Rooftop Garden Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Photo credit: Adelaide Bracewell-Stokes

"OUR COMMUNITY NEEDS SUPPORT IN A VARIETY OF WAYS. MY GOAL IS TO BECOME A RESOURCE TO THE ARTS COMMUNITY."

— Constance Bracewell

Get to know TOC's Executive Director

The Old Church (TOC) has a familiar face with Constance Bracewell as its Executive Director. Originally a volunteer with the 56-year-old non-profit, Bracewell was on the board for two years before taking on a leadership position as Board President. In that role, she helped steer the organization, focusing on strategic planning, asking critical questions with direction for impact. And she updated how they worked as a board. 

“I changed when, how, and why we met,” Bracewell explains. “But that was just the start. People understood we needed to bring the whole organization into modern times. In 2016 TOC installed high-end audio equipment – quite possibly the best in the city and certainly the best for the natural acoustics of our space. We also acknowledged that other elements needed to come up to standards. Organizations grow in stages and we’re doing that now. On the board, my focus was strategy. As Executive Director, it’s all about programming and outreach ”

Art as the Great Equalizer

The position suits her, too, utilizing many of Bracewell’s skills. At University, she studied art, and then went on to create it, both in Toronto and Los Angeles, where she ultimately came to oversee visual effects units on some of the most notable films of the decade. All the while, she was involved with, and supporting, nonprofits and the local art communities. Her strong belief is that the arts are essential to a healthy and complete life and shouldn’t be just the purview of the financially privileged. 


Bracewell explains how this belief guides her work at TOC: “Our community needs support in a variety of ways—and our mission guides how we do it. It's social service through culture; allied with the arts and a concert hall.”


Which also explains why Bracewell has focused so much on community and accessibility in her efforts. Since her first day, she’s been steadfastly preaching TOC’s unsurpassed quality as a music venue. But her vision reaches far beyond that. The goal, ultimately, is to become an invaluable resource to the arts community: A place for artists of all types to perform, collaborate, and be nurtured, while offering a cultural oasis for audiences, regardless of identity, class or wealth.

“I changed when, how, and why we met,” Bracewell explains. “But that was just the start. People understood we needed to bring the whole organization into modern times. In 2016 TOC installed high-end audio equipment—quite possibly the best in the city and certainly the best for the natural acoustics of our space. We also acknowledged that other elements needed to come up to standards. Organizations grow in stages and we’re doing that now. On the board, my focus was strategy. As Executive Director, it’s all about programming and outreach ”

Art as the Great Equalizer

The position suits her, too, utilizing many of Bracewell’s skills. At University, she studied art, and then went on to create it, both in Toronto and Los Angeles, where she ultimately came to oversee visual effects on some of the most notable films of the decade. All the while, she was involved with, and supporting, nonprofits and the local art communities. Her strong belief is that the arts are essential to a healthy and complete life and shouldn’t be just the purview of the financially privileged. 


Bracewell explains how this belief guides her work at TOC: “Our community needs support in a variety of ways, and our mission guides how we do it. It's social service through culture; allied with the arts and a concert hall.”


Which also explains why Bracewell has focused so much on community and accessibility in her efforts. Since her first day, she’s been steadfastly preaching TOC’s unsurpassed quality as a music venue. But her vision reaches far beyond that. The goal, ultimately, is to become an invaluable resource to the arts community: A place for artists of all types to perform, collaborate, and be nurtured, while offering a cultural oasis for audiences, regardless of identity, class or wealth.

Expanded free programming has been the cornerstone of TOC since its inception as a non-profit fifty-six years ago. Created as a way of thanking the countless volunteers for their extensive efforts to save and then revitalize the building, the Wednesday concerts also provide local artists with an opportunity to perform.

More than Music

Listen to this: TOC offers steeply discounted rent and donated space to multiple to multiple non-profits as a means of fostering community, interaction, and accessibility. There’s an upcoming PNW Music Awards, a second year of collaborating with the Albina Music Trust, for Black History Month that will include performances and a display of photographs centering Portland's Black music legacy in our gallery.. 

Bracewell is proud to discuss TOC’s efforts to support downtown revitalization, including the gallery space launched in February of 2024. Bracewell describes the new effort, “There’s no other gallery in Portland with a space like ours. It’s not a white box but a grand historic building with an ornate 20-foot ceiling. You have all this gorgeous Victorian and colonial architecture in fantastic contrast to the artists’ contemporary work.

When you step into the space you see contemporary work in contrast with history, and the historic architecture becomes grounded in the present”.

If you have a keen eye for pop culture and music you might recognize the orange Bauhaus-inspired sofa from Harry Styles' album, Harry's House. 

Community as a Driver

This fall, another effort is being launched: the Cheshire Cat Lounge. This new venue, inside the Old Church, has a casual house concert vibe, featuring limited seating, blankets on the floor, standing tables, and a capacity of just 60-70. The aim of the venue is to highlight Portland’s vast talent pool, further solidifying Bracewell’s commitment to fostering community, celebrating art and making all of it more accessible. 


“We love having local musicians open for our touring acts in the 300-capacity Collins Hall and are thrilled we can now offer them the opportunity to headline a smaller stage that is so very intimate,” says Bracewell.

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