NEW GALLERY OPENS IN DOWNTOWN CAPE

Local artists soon will have a new place to display their creations.

John and Evelyn Boardman are preparing to open Gallery St. Avit in mid-June. The downtown art gallery will be housed at 119 Independence, in a structure previously renovated by John Boardman, who is an architect.

Evelyn Boardman said her husband had been considering the idea of opening such a gallery for some time. "There needed to be more space for local artists to show, and his friends are all artists.

"This is a different concept," she explained. "There are no consignment fees."

Artists will be able to rent space to display their creations. Money from the sale of the art work will go to the artists.

She said the gallery will occupy about 3,000 square feet of space and display everything from paintings to sculpture and handmade jewelry.

The structure at the corner of Independence and Spanish, actually consisting of three buildings dating back to the 1800s, was renovated by the Boardmans several years ago for use as their residence. It also housed an antique shop operated by Evelyn Boardman and John Boardman's architecture office.

The Boardmans moved out of that building and into one at 31 N. Main. That building serves as their residence and also houses Evelyn Boardman's Madder Rose Ltd., a retail business that sells trendy fashion accessories for women, such as jewelry and clothing.

John Boardman had been operating his architecture office from that building as well. He has now moved his office back to the structure at 119 Independence, which he will share with the new art gallery.

"I needed more space and he needed to hire a draftsman," Evelyn Boardman said in explaining the move. "We really didn't have the room here."

The gallery is named after John St. Avit Sr. The St. Avit family was one of the few French families that settled in the Cape Girardeau area, she said.

"They were quite wealthy for the time," she explained. "There were so few French families here, and they were very cultured people."

One of the three buildings that make up the Boardman-renovated structure at 119 Independence was built in the late 1850s by St. Avit.

St. Avit was a pork packer and later went into the mercantile business, selling groceries and English creamware and dishes.

One son, John St. Avit, was a Cape Girardeau physician. He died in 1942. The other son, Eugene, ran the family business after his father died. Eugene St. Avit died in 1921.

"Every time we buy a building, I get so involved in the history," she said.