Signal's makeover of historic Fort Worden offers Puget Sound a new arts center

2021-10-13T18:14:00-04:00

Whence a military installation, now an art gallery. A new adaptive reuse project from Signal Architecture + Research has transformed a one-time coastal artillery fortification in Port Townsend, Washington into an eight-acre arts compound with accommodations for studios, exhibition space, and a new artist residency called Makers Square.

Image courtesy SIGNAL

The project took three of Fort Worden’s warehouse buildings currently listed on the National Register of Historic Places and remade what began a harbinger of violence into a historically sensitive space for creative expression.

Image courtesy Washington State Parks and Recreation Commission

The old quartermasters’ warehouse is now a gallery space complete with new double-height ceilings and a gabled roofline. Two writers’ studios occupy an expanded attic area, and the basement has been transformed into a headquarters for the local station KPTZ with the help of engineering partner Arup. The two remaining buildings became ideal canva...

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Signal's makeover of historic Fort Worden offers Puget Sound a new arts center