Partners for Sacred Places

Partners for Sacred Places (Partners) assists religious organizations in their efforts to preserve historic buildings by helping them find additional uses for those buildings. Previously the Foundation funded the development and launch of a web-based hub designed to assist in the creation of partnerships between arts organizations in need of space and religious congregations that had space available. This grant funds a pilot program, focused on two underserved Chicago neighborhoods (Englewood and Bronzeville), that uses both the newly developed website and in-person facilitation to create 20 new collaborations between arts and religious organizations.

Partners for Sacred Places assists religious organizations in their efforts to preserve historic buildings by helping them find ways to use those buildings to meet the rehearsal, performance, and other space needs of arts organizations. It provides training programs to local congregations on topics such as adaptive reuse, fundraising, and identifying community needs. Grant funds will be used to design, develop and launch an online information hub which will provide general information and resources for the public and specific technical and cultural information about arts organizations and available facilities to the staff.