When the Town of Bluffton opened the Bluffton Welcome Center in February inside the restored Squire Pope Carriage House, it joined a growing list of South Carolina municipalities turning historic properties into destinations of their own. Once a historically significant, but collapsing, structure teetering on the edge of demolition, the house is now the front door for Bluffton, a hub for visitors, and a living testament to the town’s creative partnerships.
From such places as Bluffton, Gaffney and Sumter, local governments have found that a visitor center can be more than just a desk stacked with brochures. They can preserve history, repurpose underused spaces and offer residents as well as visitors a wayfinding point for navigating the community they are visiting. They also require collaborations among city leaders, preservationists, universities, arts groups and volunteers to breathe new life into old spaces.
For Bluffton, even the staunchest preservationists had their doubts the Squire Pope Carriage House, dating to 1850, could be saved.
the Town of Bluffton Welcome Center. Photo: Town of Bluffton.
“We had a building that had been left abandoned for about 10 years. In historic preservation world, we call it demolition by neglect,” said Glen Umberger, the town’s historic preservationist and a graduate of the Savannah College of Art and Design with a background in architectural history. “I had some serious concerns [on whether] we were able to save the building.”
Two years and $2.7 million later, the residence that had been pieced together over generations from several outbuildings was rehabilitated to its new use.
the Town of Bluffton Welcome Center. Photo: Town of Bluffton.
Beaufort County partnered with the town in purchasing the land, while preservation architects from Charleston and contractors specializing in historic buildings did the technical work. SCAD students, through the school’s SCADpro program, designed the welcome center’s interior layout.
“They bring in about 15 students from different disciplines to work on a project for a client, a real-world client,” Umberger said.
The resulting 540-square-foot downstairs space is modest in size but ambitious in scope, serving as both a first stop for tourists and a programming venue for residents. The upstairs houses town offices.
“We've already surpassed 12,000 individual visitors since January,” he said. “So that's a value that we have face time with people who are coming to Bluffton to visit … One of the other values is we're able to do public programming at the welcome center. So back in May, which is National Historic Preservation Month, I was able to give a lecture series at lunchtime on Thursdays about historic preservation. So that's something we can offer our residents.”
Umberger said it is appropriate that the town created something new out of something old to appeal to both residents and tourists.
“The Lowcountry is very special,” he said. “Once you visit once, I think you’re captivated.”
The City of Sumter chose a different path for the Sumter Visitors Center, locating it within its most-visited location — Swan Lake Iris Gardens. The city-owned park, known for its eight species of swans and spectacular Japanese irises, was already a major draw. Positioning the visitor center there gave it instant visibility.
“In late spring, when the iris gardens are in full bloom, that is our busiest time of year, when we have literally hundreds of people coming through on a daily basis,” said Colette Daniels, who has worked at the Sumter Visitors Center since it opened in 2002.
“They come into the visitors center, they are greeted, they are given an orientation of the park. They are provided information on places to eat, other things to see and do in the area. We’re just really trying to welcome them to the community and make sure that they have everything they need to enjoy their time here.”
That public interaction was missing when the visitors center was located in a single room at the Chamber of Commerce.
“We really needed a space where visitors and residents and anyone who needed information or things to do needed to have a place that was accessible and comfortable for everyone,” Daniels said.
To create the center, the city renovated a 1960s-era pavilion built by personnel from nearby Shaw Air Force Base. For decades, civic clubs had sold concessions from this space, and families gathered there for picnics.
In addition to providing directions and information on things to do in Sumter, the visitors center staff conducts a monthly community tour for in-processing personnel at Shaw, showing them area attractions and answering questions. The staff also handles facility rentals and manages a gift shop, which has grown so much that it will be getting a separate building near the visitors center.
The center’s success comes both from its strategic location within in the city’s biggest tourist draw, as well as having several operations under one roof.
“In smaller communities, often you do not have a sufficient amount of visitation to pay someone to sit here full time and greet visitors,” Daniels said. “To justify the expense of a visitors center, I would recommend having other things happening there.”
Gaffney is another city to have adapted an existing structure to use as a visitor center, and has used it as a launchpad for greater ambitions. LeighAnn Moon, who has worked with the city for three decades, recalled that when the first small visitor center opened in 2004, it quickly proved there was an audience for more.
“I spent the first year asking people why they were here,” she said. “And 90-some percent of my true tourists were here for our national parks and genealogy and Revolutionary War history.”
That insight shifted the city’s strategy. In 2009, Gaffney acquired and restored its historic post office to serve as a larger visitor center and art gallery. It also meant that the city needed to partner with organizations around that visitor demand, including the National Park Service, local Revolutionary War reenactment groups and a local historian who has written dozens of books about the American Revolution.
In addition to providing services to about 18,000 visitors a year, the visitor center is a destination all its own with an art gallery curated by the Cherokee Alliance of Visual Artists and the “It Took Us All” exhibit exploring the stories of Upstate residents involved in the Revolutionary War.
While the visitor center serves as that gateway to the city, the Revolutionary War history will take center stage inside Gaffney’s former Carnegie library with a $7.3 million Carolina Rising history museum, set to open next year during the celebration of the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States. That museum will feature holograms, immersive galleries and even use artificial intelligence to let visitors interact with historical figures.
Moon called it “very 21st century,” while being rooted in the town’s rich history.
A Clemson University economic study projected that the museum could draw 124,000 visitors annually, and it grew out of the city listening to what their visitors were interested in and filling that demand with Gaffney’s own stories.
“Every person, every place and everything has a story,” Moon said. “So that’s what I do. I dig into stories. I chase rabbits until they can’t be chased anymore.”