See NKB plans Oct. 7 at First Thursday

October 7, 5-9 p.m., First Thursday open studios at the Northrup King Building, 1500 Jackson St. NE, will feature a look at plans for site improvements. There will be live music by Mwago Kuria; traditional English pasties from Potter’s Pasties; and a presentation by Artspace Rafala Green Fellows Shalom Cook and Pablo Lituma, who will share results from their Radical Asset Mapping Project in Northeast Minneapolis. The presentation will be at 7:00 p.m. in Gallery 332.

Announced NKB site improvements will include the addition of affordable live/work housing on campus, stormwater management, and more, revealed to the public through QR codes scattered throughout the existing building.

Masks are required in the building.

Recently representatives of Artspace, owner of the Northrup King Building, toured three Arts District board members through two undeveloped buildings not seen before—the barrel-ceiling garage next to their picnic area, and the 6-story building with its 2-story loft potential. Breathtaking!

From outside the garage, unless you know to look behind the linear façade, the ceiling design is barely evident. From inside, it’s an engineering wonder.
At the peak of seed production at Northrup King, they relied on gravity to drop and send the seeds where they needed to go, separating out waste material. The equipment in the corners of the 6th floor and other floors below must remain, because of the complex being placed on the National Historic Register. But there are many wide open high-ceiling spaces that Artspace will turn into lofted apartments. The presence of housing and the various other financial instruments they are assembling in order to renovate and restore these spaces make it possible to have more space for working artists and keep what is already functioning in what we know as NKB today.