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W
hen I was growing up as an only child in suburban Oklahoma, our PBS
a昀케liate was a 昀椀xture in our home. My parents and I would kick on the
TV and tune into Rick Steves, Lawrence Welk, and Oklahoma Gardening with
staid devotion. Before smartphones and household internet, PBS helped me
access the world beyond my cul de sac. And PBS gave me the 昀椀rst taste of my
future home late on Saturday nights, a little bit after bedtime, when “Austin
City Limits” aired — a cultural transmission from south of the Red River.
The 昀椀rst time I saw the “Austin City Limits” backdrop in person, it was the
middle of the pandemic, and I was visiting my friend who worked at an art
storage facility in South Austin. All 20 panels had been packed up and were
hiding out in storage while the rest of town was lying low. Stacked up amongst
the crates and shelves of priceless art objects were massive plywood panels
painted grey, dotted with old-school incandescent bulbs. I was shocked at how
ordinary they seemed. Until then, I had only seen them on my screen, where
they were endowed with the magic of TV production and the high-powered
wattage of the country and rock stars in front of them.
I had imagined them as larger than life. But the panels were originally
created on what was likely a shoestring budget by designer Augie Kymmel.
The Austin-American Statesman’s music critic Peter Blackstock notes that they
were fashioned out of “wood, wire, and Christmas lights.” The panels were in
storage until they could be auctioned o昀昀 to support Austin PBS’s construction
of a new dedicated space for the station. It turned out that Austin PBS studio
executives and sta昀昀 had been conjuring some of their own magic. Although
“Austin City Limits” had moved into its downtown location in the Moody
Center in 2010, the rest of the Austin PBS studio was cha昀椀ng at the constraints
of its home of 60 years on the UT Austin campus.
Sharing an academic building with UT’s communications school, the
TV station had evolved beyond the limitations of its physical space. It lacked
parking, collaborative spaces for sta昀昀ers, and a cohesive spatial program for
the needs of 21st-century television production. For example, they had studio
spaces but no restrooms for guests or greenrooms for talent on the same 昀氀oors.
Perhaps most symbolic of their warehousing on UT’s campus, there was no
signage for Austin PBS on their building, and they had nowhere to host public
programming.
Wanting to grow their footprint, they searched for a site that would let
them build out a new home for their program, both improving their technical
capabilities and allowing them to become a physical hub for the community in
Austin. They found it in 2017 in a long-term lease for a yet-to-be-completed
building in Austin Community College’s new Highland Campus. In collaboration with Studio Steinbomer Architecture & Interiors, who led the design of
the interior 昀椀tout, they set about transforming the ground 昀氀oor of what had
been a Dillard’s into the Austin Media Center. (Gensler was responsible for
the redesign of the building’s shell.)
The design team worked to retro昀椀t approximately 51,000 sf of empty, steelframed space in that building, which would also house ACC administrative
o昀케ces. They also added 19,000 sf, coming up with a comprehensive design
that includes three state-of-the-art studios, production and audio control
rooms, and a scene shop.
With a background in spaces that support audiovisual production, including
Austin Studios and Troublemaker Studios, Studio Steinbomer managed the
highly technical process of designing all three studios. The largest, the P昀氀uger
Keller Community Soundstage (formerly known as Studio 6A), is 6,600 sf and
equipped to meet the intense requirements of high-quality live broadcasts
while also giving production sta昀昀ers 昀氀exibility and ease.
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