Editor’s note: The Ouray County Plaindealer started publishing profiles of nonprofits between Thanksgiving and New Year’s in 2020 as a community service. The purpose of these profiles is to highlight the meaningful work being performed by these organizations and let the community know how they can help them even more, as the holidays approach and we reach the end of 2023. Nonprofit organizations that are based in Ouray County and serve Ouray County are eligible for these profiles.

Year established as a nonprofit: 2008

What does your organization do for Ouray County?

The Wright Opera House brings a diverse array of theatrical art performances, music, dance, education and social activities to our community. We pride ourselves on providing an inclusive space for art, creativity and learning. We also make our space available to anyone in the community to rent for private events.

What do you list as your greatest accomplishments in 2023?

We are excited announce that we’ve finished our beautiful new classroom space in the basement! It’s light, bright and warm, with a kitchenette, a full bathroom and gallery walls. This space is designed to be a boon for our community and will be offered for rent at a nominal fee to community members, ensuring there is an affordable and accessible classroom/ meeting space for locals!

What are some goals or projects you have planned for 2024?

We see The Wright Opera House as a year-round tourism draw in the future.

We believe that we can boost year round tourism business for our neighbors while attracting a crowd who are interested art and cultural activities, thus helping preserve our ecology and environment.

In order to accomplish this we need to finish restoring the building, including the historic Mesker facade, and reconfig- ure space to work more effectively.

We want to be able to continue, and even raise, the level of theatrical art and music we now offer. We will kick off a capital campaign in 2024 to raise the money for this important work!

Tell us how the community can help you do more here in Ouray County.

The Friends of the Wright Opera House so appreciate your generous donations to our endowment fund and our operating budget. We survive and thrive off of our community’s good will. At the end of the year we are filling in our operations budget and would greatly benefit from donations of any size. Right now we’re in the research stage of our capital campaign, details to follow in early 2024.

Thanks to Ann Fellin for providing this information.