Former college building transformed into a “modern-day girls’ club”
A Virginia businesswoman has turned the three-story building into an entrepreneurial center for women.
Angela Reddix, President and Chief Executive Officer of ARDX, a Norfolk, VA-based health care management and information technology consulting firm, is on a mission to create economic opportunities for women.
According to a recent article in Virginia Business, she purchased the former Tidewater Community College Visual Arts Center in downtown Portsmouth in April 2023 for $1.9 million. Reddix considered developing it into apartments and commercial space but saw a chance to create the hub for women entrepreneurs instead.
Now, the newly minted facility is known as The Mustard Seed Place, which Reddix calls a “modern-day girls’ club.” The first two floors of the three-story building will open this month, providing leased business spaces for women entrepreneurs with an aim to develop a community that will uplift and support each other.
Eleven tenants, including The Well on High, a mental wellness and healing boutique, represent the inaugural occupants. Each tenant receives a roughly 2,000-square-foot space under a discounted five-year lease that includes utilities and mentoring from Reddix.
The third floor holds a 12,000-square-foot, 450-person space for private events like weddings. Opening in April, Très Élevé will harken back to the building’s history as a department store which sold wedding dresses on the third floor.
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