Ever wanted to live in an art gallery? One Arizona couple has made art their home
When Dan Lutzick agreed to purchase a weathered building in Winslow for $2, he looked more at the promise of the space than the aesthetics.
Dan Lutzick and his wife, Ann-Mary
As far as a place to live, the former department store couldn’t be more rugged than the former post office he was calling home at the time, where a rolling horse trough kept him warm on chilly nights.
“Most people thought (the former Babbitt Brothers Mercantile) was going to fall down,” Lutzick said. “When I moved in, my rear wall was gone and people would drive by and walk by and see me working. It was rough to say the least.”
More than two decades later, Lutzick and his wife have transformed the building into a vibrant and eclectic live-work art space — a hidden gem along historic Route 66 in the heart of downtown Winslow.
The mercantile building in the 1920s
The 22,000-square-foot gallery now known as Snowdrift Art Space offers Lutzick the room he always dreamed of having as a budding sculpture artist.
“When I bought Snowdrift, I’ll never forget a contractor who was helping me said, ‘I don’t get it. You could buy a house with the money you’re going to sink into this,’” Lutzick said. “But, I could fit eight to 10 houses in this building. All I saw was space. It needed to be saved.”
Seeking a rural Arizona lifestyle
Lutzick originally moved to Winslow from California to help restore the century-old La Posada Hotel, a property that now incorporates an art gallery and museum. He has since worked with the same ownership group on two New Mexican hotels, in charge of special projects.
All the while, Snowdrift Art Space has allowed Lutzick to continue creating as the rural town around him has grown.
Lutzick at work
“Compared to when I moved here, Winslow was a vacant town. At five in the afternoon, there wasn’t a car on the road,” Lutzick said. “Now, I can’t park in front of my building on most days, and that’s great. It’s truly revived. I think Local First Arizona works to make that happen.”
Years ago, Lutzick and his wife, Ann-Mary, became involved with Local First after attending outreach events tailored to those living in rural areas. As an artist who chose a rural lifestyle, Lutzick appreciated the organization’s philosophical approach to sustainable community building.
A piece displayed at Snowdrift Art Space
“When you live in a small town, it’s very common to come across the opinion that what a town needs is a shoe store or giant bargain bin or some other horrible idea. Local First offered an alternative to that,” Lutzick said. “What Local First represented was taking this depressed downtown neighborhood and renewing it, using artists and creative people.”
As the state’s Rural Development Council, Local First partners with businesses, community leaders, service organizations, economic developers and municipalities across the state to build a rural and tribal Arizona economy that is sustainable, resilient and celebratory of diverse cultures.
Among the goals are growing economic opportunity, strengthening small businesses, creating jobs to retain young residents, developing robust food systems that improve healthy food access and increasing tourism revenue to empower rural and tribal towns and their residents.
Life inside an art gallery
Dan and Ann-Mary offer tours, by appointment, of their novel and creative live-work space, which is also home to the couple’s dogs and cat. Panels and windows that Dan salvages from restoration projects are hung in the space to separate living areas from working areas.
Visitors who tour the property are often curious about how it looks and feels to actually live in a gallery that is also an active, creative space.
Lutzick at home with one of the couple’s dogs
“The entire building is an art gallery and a home at the same time,” said Ann-Mary, who runs Winslow’s Old Trails Museum. “The art never stops coming.”
Most importantly, Snowdrift Art Space has allowed her husband to create his art, join a small but growing community and build the life he had envisioned as a fine arts student at the University of California, Irvine. The added support from Local First in rural areas, he said, has played a vital role in his community and others like it.
“We’re the same as every other small town, like Holbrook and Kingman and all those other towns. Most of the people doing things and living downtown are wearing five different hats, and they’re stretched for time and money and resources,” Lutzick said. “So Local First Arizona raises awareness for those towns and ways to help those small towns grow.”
Want to find more hidden gems in Arizona? Check out Local First’s Explore AZ trip guides to plan your next adventure.
Or schedule a tour of Snowdrift Art Space at snowdriftart.com.
