Raymond F. Kravis Center for the Performing Arts

The Kravis Center for the Performing Arts plans a $40 million redesign to expand its glass-faced lobby, transform its entrance fountain into a stepped plaza and add a valet garage on the east side while reconfiguring its traffic-prone main garage on the west. Despite the changes, expect the Kravis, which hosts more than 500,000 people a year to concerts and events, to keep its look as a prominent architectural landmark on the rise at downtown’s Okeechobee Boulevard approach.

Perhaps most noticeably, the facade’s glass curtain wall will be pushed outward, to add 5,200 square feet of space to the lobby, “to hold more patrons, in a more open area during the beginning or intermissions,” Mitchell said. Out front the signature fountain will shrink significantly, to be replaced with steps that rise to the entrance from Okeechobee, and with a reworked plaza along South Sapodilla Avenue. When done, what’s currently the fountain will be pretty, more open and pedestrian-friendly for people walking over from the Marriott or Palm Beach County Convention Center, Mitchell said. The changes coincide with city efforts to make Okeechobee easier for walkers and bicyclists to navigate.