NORFOLK, Va. — After closing its doors at MacArthur Mall, 757 Creative Reuse Center has found a new home on Colley Avenue in Norfolk and the community showed up to help build it.
Neighbors gathered Sunday to build a new community garden at the nonprofit's new location, marking a fresh start for the organization that promotes reuse by selling affordable secondhand art supplies.
Beth Dryer, executive director and owner of 757 Creative Reuse Center, said the move was made possible through community support.
"We raised over 21 thousand dollars from our members in the community, individual donors just to help us get into this spot," Dryer said.
The transition has been months in the making.
"We were ready to start meeting people again we have not been open since June, so we spent all of July packing, and moving. We spent all of August unpacking and we're just ready to start meeting people in our community again," Dryer said.
For some community members, the new location brings back fond memories of what the center offered at its previous home.
"Painting is so expensive, and the creative reuse center makes it not so expensive, and I miss that so bad," Jaimes said.
Dryer said the Colley Avenue neighborhood is a natural fit for the nonprofit.
"It's such a good synergy to be in a neighborhood again we have colonial place right there, highland place is right there all up and down Colley is the Eco district so we have a lot of partnerships that we've already made in this area and it's just a fantastic place to be," Dryer said.
The building is not yet open to customers, but 757 Creative Reuse Center will hold its grand opening celebration on Oct. 4. In the meantime, the organization is looking for volunteers to help maintain the new community garden.
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