The Recording Studio is UNDER CONSTRUCTION NOW!

(check out photos here)

Executive Director Ann Hackler and Artistic Director June Millington hired architect Tristram Metcalfe in 2003 and began working out plans for the conversion of IMA’s Big Barn into a teaching, performing and recording space. Contractor Mark Landy was hired in early ’04 and construction began that spring with the addition of 1,100 square feet to the original structure for the bunk house and studio. The barn conversion work has ebbed and flowed with the availability of funds and the demands of programming, always stopping for the summer rock camps. The building of the recording studio interior will bring this half-million dollar project to completion.

At the AES Convention in 2005, June Millingotn connected with interior designer Beth Walters of the internationally known studio architectural firm WSDG, Inc. (Walters/Storyk Design Group). Walters quickly understood the importance of a world class recording studio dedicated to supporting fully empowered female artists and convinced her husband John Storyk, whose first studio design job was Jimi Hendrix’s Electric Ladyland, to come on board for the project.

The WSDG designed studio will feature a large control room, a post-production suite and two isolation booths. All four rooms will be “floating” on special Kinetics material and connected via a central patchbay to each other and the barn proper, which also has four rooms of different sizes. IMA will offer something that is becoming increasingly rare in the recording world: a facility large enough to accommodate an orchestra with high ceilings where it is possible to “push air” and which has two iso-booths (which are controllable and prevent cross-talk) connected to the Control Rooms via specially designed doors and windows.

Much of the design and construction time is being donated, as are quite a few building materials and supplies. In addition, the studio equipment and technical materials themselves have already been donated or promised. While the studio and performance area are progressive even by 21st Century standards, the historic integrity of the 200-year-old-barn has been faithfully maintained throughout the design and construction process.

IMA intends to raise $150,000 by June of 2008 to complete the studio in time for the girls who participate in its summer Studio Recording and Production Program to use.

You can contribute: bid on items at the eBay auction starting March 8th, donate any amount through Paypal:

or become one of the IMA Barn Raisers with a donation of $10,000 or more and proudly be recognized for such a substantial commitment to women artists on the barn’s dedicating plaque.