where it is being decorated to evoke memories of New Orleans’ bygone amusement park Pontchartrain Beach that closed in 1983.

The “Pontchartrain Beach,” which could stretch the length of a football field, beats its next largest rival, the Krewe of Orpheus’ “Smokey Mary” float, by 102 feet, said the float’s builder Barry Kern, chief financial officer of Mardi Gras World and Blaine Kern Studios.

The behemoth float was one of two major revelations delivered by the Endymion management during a mildly surrealistic press conference on Thursday (Oct. 25), which was held on the steps of an artificially moon-lit, neo-classical mansion housed inside Kern’s Mardi Gras World warehouses on the Mississippi riverfront.

The other news flash was that pop diva Kelly Clarkson will be the celebrity grand marshal of the Feb. 9 parade and the entertainment headliner at the Endymion ball in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome afterward. Clarkson, the first winner of the “American Idol” television talent contest, follows in the footsteps of pop luminaries including Kid Rock in 2009, fellow “American Idol” alumnus Taylor Hicks in 2007 and Britney Spears in 2000. Endymion founder Ed Muniz said that revenue from the popular ball allows the non-profit organization to pay for projects like the million-plus “Pontchartrain Beach” float. And that’s “not doubloons,” Muniz said.

Though news of Grammy award winning Clarkson’s appearance at Endymion 2013 was welcome, it was the details of the history-making float that captured the imagination. “Pontchartrain Beach, Then and Now” was originally envisioned as a blockbuster attraction to mark the Mid-City krewe’s 50th anniversary in 2016, Kern said. TheSuper Bowl taking place in the Crescent City in 2013, however, prompted the 2,750-member organization to roll the goliath out early.

The big float was originally imagined to be even bigger, with 10 segments. Kern joked that eventually Endymion would be able to park a continuous line of floats from City Park all the way down Canal Street, making a moving parade unnecessary.

Locomotion was a big hurtle in building the massive freight-train-like float. The tractor that will pull the “Pontchartrain Beach” is the same kind used to tow Boeing 747s at airports. To avoid flats, the tires of the new float are solid rubber. The chassis is expected to carry more than 40 tons – 11 of which will be made up of beads and other throws.

If sheer scale weren’t enough, the segmented float will feature twin lighting systems, Muniz said. One will duplicate the kind of vintage lighting visitors to the original amusement park might have known, but at the flip of a switch, the old-fashioned lights will be supplanted by high-tech LED illumination. The effect will symbolize the “then and now” aspect of the design.

In a still more startling innovation, the float will exude the aroma of popcorn and cotton candy, and “all the smells you’d like to smell from a theme park,” Kern said. Asked how the olfactory effect would be accomplished, Kern said that some things must remain Mardi Gras secrets.

History’s biggest float was designed by Kern’s artistic director Damon Bowie, who took the podium Thursday to reveal the inspiration for each segment of the creation. The first segment depicts the parabolic Zephyr roller coaster, the second represents the flying horses of the carousel, the third segment is surmounted by a Ferris wheel and the fourth represents the “Wild Maus,” which Bowie described as a “treacherous little ride.”

The fifth segment recalls Pontchartrain Beach’s haunted house attraction. During a tour of the den, eerie artificial vapor wafted from the creepy upper dormers of the float Alluring segment six includes vintage images of mid-century bathing beauties, one of whom is Muniz’s wife – the young couple frequented  Pontchartrain Beach when they were dating.

Expect loud music from the seventh segment, dedicated to the “Music Express” attraction. Bowie said he hopes to play 1970s funk master Rick James. The final segment features the huge clown head that was one of Pontchartrain Beach’s signature images.

Endymion’s 2013 theme is “Ancient Mysteries,” though nostalgia for the mid-20th-century amusement park dominated Thursday’s presentation. To further emphasize the sun and fun symbolism of the “Pontchartrain Beach” float, this year’s riders will throw beach balls and plush clowns as well as Endymion light-up medallions.

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By Associated Press

Ruby Bridges remembers how excited she was when an anonymous donor sent Dr. Seuss books to her New Orleans home in 1960, the year she ended segregation in local public education by enrolling at a previously all-white elementary school.

The civil rights icon says the books were a bright spot during the time she entered the William Frantz Elementary School at the age of 6. They were pivotal not only to her passion for reading, but also to her later work to get books to as many schoolchildren as possible.

Bridges will be furthering that mission this weekend at the New Orleans Children‘s Book Festival, an event she launched withCheryl Landrieu, wife of Mayor Mitch Landrieu, in 2010.

The free festival is on Friday and Saturday. Books will be given to children free and there will be readings by Bridges and other authors.

It was on Nov. 14, 1960, that court-ordered integration of public schools began in New Orleans. Escorted by U.S. marshals through an angry crowd, Bridges walked up the steps and into the school. The moment was captured in pictures and in a Norman Rockwell painting that last summer hung for a time in the White House.

Ken Ducote, a teacher and school administrator in New Orleans’ public school system from 1971 to 2003, said Bridges put a name and face on integration.

“Until that moment, black kids and white kids didn’t have relationships with each other. They didn’t know each other by name. There was a real disconnect,” said Ducote, who now serves on the advisory board for the Ruby Bridges Foundation.

Bridges, 58, lives in suburban New Orleans and wrote a book geared to older children about her experience at Frantz called “Through My Eyes.” She travels the country speaking at schools and book fairs and says her experience, though lonely at times, wasn’t as scary as one might think.

“I just thought it was like Mardi Gras,” she said, referring to the policemen and mob outside the school. “I’m sure it was a different story for my parents.”

Bridges said she remembers feeling safe at school and being greeted each morning with a smile and hug from her teacher, Barbara Henry. School, she says, is a place where every child belongs and where children from all backgrounds can connect through books and education.

“My message is really that racism has no place in the hearts and minds of our children,” she said.

Bridges said she empathizes with parents struggling to provide for their children. That’s why some books will be distributed free at the festival. Others will be offered for sale.

For Bridges, the eldest child in a family that would grow to include eight children, receiving the Dr. Seuss books is a special memory.

“I so loved getting those books,” she said. “We didn’t have much growing up. My parents were concerned with things like where the next meal was coming from, so books were a luxury.”

The family lived a few blocks from William Frantz elementary in an upper 9th Ward neighborhood. The area flooded when levees failed during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The school is still under repair and is on the National Register of Historical Places.

Ducote said Bridges’ story is part of an exhibit at the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis called “The Power of Children,” which also includes the stories of Holocaust survivor Anne Frank and AIDS sufferer Ryan White.

“They were all children surrounded by something bad who continued to grow and come of age and build themselves up stronger in spite of their circumstances,” Ducote said. “Any child being bullied today, over race or for any other reason, can feel empowered by their stories.”

The New Orleans book festival was launched to mark the 50th anniversary of Bridges’ historic walk into Frantz Elementary. It begins Friday evening with a reading and musical performance by the Greater New Orleans Youth Orchestra. Families are invited to bring picnic baskets to enjoy the event on the grounds of the Latter Library, just off the St. Charles Avenue streetcar line.

Festivities continue Saturday with food, music, readings and activities geared toward children.

Among the authors scheduled to read are Bridges, “Crawfish Tales” author Dee Scallan, “Goodnight NOLA” author Cornell Landry and Jean Cassels, author of “The Cajun Nutcracker.”

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Online:

http://www.rubybridges.com