Before the 5600 and 5700 blocks of Park Boulevard became Pinellas Arts Village, it housed the Suncoast Haven of Rest Rescue Mission. The Mission offered services to houseless individuals and impoverished families in the area. Unfortunately, sometimes individuals showed up inebriated, and businesses began to complain about loitering and trespassing on their private property.
“That location where the artists are now is what we’d call a typical blighted property,” Pinellas Park Community Development Administrator Nick Colonna told Creative Loafing Tampa Bay. “There were a lot of interesting activities going on there, so the CRA Agency ended up purchasing the property, cleaned it up, and decided that this would be a great place to help growing artists.”
The idea was to “cultivate a Pinellas Park version of what’s going on in St. Pete and Tampa and so forth,” Colonna told CL. Community redevelopment agencies (CRAs) purchase a city’s problematic properties and convert them into something better for the community—and this is what Pinellas Park’s CRA did in 2012. Given Pinellas Park’s history—Beaux Arts Coffeehouse supported a vibrant art scene in this area in the 1950s-1970s—inviting artists back made sense.
Around 2012, muralist Derek Donnelly was working out of Bloom Art Center, which he could see was sunsetting, in St. Pete. “I’m actually raised in the neighborhood here, so it seemed like a good fit” Donnelly told CL. “But I was also kind of hesitant because [pregnant pause] Pinellas Park. And I tried really hard to get out of the neighborhood I grew up in, live in St. Pete and do all that.”
But the powers that be, Debra Rose and Council Member Rick Butler at the time, talked him into it. “It started as a five-year lease, with the option to renew after five years for another five,” Donnelly told CL, “but ownership was always the goal for myself and for the city as well.
John Gascot discovered the properties in 2015 through a Better Block event.
“The city had an event, Better Block, to kind of test out what bringing art to that area would look like,” Gascot told CL. “They had storage containers like pods that they made for artists to display [their work]. The CRA person at the time [Debra Rose] pulled me over and told me that the offices were going to become art studios, and I might want to take a look at them.”
The low rent convinced Gascot to move into the Studios at 5663 in 2016. “I think I [joined] in January, and then we got our first artist, other than myself, in March,” Gascot told CL.
More artists moved in, formed collaborations, and painted murals. Pet photographer Laurie Elmer was photographing outdoors, and in her husband’s veterinary practice after hours, when she discovered Pinellas Arts Village around 2016-2017. She’d just established Urban Dog Studio with her business partner Knicki Knowlton, and they were studio shopping.
“I had taken notice of the area because of the murals on the side of the building,” Elmer told CL. “I’d researched renting a studio space there, but I had noticed on the application it said ‘no pets allowed,’ and I’m a pet photographer.”
Still, Elmer took Knowlton to see the space. Robert Riedel answered the door when they knocked and gave them a tour. When Elmer mentioned the pet policy, Riedel said, “Everybody brings their dog here.”
So Urban Dog Studio applied for a spot in the Studios at 5663.
“I believe John was one of the people on the approval committee, and thankfully John got excited about dog photography in the studio, and we were accepted,” she added.
Two months later, Urban Dog Studio moved into the largest studio space in the building.
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Gascot gets mural-painting tips from Donnelly. Elmer sits on the board of Gascot’s Diversity Arts, an organization that provides arts programming to kids from underserved communities. And Gascot often models for Elmer’s human portraits. All of them collaborate on Pinellas Park’s signature event— the monthly Fourth Saturday Block Party (stylized “pARTy”). The October Block Party has a Halloween theme, and the Arts Village always delivers on that. It’s done haunted art installations, pet costume contests, and people costume contests too.
After close to a decade working together in Pinellas Arts Village, the city let them purchase their spaces. Donnelly claimed ownership of The Cove in February 2023, and John Gascot and Laurie Elmer now co-own the Studios at 5663.
“The current council really deserves so much credit for how supportive they’ve been of us,” Gascot told CL. “They could have awarded these buildings to people who were bidding higher amounts…and they really acknowledged and rewarded the work that we put into the city. Not just myself and Laurie, but also Derek, and Painting with a Twist, and Swartz. We all got our building.”
“We hear so many stories about artists in St. Pete who are losing their spaces because their building’s being sold or their rent is going up,” says Elmer. “The one thing John and I were in agreement on when we went into this was that our goal was to do everything we can to provide reliable, long-term spaces for artists…and that’s because the city gave us the opportunity to do this."
For artists, owning your own studio space is “everything.”
“It’s a dream come true,” says Gascot. “As artists and creatives, to be able to own a brick and mortar, and do what we do, and offer what we’re going to offer, which is going to be so much more to the community. And to just have ownership in that.”
For Donnelly, Gascot and Elmer, their gratitude and joy manifest in renovations and exciting plans for the future. Donnelly’s doing some necessary maintenance on The Cove, but he’s also creating a mural garden and re-branding the space as a live entertainment venue with live music, open mic nights, poetry readings, and comedy. That’s in addition to art shows and block party events.
Next door, Gascot and Elmer are expanding the Studios at 5663’s gallery and classroom space. They’re also improving the overall look of the building to make it look less like an office space and more like a creative space. They’re creating an event space and planning to host art and continuing education classes. Gascot’s husband, Ron Diana, is a licensed massage therapist who will offer massage classes in a gallery environment for a relaxing and inspiring experience. Elmer’s already thinking about how they can make the space even more dog friendly. They’ll start curating regular, bimonthly/quarterly art shows in their expanded gallery space. And they’re actively looking for ways to broaden Diversity Arts’ programming at the studios.
“We’re going to have a full calendar of events and a full menu of services, experiences, and things to do,” Gascot told CL. “Something’s going to be going on all the time.”
So keep an eye on Pinellas Arts Village this fall by stalking them on social media @saintpaintarts and @studios5663, because Pinellas Park’s about to get exciting.
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