Smiley Building
Durango, La Plata County, Colorado
SHF Project #00-01-022 and #02-HA-030
The former Smiley Junior High School
in Durango was named for Emory E. Smiley, the superintendent
of Durango School District 9-R between the years 1906 and
1943. Smiley, who is often noted for his ability to remember
the first names of the 1,600 students that made up his district,
protested the naming of the junior high in his honor. His
protestations did not meet with success. With a design from
Colorado Springs Architect Charles Thomas and funding from
a $97,000 bond and an $86,198 grant from FDR's Federal Emergency
Administration of Public Works, the School District initiated
work on the new building in 1935. The contractor, Raymond
C. Whitlock, completed the work the following year for a
price of $191,188. The School District declared the building
surplus in 1995 when they abandoned Smiley Junior High for
the recently constructed Escalante Middle School.
A new use emerged for the building in 1997 when three Durangoans
succeeded at convincing the local community of the viability
of their vision for the old Smiley Junior High. Brothers
Charles and John Shaw and Lisa Bodwalk, Charles' wife, proposed
to convert the school's classrooms into studios and workshops
for a wide array of community arts, education, and crafts
programs. The school district sold the building to the three
partners, and they set out to realize their vision. A substantial
amount of work was required to mend the damage caused by
water leaks, vandalism, and years of deferred maintenance.
The Shaw brothers' experience in the building trades and
Lisa's experience as a dance instructor well equipped them
for the thousands of hours they spent transforming the Smiley
Building into a center of bustling activity. The Shaws and
Ms. Bodwalk, however, were not alone. Many members of the
community donated hundreds of hours cleaning, scraping,
and painting the dingy walls of the old school.
In 1999 Smiley Studios, a nonprofit
that operates many of the studios in the Smiley Building,
along with the building's owners, applied for and received
a grant of $129,889 to restore all of the building's wood
double-hung and steel casement windows, as well as the third
floor greenhouse. The Shaws set up a window restoration
shop in the building's basement, which allowed the entire
project to take place on site. The Shaws oversaw the entire
project and provided a significant portion of the labor
required to restore both the windows and the greenhouse.
The finished work exhibits a high degree of craftsmanship
and the Shaws deserve praise for their success on this project.
|
Jim Hall & Robert
van der Hoeven, both of Atkinson-Noland & Associates,
and Charles Shaw, President of Smiley Studios and Owner
of the Smiley Building |
A second grant was awarded
to Smiley Studios in 2001 to fund a Historic Structure
Assessment of the Smiley Building. The building's
owners chose Atkinson-Noland & Associates of Boulder,
Colorado, to conduct the assessment and prepare the
report. The building's distinctive blonde brick is
showing signs of moisture-related deterioration and
failure, and Atkinson-Noland was selected because
of their expertise and experience working with historic
masonry buildings throughout Colorado.
For additional information
about this project please contact the State Historical
Fund at 303.866.2825.
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