Grand Center
The south side of the building was originally called the Grand Center. It features the DeVos Performance Hall and Civic Auditorium, which are still in use although they were renovated when DeVos Place was built. DeVos Performance Hall, built in 1980, is a 2,400 seat theater is home to the Grand Rapids Symphony, Grand Rapids Ballet Company, Opera Grand Rapids and Broadway Grand Rapids. It can also serve as the perfect space for a general session or keynote address.
DeVos Performance Hall has hosted concerts including B.B. King, Barenaked Ladies, James Taylor, Tori Amos and Harry Connick, Jr.; comedians such as Jerry Seinfeld, Bill Cosby and Ron White; and family shows including Dora The Explorer Live, Bear in The Big Blue House Live, Blue’s Clues Live and Thomas & Friends Live.
The new lobby of DeVos Performance Hall was unveiled in June 2002 as part of the DeVos Place Expansion project. The renovated lobby includes a beautiful terrazzo floor, new box office with an outside window and a scrolling marquee. Also part of the renovations were new restroom facilities located on the north side of the theater on the second and third floors.
Internal renovations include refurbished theater seating, as well as new wall and ceiling finishes, new flooring and enhanced colored accent lighting to refresh the house interior and adjoining entry paths. New balcony light fixtures were added along with freshly redesigned balcony fronts that have improved sight lines.
Read more about this topic: DeVos Place Convention Center
Famous quotes containing the words grand and/or center:
“Well! If the Bard was weather-wise, who made
The grand old ballad of Sir Patrick Spence,”
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)
“Children can’t be a center of life and a reason for being. They can be a thousand things that are delightful, interesting, satisfying, but they can’t be a wellspring to live from. Or they shouldn’t be.”
—Doris Lessing (b. 1919)