Banana Factory demolition plans approved

Plans to demolish the Banana Factory to build a new arts center can move forward now that Bethlehem City Council has approved the plan. The decision overruled an earlier recommendation by the city’s Historic Commission, which had voted down the plan. 

Kassie Hilgert, president and CEO of ArtsQuest, which owns the building, said the approval is a big relief. 

The arts organization had originally planned to preserve two of the property’s six buildings and incorporate them into the new center, but Hilgert said that would plan turned out to not be feasible. 

“It would have cost close to $7 million more to keep the buildings, turning what was supposed to be about a $22 million project to more like $30 million. It was just too cost prohibitive,” she said. 

Hilgert said one of the reasons cost is an issue for the arts center is that it won’t have the revenue generating resources that its main property at SteelStacks has. That building houses a revenue generating movie theater and café. 

The ArtsQuest Community Cultural Center will include expanded artist studios, MakerSpace, a comedy theatre and children’s arts education classrooms, which she described as more core to the organization’s mission of arts enrichment and education.    

ArtsQuest has already raised around $14 million in grants and donations towards the project, and the approval will help the organization continue its fundraising efforts. 

She said the next step is to get a final design in place. ArtsQuest is working with MKSD Architects on the center. It will make it much easier for the organization to solicit funds for the project once that is in hand, she said. 

Then the organization will be able to set a construction timetable on the project.