The Giordano Dance School, a landmark in downtown Evanston for a half century, has put its Davis Street building up for sale and is opening a new studio in Chicago’s Andersonville neighborhood.
The three-story building at 614 Davis St. has 17,430 square feet of space and is listed with the commercial real estate firm Sperry Van Ness for $2.6 million.
The listing describes the the building’s second and third floors, where the dance studio has been located, as having “wide open floor plans” suitable “for any office user’s needs.”
Calls to the school and to the related Giordano Jazz Dance Chicago organization were not returned Tuesday. A sign on the door said the school is on spring break this week.
A recorded message indicates the school will hold its summer dance camps at its new facility at 5230 N. Clark St. in Chicago starting in June.
The school’s founder, Gus Giordano, died in 2008 at age 84. An obituary in the New York Times said he founded the dance company in Evanston in 1962.
The dance school is now directed by his daughter Amy, while his daughter Nan is artistic director of Giordano Jazz Dance Chicago.
The two-story building in Andersonville appears, from county assessor’s records, to have about half as much space for the school as the Davis Street building.
Downtown Evanston Executive Director Carolyn Dellutri said that the dance school “has been a great asset to the downtown business district, and we’re not happy to see them leave.”
She said she her efforts to reach the organization’s leaders to learn more about their plans had so far been unsuccessful.