ImaginOn rises here as one of Charlotte's most beloved civic buildings, a place that takes children seriously as readers and theatergoers. ImaginOn opened in 2005 as a unique partnership between the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library and the Children's Theatre of Charlotte, combining two children's library branches with two professional performance spaces under a single dramatically designed roof. The building itself is a piece of theater: its soaring atrium, its colorful reading lofts, its storytelling coves are all designed to spark the imagination of young visitors the moment they walk in.
The Wachovia Playhouse and the Wells Fargo Theatre host productions aimed at young audiences and family audiences, from classic fairy tales to new works that tackle serious subjects with honesty and craft. Before ImaginOn opened, the site was a parking lot — one of the many surface lots that pockmarked uptown Charlotte after urban renewal cleared away the old neighborhood. The building's presence here is itself a statement about what a city owes its children: not just schools, but places where stories come alive.