Above: Artist Camille Erickson pinned screen-printed postcards on a line at the Soap Factory in 2017 as part of a project to support the National Endowment for the Arts. Photo: Jerry Holt.
The Soap Factory is not dead.
The Twin Cities stalwart experimental art space has been closed for more than two years, and some feared that it was shut down for good, especially after its mortgage sold for $1.2 million at a sheriff's sale on Dec. 18. But now it is getting a second chance.
This fall, the Soap Factory will receive 6,000 square feet, rent-free, in the basement-level of the 130-year-old soap factory near the downtown riverfront for the next two years. Its board of directors voted to accept the offer on March 4.
This deal came through a series of financial transactions orchestrated by RJM Construction, the Golden Valley-based company that worked on the building remodel and had already taken on $2.5 million of the Soap's debt. In lieu of paying them back, the Soap handed over the building deed, worth $3.8 million, to RJM. They will buy back the mortgage from OSP LLC, an Edina-based asset and wealth management company that purchased it in the sheriff's sale.
RJM is selling the building to a new buyer whose name was not disclosed. The rest of the building will be offices, with a space on the first floor targeted for a restaurant, which was part of the Soap's original remodeling plan.That sale is expected to close between April 1 and mid-May.
"They've got a long history in that property and it's kind of their namesake," said RJM chief executive Bob Jossart. "Sometimes those organizations need a little extra help and this was one of them."
Construction ofn the Soap's new space will take place over the summer, with an expected opening around Labor Day.
