Mass MoCA Welcomes New Tenant, Hosts Route 2 Study Reveal

By Breanna SteeleiBerkshires Staff
06:24PM / Thursday, December 04, 2025Print Story | Email Story

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — The Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art Commission approved a new tenant Monday for the third floor of Building 1, above Bright Ideas Brewery.

Gianne Inc. uses recycled materials to create funcational art.

"They are corporation that recycles textiles into functional handmade home art pieces such as quilts and rugs, promoting sustainability through creative design," said Jason Ahuja, senior manager of public initiatives.

According to Ahuja, the company is a mother and son duo who will be producing their work in the 400 square foot space.

Their lease will be two years long and started on Oct. 1.

Director of Public Initiatives & Real Estate Morgan Everett updated the commission on an upcoming exhibition, "Race/Hustle" by Zora J Murff. The exhibit will be on view starting Dec. 6.

The exhibit features many different types of works "that examine physical, psychic, and political violence, the rhythms and resonances of oppression throughout history and into the present, and the harmful desires that our visual culture cultivates," according to the Mass MoCA website.

Also upcoming on Thursday, Dec. 11, is a new dance work by choreographer Deborah Hay called "Short-Sighted" that will feature three of her dancers offering a unique and deep understanding into Hay's work across four decades.

Everett also noted that the museum will host the recommendations for the Veterans Memorial Bridge and the surrounding area. This will be on Friday, Dec. 12, at 3 p.m. in the swing space and is open to the public.

"We are really excited to be collaborating with the city to host a community celebration for the Reconnecting Communities project and all the community collaboration that's gone into that Reconnecting Communities, the Route 2 overpass study," he said.

Tags: mass moca, route 2,

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North Adams School Project Awards $52M Bid

By Tammy Daniels iBerkshires Staff
05:10AM / Friday, February 13, 2026

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — The School Building Committee has awarded the Greylock School project to Fontaine Bros. Inc. of Springfield.

Mayor Jennifer Macksey said she could "breathe a little better" with a bid contract that comes in nearly $2 million under budget.

The committee approved a bid of $50,498,544 on Thursday night that includes two alternates — the rebuild of the Appalachian Trail kiosk and the relocation and reconstruction of the baseball field.

"I will say, all in all, for us to have overall the number of bidders that we had interested in our project, and especially to receive the GC bids that we did, the team Colliers and TSKP certainly did a good job attracting people to us," she said. "But this project ... really shows the testament of the good work that Colliers and TSKP and all of you have been doing throughout this process."

Fontaine had the low bid between Brait Builders of Marshfield and J&J Contractors Inc. of North Billerica.

The project had been bid out at $52,250,000 with three alternates: moving the ballfield, the kiosk and vertical geothermal wells.

Committee members asked Timothy Alix of Collier's International, the owner's project manager, about his impressions of the bidders. He was most familiar with Fontaine, having worked with the company on a half-dozen school projects and noted it was the contractor on the Mountain View Elementary School in Easthampton that the Massachusetts School Building Authority has held up as an example school. He also had some of his colleagues call on projects that he had not personally worked on.

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