Project 3.0 Gains Momentum At Roosevelt Art Museum

Project 3.0, an experimental business cooperative housed in a renovated “green” building in Ybor City, is gaining momentum in its effort to shape the future of business collaboration and the uses of self-sustaining construction.

The Roosevelt Art Gallery at 1812 N. 15th St. will host a combination music-and-art event called the Guerrilla Gallery on Saturday, Feb. 20. Tickets are $5 at the door, and the event will feature several local bands and artists collaborating in performance.

It’s the latest public event to showcase the project, which is spearheaded by local developer Rudy Arnauts and contractor Bryan Roberts of Earthship Florida, among others with Project 3.0.

The concept, Arnauts says, is envisioned as a “global, entrepreneurial, financially transparent network” of artists and creative businesses to create what Arnauts calls a “Wikipedia of everything.”

The ongoing renovation of the 104-year-old building in Ybor City into a self-sustaining structure is the heart of the project. Operating on donations and collaborative sponsorships, the Project 3.0 team has taken a gutted building, which formerly housed the Tampa Bay Brewing Company, and turned it into a model of sustainability.

In the past year-plus, the building has been refitted with an organic roof, garbage-concrete flooring, an LED lighting system, a vegetable-oil-burning generator and other “green” accoutrements.

The building also hosts workshops on “green” living and business operation.

“We have fun, we have a good time, we have entertainment,” says Arnauts. “But it always revolves around an educational message.”

The Project 3.0 team also is in talks to build a series of sustainable houses for a Tampa nonprofit organization, Arnauts says.

The project is being documented through a series of documentaries, the first of which was publicly aired at the building’s official grand opening event on Feb. 1.

Writer: Carter Gaddis
Source: Rudy Arnauts, Project 3.0