The Cary Arts Center stirred to life as a Belgian orchestra warmed its strings, potters spun clay and town crews worked to finish Cary's largest cultural project in a decade.

With a $13 million investment, Cary created a 390-seat theater, a gallery, rehearsal space and community art workshops inside the historic school building on South Academy Street.

The center, scheduled for a grand debut on Aug. 13 and 14, opened to the public this month with arts classes and the two-week Cross Currents chamber music festival.

"It's like the cornerstone of the arts community," said Councilwoman Jennifer Robinson.

Inside the 48,000-square-foot arts center, photographs and mixed-media art depicting Cary's history cover translucent doors and walls. A new tower decorated by rainbow glass panels rises from the building's back, and restored columns support the front pediment.

The historic site was home to three school buildings since 1879, including the original Cary Academy and a high school that was a model for public education, according to historian Thomas Byrd. The third school, erected in 1939, most recently served as Cary Elementary School and closed in the early 2000s.

The town council unanimously approved the purchase of the building from Wake County in 2002, months after Cary penned a master plan for downtown.

Seven years after the purchase, the current council authorized funding for the 48,000-square-foot facility during 2009's budget debates, months before the town froze dozens of other capital projects.

"It was a gutsy decision in the middle of a recession," said Councilwoman Gale Adcock.

At the time, construction costs had fallen. Bids came in about $4 million lower than the town expected. But the project's total cost was still three times more than staff estimates from 2002.

The center will lose money but will draw people to downtown Cary and its businesses, town officials say.

Cary budgeted $1.4 million for arts center costs this year. It expects visitors will pump about $580,000 into the center through things such as admissions and class fees this fiscal year.

The Cary Arts Center is the town's largest cultural project since the Koka Booth Amphitheatre, a 7,000-seat outdoor stage that opened in 2001.

With the center's opening this month, the town's old Jordan Hall arts building, which was about a tenth the size of the new space, dropped from regular use and became an overflow space for the town's cultural programs.

The new facility includes a textile workshop and extensive workspace for ceramics, as well as an art gallery and office space for local organizations.

It is "already pretty much over-subscribed," with musical and dramatic groups booked through the end of the year, said Lyman Collins, the town's cultural arts manager.

The Brussels Chamber Orchestra was the first act to cross the new stage as it played a series of concerts beginning July 8.

The orchestra is the star of the fourth annual Cross Currents festival, which moved to Cary this summer after years based in Raleigh.

The new arts center "has really solidified the situation and made it wonderful," said Tom Mann, a member of an organizing board for the festival.

Mann, a pianist from Raleigh, particularly enjoyed the acoustics of the new auditorium.

"There's nothing quite like this - it's a unique, intimate, small space," he said as the orchestra rehearsed last Tuesday.

On the same day, Tommy Dillard took her daughter and granddaughter to see what became of the school where she worked as a guidance counselor in 1974.

The Raleigh resident recalled a well worn building and pointed to the site of her old office as her family toured the gleaming new halls.

"I'm so thrilled that they kept a lot of the old," Dillard said. "This is a treasure."