Upstate, SC [November 23, 2015] – Ten at the Top (TATT), an organization created to enhance economic vitality and quality of life across the Upstate by fostering collaboration and strategic partnerships has announced the recipients for the 2015 Hughes Investments Elevate Upstate Community Vibrancy Grants.
The program, which began in 2013, annually provides “seed funds” to support vibrancy initiatives in communities across the Upstate region. There were 26 applications for the 2015 grants and five finalists gave brief presentations before the selections were made during the Our Upstate Vision Forum on November 19th.
The commitment from Phil Hughes and Hughes Investments is to annually provide two grants of $5,000 each. However, for 2015, Hughes provided an additional $5,000 with the third grant being split amongst two communities.
The two $5,000 recipients are:
celebrate agriCULTURE: Greenwood – The Arts Council of Greenwood County plans to celebrate national farmers market week with several activities: tailored pieces of art to exhibit and family fun day focused on our agricultural heritage, cooking demonstrations, etc. throughout the six week celebration.
Music at the Museum: Greenville – In a partnership between the Children’s Museum of the Upstate and the Furman University Partners in the Arts Program, student and faculty ensembles will perform a series of mini concerts.
Two other finalists will receive $2,500 towards their project:
Art in the Park: Woodruff – The Woodruff Living Arts Festival will be a downtown event which will bring art to life in the Upstate.
Walkable Cultural District: Spartanburg – The Art Partnership (TAP) in collaboration with the Spartanburg Arts Museum (SAM) aims to create a temporary public art installation to uniquely launch the newly designated Spartanburg Downtown cultural District.
“The goal of the Elevate Upstate program is to get communities thinking about what types of initiatives or programs might help spark vibrancy within their area and then provide some seed money to get some of them started,” said Hughes Investments President Phil Hughes. “In the three years we have done this program, I have been amazed by the great ideas and passion of communities across the region to grow their vibrancy and sense of place. It was a real challenge to narrow the field to five finalists and to select the recipients.”