Nearly 30 years in the making, the San Luis Obispo Repertory Theatre is close to getting a new venue in downtown.
“It's time to move on. It's time for SLO REP to have a real home, a permanent home in downtown San Luis Obispo," said Managing Artistic Director Kevin Harris.
The current 97-seat theatre on Morro Street has been home to SLO REP since 1993. Before that, it had moved to 26 different locations since 1947. Harris has been with the non-profit since 2008 and says “SLO REP has has outgrown that space over the last 15-20 years."
While Around 20,000 people attend their shows every year, the new theatre proposed off of Monterey Street near the new Cultural Arts District Parking structureis estimated to more than double that, bringing in an estimated 50,000 people annually once fully operational. It will also include a 215-seat main stage and 99-seat flexible theater.
“We're not so little anymore," SLO REP Development & Capital Campaign Director Patty Thayer explained. "We bring a lot of people downtown and we anticipate bringing more downtown.”
With about 30% of funding coming from the City of San Luis Obispo and 70% from private donors, the project goal to build the theater is $21.5 million with an economic impact report revealing that the new theatre would bring in an additional $4 million in business to downtown, according to Thayer.
“It's very much a civic project bringing sort of a vitality to downtown SLO," she said.
For performers like Suzy Newman, a new theatre would provide a new feeling of excitement.
“Any time that I come into a new place that I haven't performed in before, there's just this first moment of just taking it in and this indescribable feeling," Newman said.
Right now, SLO REP is about $2.5 million shy its goal but recently, the Harold J. Miossi Charitable Trust announced it will match up to $500,000 in individual contributions between now and June 30.
“I just imagine it's going to be so satisfying and so glorious," Newman said of the future theatre.
“We've been a nomadic organization, a nonprofit, but a resilient one, you know, for the last, for the last eight decades,” Harris added.
The new theatre could break ground early next year and open in 2027. The Cultural Arts District Parking structure is slated to be complete by the beginning of 2026. You can donate at SLOREP.org.
