The husband-and-wife team who built the original Gorge Amphitheatre nearly four decades ago is heading back to the drafting table, this time for a far more intimate stage. Vince and Carol Bryan have announced plans for The Grotto, a new performance hall planned for a 6.5-acre property near Quincy, Washington, with conceptual development and construction costs estimated between $35 million and $40 million.
The project marks a return to the Columbia River bluffs where the Bryans first made their mark on Pacific Northwest music history. As reported by KOMO News, the Bryans and their nonprofit initiative, The Hilltop, are working on the new venue in Quincy, located nearly 20 miles north of the Gorge Amphitheatre in Grant County. The underlying land is held by an LLC controlled by the couple, according to the Daily Journal of Commerce.
An Acoustically Tuned Hall Inspired by Basalt Cliffs
The Grotto is planned as an acoustically optimized indoor venue with seating for between 1,000 and 1,200 people, designed to host theatrical performances, lectures, chamber concerts, and masterclasses, per the Daily Journal of Commerce's reporting. Concept design is now underway, and KOMO News reports the hall is meant to pair performance with the natural grandeur of its setting.
According to KOMO News, the design draws inspiration from the basalt cliffs and expansive skies above the Columbia River. Vince Bryan said the environment should structure the architecture rather than have a structure imposed on it, per the same outlet's report, and The Hilltop says the building is designed around energy, water, and materials as its guiding elements.
The Hilltop selected ZGF Architects to design the hall specifically because of the firm's track record delivering award-winning cultural, civic, and sustainable architecture, KOMO News reports. ZGF previously received the AIA Architecture Firm Award and designed the expansion of the Portland International Airport main terminal, which opened in August 2024 featuring a mass-timber roof, according to ZGF Architects. The firm has also built a reputation for double LEED Platinum commercial developments, per the same source.
A Bigger Master Plan for The Hilltop Campus
The Grotto is only one piece of a larger vision for the site. As Sip Magazine reports, the broader Hilltop master plan includes a second venue called The Terraces, a proposed 2,000-seat outdoor open-air amphitheater connected to The Grotto by a landscaped desert pathway called The Perch. The outdoor space is designed around the existing terrain rather than traditional heavy grading, according to the magazine's coverage.
The Hilltop is aiming high with its ambitions: the group aspires to make The Grotto the most sustainable performance venue in the country, KOMO News reports. ZGF has said it will deliver a venue that celebrates the arts, the environment, and the community for generations, with the design intended to last well beyond its opening.
The Bryans' Roots at the Original Gorge
Vince Bryan, a former Seattle neurosurgeon and inventor of the artificial spinal disc, originally acquired the Columbia River property with his wife Carol in 1980 to plant grapevines, according to the Daily Journal of Commerce. Their original winery on the site was named Champs de Brionne. The Bryans opened the Gorge's predecessor in 1986 as a 3,000-seat natural grass venue called Champs de Brionne Music Theatre, later expanding it to 19,000 seats before selling the concert operations to MCA in 1993, the Daily Journal of Commerce reports.
Following that 1993 sale, the venue grew into today's 27,500-capacity Gorge Amphitheatre and has been owned and operated by Live Nation since 2006, per the Daily Journal of Commerce. The Bryans retained ownership of the surrounding vineyard land even after selling the concert business, and the new Grotto project operates entirely separately from Live Nation's commercial amphitheater next door.
The couple has continued building smaller, boutique performance spaces on their remaining property in the years since. In 2017, they constructed Stage B Amphitheater, a 1,000-capacity outdoor space situated directly in front of their Cave B Estate Winery tasting room, with its inaugural performance featuring the Yakima Symphony Orchestra.
Public Launch Planned for Later This Month
The Hilltop's public launch and inaugural fundraiser is scheduled for the SOAR Festival on August 22 at Cave B Estate Winery, featuring performances by David Foster, Katharine McPhee, and the Wenatchee Valley Symphony Orchestra, according to NCW News. Tickets for the inaugural benefit were priced starting at $108.39, the outlet reports.
The new venue arrives in a region already well acquainted with the strains of hosting large-scale entertainment. Major concert events at the neighboring Gorge Amphitheatre periodically swell Grant County's rural population from roughly 8,000 residents to more than 40,000 visitors, creating significant seasonal demand on local emergency and healthcare services, according to a Washington State Legislature report. Local rural hospitals have previously sought legislative relief for uncompensated concertgoer care, the report notes, underscoring the infrastructure questions that can accompany any new venue capacity in the area.
