Winston-Salem Journal writes about Chestnut Creek

http://www2.journalnow.com/content/2010/aug/12/111925/galax/  

By Lisa O’Donnell | Journal Reporter

Published: August 12, 2010

Updated: 08/11/2010 07:25 pm

GALAX, Va. – Take N.C. 89 north off of U.S. 77 and you will come within hollering distance of Cumberland Knob, the birthplace of the Blue Ridge Parkway, and the Blue Ridge Music Center, where the surrounding mountains ring each summer with the high lonesome sound of fiddles and banjos.

Cross over into Virginia and this mountain-hugging road eases into the outskirts of Galax and becomes Main Street. Here, you will find Jimmy Edmonds building world-class guitars in a shop tucked behind a lawn and garden store.

Continue north and you will pass Felts Park, where 40,000 people flock each year to the Old Fiddler’s Convention against the backdrop of furniture factories. Barr’s Fiddle Shop, a legendary music shop that is home to spontaneous jams, will soon be on your right. And up on your left, in a renovated bank, sits the Chestnut Creek School of the Arts, a new player in the city’s arts scene that hopes to take advantage of the area’s confluence of culture and nature to make Galax a destination spot for tourists.

Galax is one of many small towns across the country that is looking to tourism to help revitalize their economies, said Neville Bhada, the vice president of communications with the Southeast Tourism Society.

“Communities are trying to see what they have in their own back yard to promote,” Bhada said.

And Galax’s back yard is plush with music, natural beauty and artists versed in such traditional crafts as quilting and weaving.

The Chestnut Creek School was developed to give tourists a unique opportunity to learn such things as how to build a guitar from one of the area’s master craftsmen. When not in class, visitors can rent bikes and take a ride down the beautiful New River bicycle trail or stop by the historic Rex Theater to take in a show.

Penelope Moseley, an artist who has lived in Galax for about 30 years, is among a handful of people who recognized the potential for an arts school in the city, which is about 70 miles north of Winston-Salem.

About eight years ago, she heard a local economic development leader talk about a new incubator that would help small businesses.

“Afterward, I thought, ‘The arts need incubating, too,'” Moseley said.

Her idea was to model the school after the Penland School of Crafts and the John C. Campbell Folk School, two schools in North Carolina that draw people from around the world.

At the time, she and others in Galax were teaching art to students in a house in Galax.

“The classes we had in the house were going well,” she said. “And we knew there was a need for them.”

She and other local leaders were able to secure sizable grants that paid for a feasibility study and a beautiful old bank on Main Street that had sat empty for several years.

The 8,000-square-foot bank, which was built in the 1920s, was renovated and opened in April. It serves as the school’s headquarters and includes a gallery and several classrooms equipped with instruments, sewing machines, looms and spinning wheels made by a local woodworker.

Unlike Penland and John C. Campbell, which are located in rural areas, classes at the Chestnut Creek School will be spread around Galax. A pottery studio recently opened in a building down the road from the school. The next phase of the school will be a wood-wrights shop where people can learn how to make instruments from such people as Wayne Henderson, an internationally renowned luthier who lives in the area.

The school holds classes for local people who want to learn a skill and uses local artists to teach classes to visitors. Those visitors will be spending money at local bed-and-breakfasts, cabins, restaurants and shops.

Chris Shackelford, the director of the school, said that eight new businesses have opened in the area in response to the school’s opening. One such business is a coffee shop that opened next to the school.

Outdoors-oriented businesses, such as outfitters, are likely to benefit as well. For out-of-town students who enjoy the outdoors, Galax offers an abundance of opportunities. Besides the parkway, one of the big draws is the New River bicycle trail, which stretches 57 miles from Galax to Pulaski. Or visitors can spend their off-time tubing, fishing or paddling down the New, which is fairly tame in the Galax area.

Just west of Galax lies the rugged beauty of Mount Rogers National Recreation Area and Grayson Highlands State Park, two of the most stunning places to hike and camp in our neck of the Southeast.

Classes on tap for this fall include introduction to weaving, clogging, novel writing and wood carving

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