After years of planning and construction, a long-awaited chapel and events center at the Shawnee Town 1929 historic site near downtown Shawnee will open this April.
On Monday, the Shawnee City Council voted 7-1 to approve a final change order — a measure needed to approve an increase or decrease in the project’s cost — for the new Shawnee Town 1929 Chapel. Councilmember Tony Gillette was the lone dissenter, noting that he’s been opposed to the project from the start.
After more than two years of discussions, the motion was one of the final pieces the project needed to move forward.
The overall cost of the project, including design, construction, inspection, and furnishings, was $979,799, below the project’s $1.2 million that was budgeted into the city’s long-term capital improvement program.
City aims for chapel to be a new revenue stream
The 1,800-square-foot chapel will be rented out for events, accommodating up to 91 visitors for a variety of uses, including weddings and theatrical performances.
The facility features an accessibility-compliant restroom, a multi-use office space for renters and wi-fi connectivity.
Construction began last summer and wrapped up earlier this year.
“I am pleased that the project is finally finished and the construction is over, and I am ready to welcome the public into the event and start increasing our bottom line through rentals,” Charlie Pautler, the museum’s director, told the Johnson County Post.
Another chapel used to be at Shawnee Town 1929
First proposed in October 2022, the chapel replaces an old one which had been at the historic site since the 1970s through the late 2000s before it was torn down.
While the new chapel is not authentic to Shawnee, its contents, including stained glass and pews from several other churches of the time period, are, said Tonya Lecuru, director of the parks and recreation department, during its proposal.
In a previous interview with the Post, Pautler touted the museum’s aim at using unique materials and designs for the project.
“We are building very specialized-type buildings with lots of special windows and special molding and special doors and fabrics and everything from the fixtures to the furnishings,” he said.
Rental requests for the chapel are coming in
The building is centrally located on the Shawnee Town 1929 outdoor museum campus, between the farmstead and the town, which includes 1920s-themed exhibits like a city jail, grocery store and a barbershop.
While people can tour the outside of the chapel during museum tours, they can only go inside by appointment or if they are attending an event happening there.
“It can be used for a variety of opportunities, but it will not be open for the public tour, simply because, if somebody has rented that facility for a wedding, we can’t have the general public going through it and interrupting a rental,” Pautler said.
Rentals for events at the chapel are already being placed, Lecuru, said.
“We have already had multiple requests for reservations for the chapel already. We are starting to take those as they come in now,” she said.
A ribbon cutting, free and open to the public, will take place at the chapel at 10 a.m., Saturday, April 12.
What’s next for the museum
The museum is planning to launch a $10 million capital campaign it’s been planning since 2023.
The campaign is a partnership with the city of Shawnee and Friends of Shawnee Town group. The city plans to match the dollars that the museum group raises through private donations, Pautler said.
The money will go toward several projects on the property, including a new visitor’s center on Johnson Drive.
“That will pay for our new visitor’s center on Johnson Drive, so we can better serve customers and be much more visible than we are with our current visitor center and museum exhibits,” Pautler said. “Also, it will include the four reconstructed historic buildings that will be the final piece of the puzzle for our strategic plan.”
Past Shawnee Town 1929 news: City to match up to $5M for Shawnee Town 1929 expansion campaign
