It isn’t every day that a city drops $45.5 million to transform an old industrial building into a gleaming new community arts center. But that’s more or less what the city of Cambridge did with The Foundry, a maker space near Kendall Square that opened last month.
The opening celebration took place on a sunny autumnal weekend. A band played “When the Saints Go Marching In” inside The Foundry’s vast atrium, which stretched three stories to a skylight in the roof.
At a table by the stairs, Lloyd Williams was selling his paintings, bright renditions of familiar Boston scenes: the Bolling Municipal Building in Nubian Square, the swan boats in the Public Garden. Williams was excited to be inside the newly renovated building, with its exposed brick walls and tall windows. He hoped it might fill the void left by art galleries forced to close in the pandemic.
“That’s what artists…
