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Sunday, June 15, 2025
Opinion: All.Together.Now — A campaign for real human connection
"The Shaw is in the vanguard of a movement for real connection," write Tim Jennings and Tim Carroll, the Shaw's executive director and artistic director, respectively. FILE/DAVE VAN DE LAAR

Tim Carroll, Artistic Director for the Shaw Festival
Tim Jennings, Executive Director for the Shaw Festival

At the Shaw Festival, we have embarked on a bold movement for Real Human Connection. Our $150M campaign, launched last weekend as All.Together.Now, will transform the Shaw into a leading centre for communication, creativity and curiosity, a unique space dedicated to deepening connection through the art we make for you and the people you share it with.

All.Together.Now. is about bringing people together in a world that is increasingly disconnected. As such, while this campaign has a capital element, it is fundamentally not about buildings but about people and the human experience.

The Shaw is in the vanguard of a movement for real connection. We are perfectly placed to make a difference: We have a beautiful location, ideal for gatherings on a human scale; and we make theatre, an activity that not only relies on people coming together physically but positively fosters all the qualities we need more than ever — imagination, the courage and eloquence to look someone in the eye and tell them the truth, and the ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes and see how the world might look to them.

We want everyone who comes to the Shaw to have the chance to develop all these qualities, and more.

This campaign will see us expand the footprint of our festival theatre through the addition of the Shaw artists’ village next door, transforming the former Upper Canada Lodge site into a true campus with outdoor and indoor spaces for performance, education, artist housing, theatre craft and personal development.

At the heart of the artists’ village will be the Burton Centre for Lifelong Creativity, a unique space dedicated to awakening the inner artist in all of us, no matter how old or young.

It will house tailored programming and experiences to reconnect seniors, youth, businesses, tourists, teachers, physicians, artists, theatre lovers and local community members to their own creativity.

We aim to lead work that will reduce isolation for more than one million seniors across Canada every year by 2030.

And the campaign will enable us to rebuild the iconic Royal George Theatre.

This 110-year-old community landmark must close in December due to its failing infrastructure. Our aim is to rebuild it into a world-class performance space that we believe will also be North America’s first carbon-neutral theatre.

The new Royal George’s unique and much-loved character will be preserved while we create a historically inspired, world-class jewel-box theatre.

Offering modern, leading amenities, including new community spaces, the new theatre will have Rick Hansen Foundation Gold Certification levels of accessibility, allowing us to welcome both patrons and a workforce with diverse needs.

Every dollar that our patrons spend with us translates into seven dollars spent in the region. Our expanded campus and reimagined Royal George will help us attract more cultural tourists to Niagara-on-the-Lake, visitors who come more often and stay longer, supporting not just the Shaw but local restaurants, hotels, B&Bs, wineries, attractions and more.

In 1972, with the opening of the Festival Theatre by Queen Elizabeth, Niagara-on-the-Lake made the commitment to becoming a world-class centre for culture.

Over the years since, the town and the Shaw have grown together, welcoming first tens of thousands and then hundreds of thousands of patrons every year, helping this little corner of Ontario become one of the most cherished destinations in Canada.

Today, we are renewing that commitment to the town, to the region and to our shared future with a vision for the next 50 years. One that will bring connection and creativity into the life of everyone in this vibrant community.

We invite you to be a part of it.

All.Together.Now.

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