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Clemente Soto Vélez Cultural & Educational Center, Inc.
In October, 2009 the Clemente Soto Vélez Cultural & Educational Center, Inc. (“CSV”) hired Beckelman+Capalino and Deborah Berke & Partners Architects LLP, with Neyda Martinez of Monserrat Ltd. to develop its Master Plan. The Plan was completed with funding from a grant The CSV Center received from the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation “to support interior planning and design efforts.”
The Master Plan project was completed in phases over a 9 month period of time. The CSV Center has fully documented the challenges and opportunities presented by its physical plant and has a Master Plan document that articulates its current and future goals, including how it can better serve the Puerto Rican, Latino, and multicultural cultural community. Further, the Master Plan includes a timeline that prioritizes these tasks based on a realistic understanding of the challenges an organization faces in advancing future goals while continuing to administer ongoing programming.
The CSV Center is housed in a 98,000 square foot former public school building designed by the architect C.B.J. Snyder. Since adapting the building for its own use in 1993, CSV has provided the Lower East Side and the greater New York community with a place to interact with a wide range of art forms, arts organizations, 4 theaters, 2 galleries, and a café. The Center is home to the country’s only bi-lingual Spanish-English children’s theater and puppet theater, a capoeira school, as well as several organizations dedicated to arts in education programs that take place in the City’s schools. Exterior renovations funded by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs that were begun in July 2009 will restore the building’s façade to its original grandeur. Last year CSV welcomed approximately 65,000 visitors.