Here at the end of all things, or at least this particular project

The renovations are essentially complete today. The windows are in, the floors are down, the bathrooms are running (hopefully). The only remaining tasks after this historic date are the multiple coats of polyurethane on the floor, to give it a glorious finish, and the words of our young artists to move you through the space. RAW's new look has never looked less raw.



Oh wait, don't forget about the artwork on the walls! In the next few weeks the white walls of our new space will be covered with HUGE art by hundreds of RAW artists. Please come and see their stories of how they reached inside themselves to find the hopes, fears and dreams for their future in the inaugural exhibit in our new gallery space. Reach opens on Thursday May 8th from 6:00-9:30pm. There will be a ribbon-cutting ceremony promptly at 6:15 - don't miss the moment!




A wide shot of the mostly completed renovations.

Many many thanks to Groom Construction, Dan Hisel, and everyone who helped make this renovation possible.

Walk softly and fortify with large double doors

Our aging front entrance was replaced today. Two state-of-the-art crashbar doors were put in instead, giving us an opening for which to make art and prosper.




Two large, new doors.

And the ground rose up to meet them

Today we saw what will be one of the last tasks for the contractors to complete the renovations: the floors started going in. This process took several days, but the end result looks amazing. Quite a step up from RAW's first paint job using frozen black paint!





One of the contractors hammering in a piece of board.













Finishing a section.

A whole lotta open space

Hooray! The outside of the building came down at last today. We made room for the new sliding windows, which will double as a giant projector screen!






The boards came down from where the windows will be.

















An example of the sliding glass we have now. Just imagine what they will look like installed!

Enter stage left...

So after the bringing the floor up to meet the rest of the space, the builders set right to work on their next project: Building the stage. After only a day its already looking good.

What's a theater without a stage? We don't want to find out. The builders started putting together our staging on March 5th, and without giving too much away....it moves!












This is a photo of our half-built staging. It is coming together fast!

The assembly of the staging was finished on March 6th. We waited for them to buff out the last burrs and...voila!! It's going to look gorgeous once the stage has been stained, but even now it looks MAHVELOUS!





Contractors consulting on the finishing touches

And so after a week...

The floor where the sloping entrance to 39 Central Square used to be is now filled in, but we lost something else in the process. The floor-to-ceiling windows are completely gone, replaced by boards.



Don't gape at it for too long though...we are soon to get a massive projection screen that will be able to be seen from the train! Whoo hoo!

They grow up so fast....

We finally started closing up the entrance to 39 Central Square, the other doorway to our first floor. While it appears to be a long process, the progress is rather noticeable...as evidenced by the floor rising up to fill the void!