SPACE MONTROSE SELLING STUFF TO FUND NEW MONTROSE SPACE TO SELL STUFF 
The Examiner reports that Space Montrose’s 200-ft. relocation to that new retail center at the corner of Westheimer and Dunlavy where pastry chef Roy Shvartzapel is planning a café is requiring some serious dough: a $10,000 buildout, including installing from scratch plumbing, wiring, and HVAC systems in the 1,200-sq.-ft. “cold shell.” How’s a small-scale, husband-and-wife Montrose boutique that sells locally made arts and crafts supposed to pay for something like that? Why, selling locally made arts and crafts: “Owner Leila Peraza is starting an Indiegogo campaign,” reports Sarah Tucker. “[She’s] still in the process of setting up . . . ‘Our hands, united hearts,’ but plans to have different gifts for different levels of donors, such as T-shirts and artist-donated work. She also plans to incorporate the mural by artist Katharine Kearns at the front of the store into the fundraiser and new store space as a thank you.” [The Examiner; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Allyn West
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Good luck with IndieGoGo, a quasi-Kickstarter where projects go to die.
This move is part of the musical chairs at that site. Domy is moving from its current location to the location where Space is now, and a new gallery, Brandon, is opening in the location of Domy. Brandon will be run by Cody Ledvina, who until recently was co-director of the Joanna, which closed down recently. (Dan Fergus owns Brasil, Domy and the building that Space is in.)
@ Robert: So they’re shuffling the deck chairs on the Titanic?
That suggests the whole enterprise is in trouble. Which it may be, for all I know. However, if I were a commercial property owner in need of cash, I wouldn’t evict a rent-paying tenant and replace them with an art gallery (which is an inherently risky business). And Brasil still seems quite popular. So without any inside knowledge on Fergus’s motives, I’m guessing this isn’t some kind of hail Mary move.
I don’t know if Mother Hydra has enough restless spite left to keep going, but IndieGoGo is actually more practical than Kickstarter for some projects because if you don’t reach your goal, then you still get to keep what you have raised. Kickstarter’s all-or-nothing approach can be more tenuous than some people are willing to handle. $10,000 is a bit of a lofty goal for a for-profit venture, but it paid off for Austin’s Farewell Books, which currently occupies the former Domy space in Austin.