soundstage construction may be part of santa fe campus plan

Up to half a dozen new soundstages could see construction on the campus of the former Santa Fe University of Art and Design.

The Los Angeles-based Pacifica Ventures, part of the redevelopment team for the 64-acre midtown campus, has announced that it would like to build the soundstages as part of the Garson Studios, which has been located on the campus for decades.

If all of the involved parties can come to an agreement, the soundstage construction could begin later this year, with a target operational date of next summer.

The soundstage project would fold into a larger educational component of the redeveloped campus, in this case serving the needs of a film school to be jointly operated by Santa Fe Community College and the University of New Mexico.

As proposed, the soundstages would be built at the site of Garson Studios, which itself has two soundstages, one measuring around 14,000 square feet and the other 7,500 square feet.

With talks on the proposed project underway, Pacifica Ventures would be required to enter into a development agreement with the City of Santa Fe, as well as the Dallas-based KDC Real Estate Development and Investments/Cienda Partners, master developer for the larger campus.

This isn’t the first time that the Garson Studios part of the campus has been looked at for new soundstage construction. Late last year, Goodwest Studios of Santa Fe indicated that it was interested in both purchasing the Garson facility as well as adding two 15,000 square foot soundstages to it.

The studios are named in honor of Greer Garson, the well-known actor who during World War II was consistently listed as one of the country’s top box office attractions. Garson moved with her husband to New Mexico in the late 1960s, eventually donating several million dollars for the construction of the Greer Garson Theater on the Santa Fe campus.

​By Garry Boulard

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