With a background in government relations, legislative advocacy, and business strategy — including stints at the U.S. Department of Commerce and Microsoft — Nick Ferderer admits that he isn’t the first person to come to mind as an art gallery owner. And yet, in just three short years, Ferderer has opened two of the city’s hottest new creative hubs, Belltown’s Base Camp Studio and its sister spot, Base Camp Studios 2.

“If you would have asked me five years ago what I would be doing, and then described my life now, I would have laughed,” says Ferderer, a Pacific Northwest native who grew up in Vancouver, Wash., and spent time in Washington, D.C., before moving home to earn a Master of Business Administration at the University of Washington. In 2022, he opened Base Camp Studio on First Avenue with an emphasis on uplifting local artists and creating a community with rotating exhibitions, artist discussions, movie nights, and a summer block party. “Word got out, and things just kind of snowballed from there,” Ferderer recalls.

In 2023, Ferderer was laid off from Microsoft, so he threw himself deeper into the Base Camp Studio universe, planning to open a second location. “At some point, I was having so much fun that I didn’t want to return to the corporate world again,” he says.

After securing a lease on the derelict former Bergman Luggage building at the corner of Third Avenue and Stewart Street — and putting in hundreds of hours of work to ready the building — Ferderer opened Base Camp Studios 2 at the end 2023. The first exhibition, Ghosts of Belltown, looked at how vacant buildings might best serve their communities. For Ferderer, who lives in Belltown, it felt personal.

Since opening, Base Camp Studios 2 has offered a wide array of unique and immersive programming. The studio was recently awarded a Paul G. Allen Family Foundation Grant of $200,000 over three years.

Ferderer is now working to transform the space above Base Camp Studios 2 into more than two dozen affordable artist studios. “I want to create a community here,” he says, “so I’m hoping to get people who want to come in and work and talk to their neighbors. If someone is passionate about their work and pushing the limits, they’re probably going to be a good fit.”