Cultivated Community
Ever wonder how the art scene in Phoenixville initially started? Sarah Jackson interviewed key individuals who laid the foundation for today's creative community.
This interview with Bill Felton, Jim O’Brien, Barry Cassidy, & Kathy Bestwick was originally published in the 2024 issue of the PXV Art Mag.
Art galleries filled with local artists’ work.
Streets blocked off in the summer so restaurants can spread out onto the asphalt.
First Fridays filled with performers, locals and even a handful of tourists.
When you walk the streets of downtown Phoenixville, you might think it’s always been this way. But thirty years ago, Phoenixville wasn’t much more than a handful of boarded-up storefronts and an empty steel mill.
“There was a time when people had a Phoenixville address and they went and got a post office box at Valley Forge Post Office,” Barry Cassidy, a former Main Street manager of Phoenixville, said. “No one wanted to say they lived in Phoenixville.”
So, what changed in three decades? The answer is a rising arts community that wanted to support each other’s creative endeavors.
Much of the buzz in the Phoenixville art scene is generated by the art-related businesses located in the Phoenixville Borough. But have you ever wondered how Studio 323, The Upstairs Studio Artists, Ravensgate, Phoenix Fire Clay Studio, and Art Work Gallery + Meeting Space ended up here? It's no accident that they all lease their spaces from Bill Felton and Jim O’Brien, founders of The William James Group.
Bill and Jim are brothers-in-law, and when they traveled to each other’s houses for family events, they would pass through Phoenixville on the way. But with the steel mill gone, the early 90s was a major slump in Phoenixville’s economic growth.
“The streets were empty, and the buildings were not in great shape,” Jim said. “So, in ’93, Bill and I decided we would get involved in the community, and we decided to do that through real estate investment.”
They bought their first building in 1993, a small, one-story building that’s now Grace Pizzeria. From there, they purchased more properties along Main Street with the intention of renting out to local business owners in the arts and entertainment industries.
Surprisingly, the local banks were supportive of Bill and Jim’s plans to help revitalize the community in a unique way. Then again, Phoenixville has always done things a little differently.
In the late 90s, there was a public town meeting called a charrette where the local members of Phoenixville came together to decide the future of the town. Three focuses surfaced from that meeting: arts, entertainment and recreation. Phoenixville has stayed true to that initiative ever since with events such as the Firebird Festival, where local citizens build and burn a giant wooden bird sculpture, and Blobfest, a celebration of Phoenixville’s role in the 1958 cult horror film, The Blob.
“The joke is that Phoenixville is full of character and characters,” Jim said. “That’s what makes a community, and that’s what I think is attractive to a lot of people in the younger generations. The draw to Phoenixville is the energy that’s here.”
In 2000, Bill and Jim bought the building that is now home to The Upstairs Studio Artists and Ravensgate (Images above, photographed by Juliana Laury). At first, they weren’t sure what to do with the building, but Bill, who’s a custom home builder, had worked with several artists who wanted home art studios. Yet he learned that even though these artists now had a place where they could create in their own homes, they were still searching for connection with other creatives.
“I discovered that a lot of artists like to be in community,” Bill said. “Because a lot of our early tenants had studios in their homes, in their basement, in their attic, and in their garage, but they still wanted to be a part of that community.”
The design for The Upstairs Studio Artists was a unique one. Instead of each studio separated by walls and doors, Bill and Jim wanted to leave the floorplan open so artists could collaborate with each other more easily.
“We didn't put walls in,” Bill said. “We let the artists establish their own area. They’re working in a common environment so that there’s interaction amongst the artists.”
Kathy Bestwick, the founding executive director of the Arts Center, was also hungry for artistic connection of her own. So, when Bill and Jim shared that they had a building that might be perfect for communal artist studios, Kathy jumped at the chance to be part of it. It took some time to get the building up to code, but in 2004, the Art Center held its first official in-building event, an art exhibit for local artists.
“I remember vividly having the art show hung, having tablecloths on the tables, and all the food set out and music playing,” Kathy said. “It was 20 minutes before it was supposed to start and nobody else was there yet, and I was sitting there thinking, ‘Oh my gosh, I hope somebody comes.’”
But despite Kathy’s fears, the art exhibit was packed well into the night, and there was so much community support that she wanted to keep that momentum going. So, in June of 2004, Phoenixville held its inaugural First Friday comprised of any local business owners willing to keep their doors open late. Now, two decades later, First Fridays are still going strong, with a number of gallery openings the first Friday of every month, as well as street closures so businesses can spread out and performances by local musicians in the summertime.
Through it all, Bill and Jim continued to support local artists and their businesses through real estate. And they weren’t the only ones. While it might feel like Phoenixville’s thriving art culture came about naturally, it’s the carefully-cultivated result of a number of people who have consistently invested in making sure Phoenixville’s arts community stays strong.
“We didn’t all of a sudden have an art community,” Bill said. “This was something that had been planned and talked about, and we had all the forces come together at the right time when the art community exploded.”
“We took the long view of all of this,” Jim said. “We got involved in the town for the benefit of the community and the region, and we’ve always stayed true to that.” The more spaces for art Bill and Jim can create in Phoenixville, the more they believe the art community here will continue to flourish.
For Bill and Jim, today’s arts culture is the culmination of years of investment, hard work and community cooperation by many people. For 24 years, their mission has been to help the arts in Phoenixville grow, and they expect to see that continue for many years to come.
Bill Felton and Jim O’Brien outside of Art Work Gallery + Meeting Space
