Broward Center for the Performing Arts-Fort Lauderdale

Located in the heart of downtown Fort Lauderdale, Florida, the Broward Institution for the Performing Arts (or simply the Broward Cente) is a massive multi-venue performing arts center.

 

The Riverwalk Arts and Entertainment District has its roots in the center, which opened in 1991 on a 5.5-acre (22,000 m2) plot of land on the north side of the New River at Sailboat Bend.

 

The four theaters of the Broward Center, which were designed by Benjamin C. Thompson, are used for a wide variety of operas, ballets, concerts, plays, lectures, and other events for the local community. Several artistic groups—including Symphony of the Americas, Concert Association of Florida, Florida Grand Opera, and Gold Coast Jazz—work together with the Broward Center. Broadway Across America is a partnership that presents national tours of Broadway shows.

 

The downtown riverfront district of South Florida is home to the Broward Center for the Performing Arts. As a result, it has become one of the most popular theaters in the United States, with 2007 annual sales placing it at number seven on the global list of concert venues compiled by the concert trade magazine Pollstar.

 

Since its 2011 opening, the Broward Center has hosted more than 700 events, drawing in excess of 700,000 people. Additional construction on the center is scheduled to commence in the spring of 2012.

 

The Florida government created the Performing Arts Center Authority in 1984 to manage the Broward Center’s construction and subsequent policymaking. Together, the Downtown Development Authority, local residents, individual donors, and the Broward Performing Arts Foundation were able to secure the necessary funds to construct the theater complex.

 

The initial fundraising targets were achieved by the end of 1987, and the project was put out to bid with the help of additional grant funds from local, county, state, and federal agencies. Acclaimed Cambridge, Massachusetts architectural company Benjamin Thompson & Associates, Inc was hired to design the building. In May of 1988, a groundbreaking ceremony was performed to officially begin construction.

 

The Riverwalk Arts and Entertainment District was established as a result of the Broward Center’s 1998 beginnings of cooperation with adjacent retailers and cultural attractions along the New River. The Broward Center, Museum of Art, Florida Grand Opera, Concert Association of Florida, Fort Lauderdale Historical Society, and Historic Stranahan House Museum are all part of this destination marketing group. More than one million people buy tickets each year to see shows in the many Arts & Entertainment District partner venues, which were established to attract tourists interested in culture near Fort Lauderdale and the Riverwalk District in particular.