Groundbreaking Held For Southwest Virginia Culture Center In Abingdon

By Debra Mccown
Published: August 07, 2009

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ABINGDON, Va. – In two years, a building will open here as a gateway to Southwest Virginia’s cultural heritage.

A host of dignitaries helped in the official groundbreaking Thursday for Heartwood, a regional artisan center designed to attract visitors off Interstate 81 and send them into the mountains to experience the region’s crafts, history and natural heritage.

“For us to stand here today and say that this facility will give us 270,000 new visitors to Southwest Virginia and generate about $10 million of impact into the economy is a right boastful prediction,” said Virginia Sen. William Wampler, R-Bristol, who has long supported the project. “I happen to think that is on the conservative side.”

Thursday’s ceremony, which came four years after the first formal announcement of the project, was attended by senators and delegates, county and town officials, state representatives and economic development officers along with members of the region’s arts community.

They all came to the Heartwood site on the campus of Virginia Highlands Community College with the same message – tourism is Southwest Virginia’s economic future, and this is a good place to put down its roots.

“This is a great day for Southwest Virginia,” said Kenneth Reynolds, chairman of the Washington County Board of Supervisors. “It’s taken a long time to get where we are. We started out going around the mountain on the Crooked Road.”

The Crooked Road is a musical heritage trail that’s boosted the region’s tourism in recent years; ’Round the Mountain is a network of artisans that’s heavily tied to the artisan center project.

Heartwood will give a physical jumping-off point to both these regional tourism efforts – and will weave in some other elements.

“I’m giddy,” said Alisa Bailey, president of the Virginia Tourism Corp. “This is the best project in my career in tourism. … It is going to be a landlocked lighthouse for tourism and economic development.”

Woody Crenshaw, an artisan and owner of the Floyd Country Store as well as chairman of ’Round the Mountain, said the region is just beginning to understand the importance to its economy of the local artisans, musicians and culture.

“Heartwood is a symbol,” Crenshaw said. “The heart of it is about the people and the communities they live in.”

The $16 million, 28,000-square-foot facility, funded by a combination of state, local and Tobacco Commission money, will showcase area artists and their wares while providing information on specific routes visitors can travel to visit them. The Crooked Road and other tourism sites also will be promoted.

“This is about the creative economy,” said Pat Gottschalk, Virginia secretary of commerce and trade.

Wampler, who ended his speech with a plea for the artists present to autograph his shirt for use in a fundraiser, said Heartwood also will become a repository of the region’s culture, making it possible to preserve things that people a century in the future will be thankful for.

Heartwood’s online presence also will serve as a portal to the region, Wampler said, reaching out around the world to attract visitors who he believes will leave with memories of a positive experience in the Appalachian region.

dmccown@bristolnews.com | (276) 791-0701