Regarding Fremont Abbey's 5th Birthday, Plus An Interview with Executive Director Nathan Marion

Perhaps in your travels up Fremont Ave., you've noticed an old church at the crossroad at 43rd. It sits close to the street, dingy and brown, nondescript but for its distinct bell tower. Within its walls, however, the building is often bustling with activity.

What originated as the St. Paul's Lutheran Church in 1914 is now home to the Fremont Abbey Arts Center, a non-religious 501c3 arts organization centered on the neighborhood's community at large. The five-year-old organization has become a bright spot in the Fremont arts scene, hosting concerts, classes, benefits, workshops, and other creative events...even weddings. It's, as one Google reviewer puts it, "an incredible gem of creativity and community."

In celebration, the Abbey is hosting a big birthday bash and fundraiser this week, and all are welcome. Nathan Marion, the Abbey's Executive Director, is bouncing with excitement over his baby's fifth birthday, and was more than happy to answer a few of our questions.

What are five words to describe how you feel about the birthday celebration this Wednesday?

Well, we're creating decor & crazy stuff for the birthday party right now and these words popped up! Excited, young, happy, anticipating, mustaches, rawr! (that's from one of the party decorations)

What element of the organization are you personally most proud of?

I'm still rather amazed by this little event [we run] called The Round. What began as an artist dinner has developed into a beautiful volunteer-powered event going 67 months in a row now in Seattle (Dec 14 is next!) and has spawned similar Rounds in Tacoma, Portland, Austin and soon to be Denver & San Francisco. Without the support of the Abbey, we'd never have made it past about Round 6 I think.

Through The Round and other concerts and events we do, I'm really proud that we've been able to keep the level of quality way up, but also involve youth & developing artists from many art mediums. Sometimes these kids have never performed in front of an adult audience and our crowds are some of the most supportive anywhere.

I'm also really proud of the artistic collaborations that occur here, both within events like The Round or Karin Stevens Dance but also afterwords on albums & dances and dinners and who knows what!

The building has been this massive challenge to change into a multi-use space, but I really love it. Renovating an old church that was full of asbestos, lead paint, poor lighting and terrible color choices into a beautiful community arts center where all are welcome & supported.

Can you talk a little bit about the history of the building? How was the idea for the Fremont Abbey Arts Center envisioned and implemented?

The building was built in 1914 as St Paul's Lutheran, but it was in pretty bad shape when we started here in 2005. It had been a temporary homeless shelter for about four years after the Lutheran church dwindled and its congregation moved up to St. John's United on Phinney Ridge. A small Episcopal/Lutheran group called Church of the Apostles was able to buy the building. From the beginning they (with pastor Karen Wards vision) wanted it to be used by the community in an artistic (and Fremont-like) manner and managed by a separate non-profit.

So I jumped in and got involved with building up the non-profit, Fremont Abbey Arts Center, which is a non-religious 501c3. I was definitely wary at first, since I've tried to book big concerts (ie. The Presidents) at large church buildings and ran into snags regarding language or other censorship concerns. But this church group is really low key and just wants positive stuff to be going on here in the building. So we've welcomed all sorts of different artist groups, non-profits, schools, etc. even including various Buddhist and other spiritual groups if they fit the Arts Center's mission.

I actually started as a volunteer and since we used to have people living in the building I carved out a small office space in what was basically a hallway area. We had a lot of great volunteers get involved at that point and we did the best we could with cleaning and painting and making it functional for a variety of arts & community events (but mostly The Round's every month). Once the major renovations were done in early 2008, the growth just skyrocketed and it's been a wild, fun, artistic, community building experience ever since!

How has the Abbey changed in the past five years? Any notable milestones that you'd like to share?

We've learned a ton about how to keep things moving as smoothly as possible amidst a very multi-use space. We accommodate a huge variety of uses in a fairly small building with almost no storage. So I'd like to think we've made a lot of improvements in being able to support artists, non-profits, and other community groups in a more efficient and helpful manner.

We've produced & hosted some rather amazing concerts and events too... some that come to mind include artists like David Bazan, Jesse Sykes, The Lonely Forest, Damien Jurado, Tiny Vipers, Buddy Wakefield, Karen Finneyfrock, Seattle Dance Project, Jason Webley, and even having folks like Robin Pecknold and J Tillman play back a little bit before Fleet Foxes took off.

So yes, it's a new model of sharing an old beautiful church (ie. a Lonely Building) and now the Arts Center operates the building and offers independent non-religious arts & community programming Monday-Saturday. The church does roll in for their services on Sunday, but they are really nice folks and have been super supportive over the years. In fact, we're seeing this model more and more around the country as many churches cannot afford to take care of their amazing old structures. I'm actually working on a new "survival guide" called Lonely Buildings and I do some consulting with various non-profits in Seattle, Portland, Austin... and hopefully more in 2011!

Photo credit Robertsen Ashman

I would love to see an even more solid volunteer base, allowing for a wider variety of collaborative arts events to happen with limited resources being needed.

We've been developing a lot of youth-specific arts classes and I'd love to see that really take off with more consistent enrollment in both dance and visual arts as well as continued growth with the Fremont Music School.

We'd love to have the place more open during the day as well with classes and activities for seniors, home schoolers, parents, etc. The hope is to have the "Abbey Cafe" space open more often with great hot tea and who knows what else!

I also want to continue our movement towards sustainability both financially and environmentally with the building. We're not quite done yet with "Greening" the Abbey but we have made major strides with efficient heating, insulation, green cleaning & paper supplies, etc.

How can people get involved?

The best way is to come by and see a show, see what we're about, and then jump in and volunteer! Go to our website for info on volunteering and sign up for a shift right there. We also of course need financial support to reach sustainability in 2011.

That's a big part of the 5th Birthday party coming up this Wednesday night. So come by and bring the Abbey a nice gift! Lots of fun stuff, and suggested donations are at least $25 at the door or online.

Wednesday, doors open at 5 p.m. // Fremont Abbey Arts Center, 4272 Fremont Ave N // suggested donation $25