moving seabeck to december
Why did we do it?
For many of us, Seabeck Dance Camp is a treasured weekend of learning, camaraderie and connection. Yet we’ve heard from some dancers who are confused – even a bit unhappy—by our decision to move the camp from the first weekend of November to the first weekend of December.
We want you to know why.
We almost cancelled Seabeck
Most dancers don’t know that we came this close to cancelling the Seabeck—forever—at the end of last year’s camp. And not because it wasn’t fun or successful or filled with the most dancers we’ve had in a long while.
No. We almost decided to never do Seabeck again because we could no longer offer the quality experience we knew our dancers wanted and deserved.
Here’s what led us to that precipice:
Because we always shared the camp with at least one other large group, Seabeck’s administrators would never allow us have the camp’s two best spaces for dancing—the Meeting House and The Pines. Pick one or the other, they said. So we always took the Meeting House, because it has a stage for the live bands, and the other group always got The Pines.
And because we always shared the camp with another group, those other folks always got the new, snazzy bedrooms connected to The Pines—all of which included ensuite baths. Yet as our demographic of dancers evolved, more and more of us wanted private bedrooms, as well as ensuite bathrooms.
Even though we did occupy all of Seabeck’s remaining private rooms and ensuite bathrooms, it was no longer enough to meet our dancers’ demand.
We’d also grown frustrated with needing to hold dance classes in that odd-shaped, modular classroom called Rhododendron—with pillars smack in the middle of the space. Just lousy for dancing.
And we were, frankly, just done having to teach classes upstairs at The Meeting House, with its too-rough, dangerous floor.
At the end of camp last year, Seabeck’s management informed us that the announcements we make at each meal were too loud and disruptive to the other group, and told us that we’d not be permitted to make such announcements in the future. This was a conundrum for us because, as you know, we use the announcements at breakfast and at lunch to ask for shows of hands—and use those tallies to determine which classes will go in which rooms.
The loss of our announcements seemed like a final straw, a logistical mess that left us mulling some fairly oddball ways of calculating how to situate classes in the proper-size classrooms.
All of these considerations left us camp managers, as well as the NW Dance Board of Directors, wondering if we could continue offering a quality dance camp in future years.
the solution
In an attempt to see if we could save the camp, we went to the Seabeck Conference Center’s executive director, Chuck, and told him what we’d need if NW Dance were to continue holding camps at Seabeck.
We talked for half an hour, and then Chuck said, “If you’re willing to move to the first weekend in December, you can pretty much have the entire camp.”
It didn’t take us long to make the call, because getting everything we wanted, and more, made moving from early November to early December a no-brainer.
2024 will be the best camp ever
We get larger and better dance floors. Along with the Meeting House, traditionally our main dance hall, we’ll also have the large dance space in The Pines, pictured above, the recently remodeled (and rather luxurious) facility just south of the Meeting House.
- It means never again will we need to hold classes and dances in the misshapen, container-like space called Rhododendron.
- We’re also relocating from the upstairs room in the Meeting House, with its less-than-friendly floor, to Juniper, a lush new space just north of the main registration building.
- Both The Pines and Juniper have kitchen facilities to make late-night partying convenient.
- And because Seabeck is giving us all of The Pines—its spacious meeting place as well as its wing of hotel rooms—it means we’ll now be able to offer our campers 20 more rooms, eight of them private.
- Just as exciting, especially for folks who dislike having their bathrooms down the hall, those 20 posh rooms come with ensuite bathrooms, bringing the total number of spacious ensuite privies we can offer to 42.
- And, of course, with us having the run of the camp, we’ll have no restrictions on making our announcements at mealtimes.
Not to mention: Chuck, the camp director, double-promises to never again serve us breakfasts with those so-called “eggs” poured from a carton and, overall, we think there’ll be more joy afoot with the December holidays in the air.
Of course, you can expect another team of skilled and caring instructors, along with a selection of classes that both challenge and bolster your dancing, as well as the always-beautiful Seabeck campus for moments of solitude, reflection and escape from urban life.
Now you know all of the reasons we’ve scheduled Seabeck 2024 for December 5 through 8. We sure hope you’ll agree the move should make this year’s camp the very best ever.
We promise to give you plenty of notice before camp registration goes live, in case you have a hankering for one of those new hotel rooms in The Pines.
Happy Dancing,
Jodi Fleischman, Dean Paton, and Pat Breen
Seabeck 2024 Honchos