Ordway Renovates Main Hall Stage

After hosting 25 years of performances, Ordway Center for the Performing Arts is retiring its original stage floor, and renovating it this summer. It is a traditional, sprung floor ideal for dance, opera, and musical theater performances.

Leontyne Price was the first performer on it. Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater danced on it. And Les Misérables performed 216 shows on it, breaking the record for number of engagements at one theater stage.

Ordway President and CEO Patricia Mitchell Commented, “Over the years, the Ordway’s Main Hall stage has been sanded and resanded numerous times. It was too worn-down to refinish it again. It is vital to maintain the condition of the Ordway for all who enjoy and use its space, so we may continue to bring exceptional theatrical, music, and dance performances to the Twin Cities”

To that end, the Ordway’s 4,500-square-foot stage floor is being renovated by Minneapolis hardwood flooring experts Anderson Ladd. Throughout the seven-week-long construction process, oak flooring will be installed, and the permanent trapdoors will be repositioned. The renovated stage then will receive several coats of stain and precise buffing treatments to ensure a pristine finish.

Funds for renovation of the stage floor came from the state bonding bill during the 2006 legislative session, part of a $7.5-million-dollar renovation of the Ordway. The renovation project began in the fall of 2008, and will be completed in the summer of 2010.

Ordway Center for the Performing Arts
345 Washington St., St. Paul
www.ordway.org