It wasn’t long ago when the future of the West Valley Playhouse was up in the air. For almost two decades, it was a humble but proud hub for community events, workshops and plays attended by artsy audiences from across the San Fernando Valley.

But when the building that housed it was planned for sale, its staff faced a dark future. It was either buy or vacate. And just to make a down payment, its artistic director faced a huge down payment to buy it. GoFundMe was an immediate go-to, where efforts to raise money began in earnest.

But there was another option, and it came into sunny view on Thursday, as a one-of-a-kind performing arts “space lab,” expected to serve as an incubator for live dance, music and theater, went on display at what was once effectionately known as Clyde Porter’s West Valley Playhouse, 7242 Owensmouth Ave. in Canoga Park.

A group of three dozen or so community leaders, city employees and local residents gathered at what is now dubbed the Canoga Park Stage Arts Lab, the now city-owned building expected to open this fall after a hefty renovation project is completed.

The renovation of the space lab, along with those planned for the Madrid Theatre around the corner, is part of a budding hub in the historic Canoga Park Arts District supported and promoted by Los Angeles City Councilman Bob Blumenfield, who represents the area.

“A hub has many spokes and the (space lab) and the Madrid (Theatre) are just some of them,” Blumenfield said. “This is a $10.5-million shot of adrenaline to the (local) arts and business communities. The larger vision is to support local artists and bring their projects to life.”

Blumefield credited “creative thinking and strategic thinking” in helping to revamp the area.

The city used about $1.4 million in excess Community Redevelopment Agency bond funds to purchase the Playhouse property, according to Blumenfield. Those funds are required to be spent within Canoga Park and Reseda by 2020, and because they were community revitalization funds, they couldn’t be legally used for issues such as public safety or homelessness, according to Blumenfield’s office. So, soon, the property — with its modest number of seats (150 to be exact) will be operated by the city’s Department of Cultural Affairs and will become available to multiple community theater and performance groups, including the West Valley Playhouse Company.

It is expected to be a catalyst for the creation of new music, dance and theater projects and feed into the Madrid Theatre and other theaters throughout the San Fernando Valley and Los Angeles.

What is now the Playhouse’s front lobby will become a studio space devoted to the research and development of new artistic projects, workshops, readings and arts education.

The black box theater is where companies can explore their ideas in a broader theatrical context.

Eventually, the lab will be a tech-rich space where artists will work with state-of-the-art equipment and advance their work onto the stage.

Art companies will be able to reserve the space from one to six weeks to develop their artistic projects, to create and rehearse complicated new work and explore original concepts, according to Ben Johnson, the department’s performing arts program director.

“There isn’t another performing arts lab in Los Angeles like this,” Johnson said. “(The space lab) will be used for early development and rehearsal production phases in an affordable subsidized way.”

Johnson said most productions are rehearsed at a theater.

With the Canoga Park space lab, companies will pay less for the rehearsal costs versus at a theater and then be able to put that money back into more productions, he said.

Nora Ross, a CEO at the Valley Cultural Foundation, said the benefits of the playhouse will continue to nurture the arts, and she looks forward to supporting all that ventures through its doors.

“There are 160 seats, so I can bring in a smaller arts group, a trio versus a big band (for example),” she added. “With a smaller theater, I as an actor, can get a better connection, a more immediate connection with the smaller, family-friendly audience.”

Leigh Kennicott, a curriculum consultant with Tarzana-based Theater of Will, a nonprofit arts education company, came to check out the space lab.

The nonprofit has after-school programs and works with Los Angeles Unified School District in the classrooms to develop a variety of programs for 8-year-olds to 12-year-olds.

Kennicott said the space lab was perfect for student-developed productions.

“We can use this space until the Madrid is up and running. I’m excited. It’s a big, beautiful space with plenty of dressing rooms and a huge lobby for art.”

More than $8 million in renovations at the Madrid Theatre, the longtime performing arts center at 21622 Sherman Way. That work is expected to begin early 2020 and take up to 18 months to complete, according to city officials.

A little more background on the West Valley Playhouse and The Madrid:

Clyde Porter, a philanthropist and president of P.L. Porter Co., the multi-million Woodland Hills company that produced motion-control products for aircrafts, purchased the site in 2000 and later leased the space to the West Valley Playhouse ran by Artistic Producing Director Jon Berry.

It was formerly a Masonic Lodge before it was transformed into a theater in 2000.

The Madrid Theatre is a 440-seat professional-level performing arts facility in the of Antique Row in downtown Canoga Park.

The Madrid is one of the largest live theaters in the San Fernando Valley, according to the Department of Cultural Affairs.