Artword Studio

The Artword Studio at Laidlaw is on the upper floor of Laidlaw Memorial United Church in Hamilton, at the corner of Ottawa Street and Cannon Street. We call it a "performance studio", suitable for small-scale, intimate theatre performances, "tiny-desk" concerts, and workshops.

The studio is housed in a space 15 feet wide by 42 feet long, made up of two connected rooms with an archway. The layout suggests a traditional theatre space with a "proscenium arch" separating the playing area from the audience. The playing area is divided into two, 11 feet from the arch, by a large storage cupboard, covered by a black drop. The remaining back area can be opened or curtained off.

Stage lighting is provided by fixtures mounted behind the proscenium, and by LED front-of-house lights. There is a computer behind the audience to control the lights, using a program called QLC+.

There is an 8-channel mixing board stage left, hidden behind the arch. There are speakers on each side of the arch.

There are 30 soft comfortable audience seats, donated by David Crown. Audience capacity is a friendly 30. For large crowds, the Sanctuary is available, as well as the basement gym.

Before

Reverend Doug standing in the first room, set up as a Sunday School classroom
A photo showing both rooms from one end, Judith standing in the second room
One corner of the first room
The entrance doorway of the first room.

The rooms that are now the Artword Studio were used in different ways since 1912, when the church was built. More recently, they were used for the Sunday School. However, as with most churches, the number of children has dwindled. The two rooms, connected with an archway, are no longer needed.

There is a large room behind, which can accommodate the Sunday School. It will also serve as the Green Room for the Studio.

When I mentioned to the Reverend that it would make a good little performance space, Reverend Doug was enthusiastic. (He's an enthusiastic type of guy.) He pointed out, however, that the windows were in bad shape, and let in the cold and storm. Also, there was only one electrical outlet; not really enough. So I researched and wrote a proposal to the Mission Council for new windows, lots of electrical circuits, and assorted this and that. We got enough for the windows, the electrics and a little left over.

The ceiling needed repair. Fortunately, the church had a an excellent dry waller, Troy, who did what was necessary. By September, 2025, the infrastructure improvements were completed. All the was needed was to paint all the walls and floor, remove the carpet (phew), cut and hem and grommet the curtains (thanks Susan), put up a lighting grid, hang the lights and set up the dmx, get blinds for the windows, hang the speakers and connect the mixer. And other stuff I've forgotten.

The speakers were donated by Borys (of the band Junestone), who plays guitar on Sundays during the services. They were excellent Mackie studio speakers, except that unfortunately one of them didn't work. So he said we could have them. A google search revealed that this was a known issue, and the problem was capacitor C60. So the Reverend took a soldering iron and now we have two excellent speakers that both work.