If you needed an event to encapsulate the breakneck pace of development in and around the Deer District, Wednesday morning’s media gathering for the new FPC Live venue being constructed just south of Fiserv Forum was it.
The event was everything you’d expect from a typical groundbreaking ceremony, with company and community leaders standing at a lectern, offering statements about the project. The only catch is that while this was an official groundbreaking ceremony, the actual groundbreaking itself took place four months ago.
Preparations around the Republican National Convention postponed the usual handshakes and photo opps, but FPC Live wasn’t about to wait around when it could be making tangible progress.
“We would have liked to have done this earlier this summer, but we wanted to get underway as quickly as possible ahead of the RNC,” Frank Productions CEO Joel Plant said during his remarks, which also included a rough timeline that would see the room opening “late in 2025.”
“This nearly $70 million project is one of the largest private investments in Milwaukee’s entertainment scene” he added. “And it will be a catalyst for more development downtown and throughout the city.”
It’s hard to imagine any more development happening specifically in the Deer District, which welcomed Trade Hotel in May 2023 and announced the five-story Block 5 development less than a year ago. Yet, in his comment during the press conference, Milwaukee Bucks and Fiserv Forum president Peter Feigin noted that the FPC Live venue “is already attracting additional development, including significant interest in a hotel that we hope to announce very soon.”
Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson addressed the potential broader impact that he likened to “a ripple effect” extending to the surrounding neighborhoods. “The initiative will generate construction jobs. It’ll provide vital employment opportunities for our residents right here in Milwaukee,” he added. “It’s not just about the end use and the entertainment. It’s also about the jobs and the opportunities that our residents in Milwaukee have when these things are built and constructed.”
But, as anyone who has even casually followed the project’s development knows, the reception for the new venue has been mixed. District 4 Alderman Bob Bauman outlined its meandering and oftentimes intense path to approval, which started when the project was initially targeted for the Third Ward before moving to its ultimate location.
“This was probably the most controversial real-estate project that the city has dealt with during my 20 years of being on the council,” Bauman stated, noting threats of lawsuits and other pressure applied along the way.
He closed his remarks by calling it “a very worthwhile effort because one of our principal jobs on the council is to improve the built environment of the city with quality architecture and design, to bring in venues that will … bring people downtown from outlying communities, from out of state.”
From the perspective of music fans in the Milwaukee area, the most notable potential impact of the project is eliminating their need to travel if they want to see their favorite artists. Anyone who pays attention to tour schedules as they’re announced can’t help but notice how frequently artists at a particular level opt to go directly from Chicago to Minneapolis (or vice versa) while giving Milwaukee amiss. FPC Live president Charlie Goldstone called the 4,500-capacity venue “the solution to that problem.”
“We’re creating a venue that doesn't exist pretty much anywhere in the state for its size with moderate amenities, both for the fans and just as importantly for touring artists,” he continued. “Touring production and creature comforts and amenities are so important these days with artists on the road. So to be able to provide a venue for them where they can produce the show that they want to without any accommodations or limitations and feel good about being there helps attract more artists, and that helps us attract more fans.”
From a seating perspective, critics might note the overlap with the 4,100-capacity Miller High Life Theatre that’s visible from the new venue’s construction site, as well as the 3,500-capacity Eagles Ballroom less than 2 miles away. When asked about how the FPC Live facility fits into Milwaukee’s live-music puzzle, Goldstone noted that “if the city wants to grow, which we all think it should and believe that it can, it has to do that in a variety of different ways. Investing in housing, in office space, in arts and entertainment is key to that.
“This is a massive investment in the space that we know best, and we think that sets Milwaukee up for the future,” he continued. “It certainly has a very rich history, but we need to think about the next 50 years. If we're not staying competitive with other cities of its size — not just in the Midwest, but all over the country — any problem that we have about skipping over the market is just going to become more and more exacerbated in the future.”
