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welcome to the green cat studio walk thru

The green cat is located at 124 G. st., Salida, Colorado. The building was built in the late 1800's. It started out as the old hose house. A place where the fire trucks and hoses were kept. The building was later added onto in the early 1900s. Some of the uses of the building were a grocery store, various business but mainly a automotive repair shop for Tony Kolbeck. The garage and the station were built around 1930's.

Right next to the green cat building is a parking lot , Toni's old garage/ gas station and a little business station on the corner. Toni's garage has now been converted to a cafe and the small business station to a coffee house in the past 5 years. The architect of all the buildings including the green cat building was a bungalow style.

When Steph and Joe first moved to Colorado, Steph always admired the building and thought it would be a good place for her gallery. She could never figure out why the building was so dark and dingy. Especially since it had so many windows. Once they purchased the building in 2000, the darkness was never more and the the building is now full of light.

Steph cleaned all the windows, cleaned the walls, open the walls up, cleaned the floor, and cleaned and cleaned and cleaned. She painted the concrete floor. To this day, the floor looks like a piece of art in itself. Toni would be surprised!

There are many clues that Steph probably was the first woman in the building. One of the main clues is the bathroom. It's under the stairway. It's so small that you can't turn around. The light is a little pull light and there were a couple of peep holes in the wall which are now covered with glass art. And of course, Steph being a woman, there is now a mirror.

The front part of the building is used for the gallery space along with a big table in front of glass bins toward the middle of the building. She works there at the big table and in the back room where her tools for glass, picture moldings, matt cutter, matt storage , storage for more glass, and various art projects are located. There is also a couch, chairs, microwave, and little fridge in the back studio.

The gallery part has one big oversized front door with glass, three big picture windows, two big door windows, two big windows located in a doorway that was made for the old fire wagons, and five more windows. Out of one of the big picture windows is the view of S mountain. Steph says the S stands for Steph's mountain but it really stands for Salida.

The back room has two side walls that have three windows each and the back wall has two windows. It also has a oversized door with three long windows. The ceiling has a hoist attached to a heavy metal bar on the top of the roof that was once used to haul old motors. The walls are made of the old Salida brick. It also has a 18 foot bench with drawers and space for Steph to work with her many mediums. She has one of her big kilns located in the back. Some people call the kiln a coffin but she prefers the name bathtub. Especially since she is a fish who loves water.

There is also a special room in the back studio designated for sandblasting equipped with high tech dust collectors, pressure blaster, and blasting cabinet. A glass makers tools take up a lot of space and are very important. This is also where the cement floor comes in real handy!

The front part of the gallery still has the old tin ceiling. There are still old giant hinges and small locks on the doors. You can tell the history of the building just by looking at the hardware. Back in the old days, people were more interested in function rather than trying to keep people from breaking in.

The upstairs is still a work in progress and is just used for storage as there are holes in the walls, floorboards, and roof. But after six years of saving, Steph finally got a new roof. yipppeee. It was raining down from the roof thru the 2nd floor and down into the gallery space and onto the floor. She lost several pictures over the years. The old Salida brick was not really a good brick since it was so soft. The roof was a must but everything just takes time, work, and money.

Since the whole building is like an open barn, the heat had to be addressed. In the first year the green cat paid giant heating bills and the building was still cold. So Steph purchased a pellet stove which helps some with the heating bills and the cold. You can find many a cold evening with artists and friends gathered round the stove. Soon Joe will put in better insulation in the roofs and the floor between the top and bottom.

You can tell the building loves Steph and her gallery. There is a nice energy and feeling of home when you go in. And....there is always Steph and Joe's great art everywhere!