With coffee, mimosas and cupcakes, live music and lots of shovels, the Research Triangle Foundation broke ground Aug. 27 on Boxyard RTP, a retail and dining hub where the park’s “innovative minds can meet, eat, connect and unwind.” The event was invitation only, but attendees came from all over the Triangle, highlighting the Foundation’s aspirations for the Boxyard as both an anchor for the park, and as a draw that will make RTP a community destination beyond work hours. The hub will have some 12,000 square feet of leasable space, most of it inside re-purposed shipping containers.
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The Boxyard will be next to The Frontier and will include several dining options, an open space for pop-up yoga classes, and a stage. Developers are eyeing a spring 2020 completion date.
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Mayor T.J. Cawley of Morrisville and Scott Levitan, president and CEO of Research Triangle Foundation, take a practice run at the groundbreaking.
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Barry Van Deman, the CEO of the Museum of Life and Science; Wendy Jacobs, the chair of Durham County’s Board of Commissioners; and Geoff Durham, the president and CEO of the Greater Durham Chamber of Commerce.
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Sean Lilly Wilson, center, the CEO of Fullsteam Brewery, his wife, Carolyn Wilson, and their daughter, Sophie. RTP announced that Fullsteam would be the Boxyard’s anchor tenant.
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Casey Stowe, right, the founder of Boxyard Tulsa, brought the idea to RTP. Boxyard will be dog friendly, and Scott Levitan and his partner, Patrick Francisco, left, brought their dogs Jensen and Gizmo to the groundbreaking.
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Kristie VanAuken, Research Triangle Foundation’s vice president of stakeholder engagement, said that the Boxyard was a “transformational project” that would “really send us into our next 60 years.”
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“This is a project only a foundation could love,” Levitan said. “We’re not going to make any money on it, but we’re going to create a tremendous community.”
