Graceful landing: This Johnson County city plans to expand KC Ballet school’s presence

The Kansas City Ballet’s presence in Johnson County is about to get a lot bigger. Starting this fall, the company will be renovating a new space for its Prairie Village dance school, more than tripling its current size.

The school will remain in almost the same location at the northeast corner of 95th Street and Nall Avenue, moving to the other side of its current building. Jeff Bentley, executive director of the ballet, hopes the new space will be open by January.

“There’s a lot of unknowns. It depends on R.H. Johnson, because they’re also renovating all buildings around it, so that’s going to impact when we can get into our space,” Bentley said.

Classes will continue in the old spot until the new studio is ready.

The $1.8 million project will include four studios, allowing the school to expand its class offerings. Before the pandemic, the group had already been feeling pinched for space.

“We had gotten to a point where our classes were full, and we were having to create new classes, or we couldn’t create classes at all, because we didn’t have space in our schedule with only two studios,” said Grace Holmes, school director.

“As our curriculum for our academy students grew, and as we added more classes for them, there was less time in the studio available for adult classes.”

The current space has been a ballet school for decades. Before the Kansas City Ballet took it over about 20 years ago, it was Somerset Ballet.

To fund the project, the ballet applied for and has gotten two grants from The Sunderland Foundation and the Richard J. Stern Foundation for the Arts that cover about $1 million. Bentley said the organization is currently fundraising to make up the rest of the project budget.

Local firm BNIM is designing the new space, and JE Dunn Construction is the contractor.

Aside from adding more studio space, the renovation will allow the Ballet to have dressing rooms for young male dancers, who currently have to make do with changing in the bathroom, as well as separate dressing areas for girls and adults. Administrative offices, a teacher’s lounge, a waiting area and storage closets also are on the list.

Holmes is looking forward to having soundproofing on the studios, as classes typically have live piano accompaniment.

“We have sort of dueling pianos going on in both rooms when you have two classes going on,” she said.

Although enrollment has dropped to about two-thirds of pre-pandemic levels, Holmes hopes to eventually have 250 students, about twice as many as are currently enrolled. Part of that growth will be in adult classes, such as senior ballet and jazz classes; yoga; and possibly special dance classes for those with Parkinson’s disease.

Academy classes will expand to include the more advanced levels. Currently, the Prairie Village location has the lower levels, and the more advanced students have to travel to the ballet’s Kansas City school. Making that commute multiple times a week is difficult for families, especially those who have other children with different obligations.

Having a larger facility will also allow the professional company to do some rehearsals there, which is important in providing young dancers with connections to their role models.

“Even just being in the building, passing by doors, watching through windows and that sort of thing, they get to know each other,” Holmes said. “They get to see in front of them why they’re working so hard at what they’re doing, because they can see their hopeful end product.”

Holmes anticipates hiring more dance teachers, pianists, front desk staff and a new manager for the facility.

With this renovated facility, Bentley and Holmes hope to do outreach with Johnson County schools as they’ve done in the past with the Kansas City and Turner school districts.

Bentley, who is retiring next year, wants to have the completed project as something he can hand over to his successor.

“After 25 years, I’d like to put the bow on some things we’ve been talking about but for whatever reasons haven’t occurred. This is one of them.”