The building at 1716 A1A used to sell outdoor furniture as Bungalow Home Outdoor Living. It covers 6,000 square feet, and since October 1 it has belonged to the Vero Beach Museum of Art under a two-year lease. The museum calls it the VBMA "Hub," and it opens to the public in March 2027.
For the next two years, the museum will operate in two places. The galleries stay in Riverside Park for one more short season, and the museum has said it will leave that building in mid-February 2027. Classes, kids' programs and the staff who run them move to Riomar until the new campus opens in fall 2028. For people on the north end of the island, the museum's daily life is about to land in their neighborhood just as its exhibition life winds down across the river.
What Moves Into 1716 A1A
The museum's October 19 announcement lists what the Hub will hold:
- Spring Term art classes and workshops
- Museum Studios family programming
- A mini Art Zone for kids
- Community access programs, including Classes for Veterans, A+ART and Summer Art Camp
- Staff offices
The spring term runs March 1 through May 15, 2027, and registration opens Monday, January 18, 2027. The museum's class page says more details on the offerings are still to come. Classes will be smaller because the space is smaller, deputy director Suzanne Seldes told Vero Beach 32963. The eight-week summer camp for kids ages 5 to 16 will also take fewer children. If you sign up for a spring class every year, January 18 matters more than usual.
About 25 administrative employees and security staff will work from the Riomar building. Donors covered most of the move. Vero Beach 32963 reported that an anonymous trustee is paying half of the $200,000 annual lease. Two anonymous donors are paying the roughly $30,000 for paint and light construction to turn a furniture showroom into offices and classrooms.
The Programs That Won't Fit There
A 6,000-square-foot storefront can't hold everything, and the list of programs that won't fit is specific. The film studies program stays on hiatus until the new building opens. The foundry and two western art studios were torn down earlier this year. The ceramics kilns are in storage, so ceramics classes will use air-dried clay finished with paint and other surface treatments.
Several of the museum's big events are moving to other venues:
- Art in Bloom, March 4, 2027, becomes an afternoon "high tea" at Celebration Grove, an event venue on 66th Avenue west of the city.
- The 2028 International Lecture Series moves to St. Edward's School so the museum can seat its hundreds of subscribers.
- GALA 2028 will be held off-site. Its venue hasn't been announced yet.
Some programs never needed the building and will carry on as usual. These include the community access programs run with Senior Resource Association and the Center for Memory and Movement, and Museum Explorations on the Go, which puts art teachers in Indian River County classrooms. Seldes told Vero Beach 32963 that Explorations on the Go reached nearly 2,500 students this year, up from about 1,900 the year before.
The Riverside Park Calendar Has an End Date
Once the museum leaves the current building, everything except the Collections Wing comes down. That includes the Education Wing, the Administration Wing, Holmes Great Hall, the Leonhardt Auditorium and every exhibition gallery. The museum hasn't announced a final public day. It has said it will leave in mid-February 2027. The latest closing date for any listed exhibition is Sunday, February 7, 2027.
Part of the campus has already closed. The museum's visit page says the Sculpture Parks and café are "closed indefinitely" while the campus is improved. James Prosek: At Work closed October 25. That leaves three exhibitions, and they close on different dates:
| Exhibition | On view | Closes |
|---|---|---|
| Museum in the Garden: Envisioning the New VBMA | Now | January 3, 2027 |
| Jill Nathanson: Chromatic Phrases | Now | February 7, 2027 |
| Hokusai, Hiroshige, Hasui: Japanese Landscapes in Print | Opens November 21, 2026 | February 7, 2027 |
The Japanese print show opens later than the other two, so it gets about 11 weeks on the walls. Museum in the Garden, the exhibition about the new building, closes about a month before the old building does.
Closed days shorten the season further. Between now and February 7, the museum is closed on Thanksgiving and November 27, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, New Year's Eve and New Year's Day, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, and January 28 and 29, 2027. It closes early at 4 p.m. on Friday, November 6, and Friday, November 20. In 2027, Martin Luther King Jr. Day falls on January 18, the same Monday spring class registration opens.
Regular gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 1 to 4 p.m. on Sunday. That means the last listed exhibition day, a Sunday, gives you three hours, with last admission at 3:45 p.m.
The museum offers free admission to Bank of America cardholders through the Museums on Us program on the first full weekend of each month. By the calendar, those weekends are:
- November 7–8, 2026
- December 5–6, 2026
- January 2–3, 2027, the final weekend for Museum in the Garden
- February 6–7, 2027, the closing weekend for both remaining exhibitions
Members get in free on any day.
The Last Gala in the Old Building
The museum is closed to visitors on January 28 and 29 because of the gala. Gala 2027: Cherry Blossoms at Night is on Friday, January 29. Vero Beach 32963 reported that it will be the last gala in the current building.
Why the Riomar Stint Lasts Two Years
The two-year lease matches the construction schedule. Museum president Brady Roberts told Vero Beach 32963 that $119 million of the $126 million campaign goal has been raised. The elevated pad for the new building's foundation is finished, and crews have started pouring the first cast-in-place wall.
"It's one thing to look at renderings, which are beautiful, but when you're standing in the space and see that first 30-foot wall going up, you see the vertical expanse and the scale of the building. It's really impressive."
The walls take about seven months to build. They're made from a custom mix of concrete, Florida beach shells and locally mined sand. Once cast, they're sandblasted to expose more of the shells, then sealed against the weather. Foundation work ran into older mechanical, electrical and plumbing structures that weren't on any plans. Roberts said that has been resolved and the project is back on schedule.
When the new building opens, it will bring back the two things the Hub can't hold. Film moves into a new 300-seat auditorium, about 25 percent larger than the Leonhardt Auditorium. Ceramics gets a 1,000-square-foot center sponsored by Indian River Community Foundation, with its own kiln room and glazing room. That will be the museum's largest studio. Until then, the A1A building is where the museum's classes meet.
Bringing guests to see the Japanese prints this winter, or looking for a spring class at the Hub for a grandchild? I'm always glad to introduce newcomers to the museum and the people who keep it going. Reach out to Catherine Curley and request a private consultation about settling into the island's arts community before the new campus opens.
