Smithville Creative Arts
104 Olive St · Smithville, Texas
01
Smithville Creative Arts is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit founded by Sara Hickman and Jim Cannon with one mission: to acquire, renovate, and activate a 10,500-square-foot historic building in downtown Smithville, Texas.
Owned and operated by the nonprofit, the building will become a self-sustaining, multi-use arts and community hub serving the residents of Smithville and the surrounding region — a place for creativity, connection, and opportunity for everyone.
02
From livery stable to funeral home to creative campus.
Built as a livery stable — where horses were kept when folks came to visit downtown Smithville — the building later became a funeral home and remained a mortuary until the funeral home relocated. It has sat vacant for more than six years.
Today this single-story, 10,500-square-foot structure on two lots in Smithville’s Central Business District is listed at $625,000 and ready for its next chapter.
Sara has visited the building numerous times and personally paid for a property inspection (available upon request).
The building sits just outside Smithville’s Commercial Historic District, so exterior renovations won’t require review by the historic approval committee — reducing both timeline and complexity. Standard city permits and approvals apply, and the city’s economic development contacts have been identified as resources for guidance on renovation code requirements.
03
The campus is designed to operate on three levels at the same time.
Layer One
Mission Core
The charitable heart of the organization. It serves the people of Smithville directly and qualifies the campus for grants and tax-deductible donations.
Layer Two
Sustainability Engine
What makes the building financially viable without perpetual fundraising, reducing dependence on grants and donations over time.
Goal: Cover a significant and growing share of operating costs through earned revenue, so donor and grant funding can go toward mission programming rather than overhead.
Layer Three
Audience & Identity
What makes the campus a living part of Smithville’s culture rather than a building that happens to be open.
04
Smithville has no movie theater — the nearest cinema is fifteen minutes away in Bastrop.
The building’s existing theater space will host films and live performances (plays, concerts, and speakers), and with the organ that comes with the building, silent film nights too. That means film programming from day one.
A curated, community-focused film program — similar in spirit to Alamo Drafthouse — meets a real local need, generates meaningful earned revenue, and gives neighbors a reason to come back again and again.
05
See what 104 Olive St could become. Drag the slider on each photo to compare.
Before
After
Before
After
Before
After
Before
After
Before
After
Before
After
Before
After
Before
After
Before
After
Before
After
Before
After
Before
After
Before & after images by Lawrence Fontana.
06
Smithville is a small city in Bastrop County, about 45 minutes southeast of Austin. It has a strong creative and artistic community, a walkable historic downtown, and a growing population of artists, musicians, and families who have relocated from larger Texas cities in recent years.
Despite its creative character, Smithville has no structured rehearsal or studio space for rent, and no movie theater. The nearest cinema is in Bastrop, and the closest comparable multi-use arts facility is in Austin. Smithville Creative Arts fills that gap.
07
Sara Hickman is a Texas musician, visual artist, and community builder with a long career and a broad network across the Texas arts world. She has lived in Smithville for four years and recently completed an artist residency at The Prizer Gallery on Main Street.
Sara is not a first-time founder. She previously raised $125,000 to renovate a historic 1928 building, now the Sanford Community Center in Palacios, Texas. That model — a founding visionary who creates a usable space, then hands it off to a team to run — is exactly what she’s bringing to Smithville.
Smithville Creative Arts was co-founded with Sara’s good friend Jim Cannon.
08
Sara has board-level relationships with established nonprofits across Austin and Central Texas — organizations with existing programming and audiences that could expand their outreach into Smithville and the surrounding rural area through space on the campus.
The plan is to start with one anchor partner, with room for a second as space and demand allow.
09
10
The total estimated capital need is approximately $1,010,000, subject to professional validation of the renovation estimate.
Named spaces are the heart of the campaign. Donors who fund a studio, a rehearsal room, or the theater receive permanent recognition in a building with real community meaning.
Local donors, small gifts, and event-based fundraising build community ownership of this project and show the broad local support that major donors and foundations look for.
| Level | Gift | Recognition |
|---|---|---|
| Founding Partner | $250,000 and above | Naming rights for a major space, such as the main theater |
| Lead Patron | $100,000 – $249,999 | Naming rights for a studio or rehearsal room |
| Community Champion | $25,000 – $99,999 | Naming rights for a smaller space and permanent recognition in the building |
| Sustaining Donor | $5,000 – $24,999 | Community recognition and permanent recognition in the building |
| Friend of the Arts | Up to $4,999 | Community recognition and permanent recognition in the building |
I want to share with you a project I’ve been working on with my good friend Jim Cannon since the beginning of 2026.
My mom, Anita, was very excited about this idea, so in her honor I’ll be naming part of this eventual community arts center after her — the gardens? The sculpture space? I’m not sure yet. I’d like to thank the Lost Pines Artists Alliance for being the first group of folks to donate to Smithville Creative Arts in my mom’s name. I promise — Mom’s imagination will be living on throughout this project and building!
This is no longer an idea. There is a defined asset, a defined operator, and a defined model. Now it’s about finding donors to purchase the property, then renovating, and finally opening the doors to the public for community use and enjoyment.
Thank you for reading. I am visualizing someone out there who will be smitten by our vision and help us purchase the property and turn it into Smithville Creative Arts.
Love,
Sara