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A new corporate-housing concept that allows traveling actors, designers and other theater professionals to live next door to Gulfshore Playhouse while they work, rehearse and perform cleared its final hurdle and is headed toward construction. 

The Naples Design Review Board on Jan. 22 unanimously approved the final design review, allowing the Wynn family, as Downtown Naples LLC, to build 17 400-square-foot studio apartments on the third floor of a three-story, 45,000-square-foot mixed-use development at 1090 First Ave. S.  

“The goal through the whole project was to create little pockets of interest,” architect Bob Vayda, of Beck Architectural Group, said of an entrance arch, performance platform, landscaping, trees, benches, a via and covered walkway leading to the new parking garage. “You walk through and see all this, you experience all of it, or you can go directly to the Gulfshore Playhouse and walk under a covered canopy.” 

Rendering of Gulfshore Playhouse workforce housing and mixed-use project.The approval followed unanimous approval on Dec. 11 by Naples City Council. The Planning Advisory Board approved it a month earlier, with a requirement that Downtown Naples LLC limit the apartments to Gulfshore Playhouse artists. 

The nearly one-acre site is just west of the theater and north of the new city parking garage in the city’s design district. Construction can’t begin until the garage is completed because the property is being used for construction staging. It’s expected to break ground at the end of March, with completion in late 2025 or early 2026.  

The project includes a 20-year lease between the theater and the Wynn family, with Gulfshore Playhouse managing the apartments and paying rent to Downtown Naples LLC. The idea has been five years in the making and during that time, Gulfshore Playhouse CEO Kristen Coury married Michael Wynn. 

Coury had told Council they hold casting calls in New York City to tap a large pool of higher-caliber actors and theater professionals, and they’ve been using Airbnbs and rentals countywide, which requires Gulfshore Playhouse to also pay for car rentals so they can get to the theater. About 20 to 30 acting professionals are in Naples at a time and they expect that to grow beyond the 54 beds they had last year. 

During Hurricane Ian in September 2023, seven first-floor units they rented at Jade Apartments flooded and actors were evacuated to Miami and lost everything. They were evacuated again during Hurricane Milton last year due to storm-surge fears. The theater was using Stillwater Cove apartments nearby but no longer rents there due to safety concerns. 

Actors usually stay eight weeks, half for rehearsals and half for performances, while designers usually stay two to four weeks.  

The 45,000-square foot mixed-use development will feature 16,422 square feet of commercial space, including a small theater platform, a 7,000- to 8000-square-foot ground-floor restaurant and outdoor dining for theatergoers. On the second floor will be 15,181 square feet of office space, half for Gulfshore Playhouse. In addition to the studio apartments, a larger apartment will be built for the Wynn family.  

The project team also includes Barraco and Associates Inc., transportation engineers Trebilcock Consulting Solutions, landscape architects Windham Studio Inc. and Sesco Lighting.  

The building will incorporate hurricane- and flood-proof doors and windows and the color was changed to a light blue, with brown highlights, after the DRB complained about “another white building,” Vayda said. 

“The purpose of the via is really to help draw people through the building as they come and go from the Gulf Shore Playhouse,” Vayda said, adding it will include a life-size sculpture of Don Wynn, with a QR code explaining the family’s history and legacy.  

The bronze sculpture by Agli Sefa means the Wynns won’t pay a hefty public art fee. 

Landscape architect Scott Windham said they’ll add foxtail palms, a column of evergreens, wispy fern canopies, Asian jasmine, ficus, foxtail fern and other trees, plants and planters for an open, tropical look. 

The plans will incorporate the final First Avenue South streetscape plans, which GradyMinor engineers are finishing for the city. 

The DRB praised the improvements from the prior hearing, including the color change, but suggested additional plants to screen the parking area and consider the visually impaired during placement of the sculpture. Chair Steve Hruby suggested they sit down with city officials to discuss the streetscape and negotiate a solution for the street frontage. 

“Work out something and bring it back to us, but don’t hold up your whole project because … we can’t hold you hostage for the city moving slowly,” Hruby said, adding they could return to the DRB with a revision when the DRB reviews the sculpture and public art application. 

The multiuse development is part of a larger project involving the city, the Wynns and Gulfshore Playhouse.  

A four-level, 366-space public garage, the city’s third, is nearing completion on the southwest corner of 12th Street and First Avenue South, west of Goodlette-Frank Road next to Naples Square. The land was provided by the Wynns and Gulfshore Playhouse, whose new $60 million theater will use 123 parking spaces.  

That project is funded by the city Community Redevelopment Agency, using money from taxpayers whose homes and businesses are within the 550-acre CRA district, which is bounded by Seventh Avenue North, Gordon River, Sixth Avenue South and Third Street South. Completion is expected in early February. 

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