New owners to convert former downtown church in Sudbury, Ont., into concert hall

The moment Dan Guillemette and Liana Bacon first walked into the former Knox Presbyterian Church in downtown Sudbury they knew it was to be the music hall they wanted to create.

The couple recently purchased the 10,000-square-foot building at 73 Larch Street for $490,000. They'll take possession on June 1 and plan to open the venue later in the summer.

It was last September when the congregation held its final service there before the building closed. It was put up for sale earlier this year.

Guillemette and Bacon plan to convert the space into a 150-seat music hall for concerts and other live performances. They want to eventually expand that capacity to 600.

"We love live music and we've been to some wonderful venues in Toronto and thought that maybe a mid-tier venue would suit the city really well," Bacon said.

"You can tell from even the back of the space the acoustics in the space are just amazing. The sound sort of reverberates," she added.

'Clearly been very well loved'

"It does have a [church] feel certainly and maybe with auditorium seating it could change it a little, but I think that it's beautiful and it's lovely, and it's built for a community gathering space and that's how it can act," she said.

They plan to keep the pipe organ and stained glass windows, but will need to do some renovations to the building; things like repairing the eavestrough and addressing a bit of water damage.

"The stained glass is just incredible," Bacon said.

The pew seating will be kept for now, but then removable, or stackable, auditorium seating will be added. 

"We want people to enjoy the space when they're in there," Guillemette said.

There is also a basement with a secondary hall that could be used for different events, and a balcony in the main part of the building. There is also a space in the back of the building that could be used for office space or a residence.

"H-VAC is relatively new, which is always a big expense; unfortunately there's no air-conditioning so that's going to be on Phase 1," Guillemette said.

"It's also clearly been very well loved by the people who were there," Bacon said.

"We have done our research; I run a lot of numbers before I make a decision like this," Guillemette said.

"There's a lot of great venues in town, and the intent is that there is a bit of a niche market between the 300 and 600-seat venues in the downtown core. So that's kind of our niche market," he added.

They plan to seek out arts and culture funding from the City of Greater Sudbury, the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation and FedNor.

"We both love [historical buildings] so it was hitting all these checked boxes that we like and we enjoy personally so we're hoping that the public will feel the same," Guillemette said.

Guillemette and Bacon also own a cafe called Books and Beans, and a speakeasy called the Night Owl.  Both at the same location at 158 Elgin Street, also downtown.

"We believe in the downtown. We have real estate here. We have businesses here," said Guillemette.

"If the venue was somewhere else I don't think we would have purchased it."