By Barry Owens

There is an unlikely new storefront on Chambers Street, comfortably ensconced between a Duane Reade and a Modell's. Dance New Amsterdam, a 25,000-square-foot, two-story dance studio and performance space, opened last month in the historic Sun Building at 280 Broadway.

The space is bright and open, and its cultural aspirations stand in striking contrast to the government offices, fast-food joints and dollar stores that otherwise populate Chambers Street. "We've always been pioneers," said Charles Wright, executive director of the studio and performance space he founded as Dance Space Center 22-years ago in considerably less inviting quarters in the West Village.

"It was sort of like, my dad has a barn, let's put on a show," he said.

The studio lost its lease in 1999 and moved into a smaller space at 451 Broadway—lucky just to survive, Wright said, what were lean years for the arts during the dot-com boom. A call to incorporate more cultural facilities in the rebuilding of Lower Manhattan after the September 11 attacks lured the center farther Downtown.

The city contributed $2.2 million toward the dance center's move. Another $500,000 came from the September 11 Fund. The result was a $5.5 million renovation of long-empty space in the Sun Building.
There are seven studios, each naturally lighted by a second-story skylight. For the first time in the center's history, Wright said, it has more than one restroom. There are now actual dressing rooms for the dancers, with showers, and the theater space is wide enough to include wings and a backstage area. The open space in the ground-floor lobby could become a café.

		"It's amazing," Wright said. "I'm still trying to take it all in. I really haven't had the time." On an afternoon last month he was busy overseeing the completion of the 170-seat theater in preparation for the Feb. 23 launch of its performance season, which runs through June. Boxes in his office remained unpacked, but classes were under way. Nearly all of the studios were full. In one room, dancers glided across the floor to the accompaniment of live cello music. In another room, ballet students stretched in focused silence.

The studio attracts amateur and professional dancers, regularly bringing in 2,000 students per week. Classes include ballet, modern dance and jazz. The center now has a studio for yoga and Pilates classes, as well as space for therapeutic massage and physical therapy.

Wright confesses that he long had little use for Lower Manhattan, a neighborhood he associated with Wall Street, where his father worked as an investment banker.

"It was a little scary to me," he said. "I was much more comfortable with the Village."

But now he gushes with a newcomer's enthusiasm over the district that is home to his new digs.
"I'm loving being down here," he said.

The neighborhood appeals to his inherited business sense, as well.

"This area is starting to boom with families, and there's all those suits," he said. "I would really like to get them into Pilates."