Building on house party origins, Swanson’s Warehouse creates a niche in the Upstate music scene
Even David Stone sometimes finds it difficult to recall just how long Swanson’s Warehouse, Greenville’s most secretive music venue, has been in operation.
“Do you mean legally?” he asks, laughing.
It’s not entirely a joking question, considering Swanson’s Warehouse, a cozy live performance venue at 12 Irvine Street downtown, began its life as a series of unlicensed events Stone and his friends hosted about a decade ago.
What began as an informal gathering of friends at a house on Swanson’s Court (hence the “Swanson’s” name) in Greenville soon blossomed into massive parties with hundreds of attendees. The parties also doubled as charity events, with partygoers bringing canned goods for food drives or raising money for needy families and organizations around the community. They helped raise funds for the GHS Children’s Hospital, The Meyer Center, and Chris and Kelly’s Hope Foundation.
But that crowd size was not an ideal fit for a residential cul-de-sac like Swanson’s Court, so Stone realized an old warehouse might hold the potential for a true event space.
The Origins of Swanson’s Warehouse as a Music Venue
As a third-generation member of Stone Property Management, one of Greenville’s legacy family businesses, Stone had watched his grandfather fill an old warehouse on Irvine Street in downtown Greenville over the years with all sorts of maintenance tools and equipment: lawnmowers, shovels, crates, toolkits, and so on.
“It’s actually pretty funny, because my grandfather used to collect all these old tools and paint them blue–‘Stone Property Blue,’ he liked to say. That way if his tools were ever stolen, and let’s say he ran into someone using a blue shovel, he could say, ‘Hey, that’s mine!’” Stone says.
But this warehouse filled with blue tools and other detritus was just gathering dust, so Stone and some friends cleared out the space and hosted one of their biggest parties yet, in what they hoped would be a more appropriate venue.
But the city of Greenville disagreed.
“Oh yeah, we got shut down,” Stone recalls – again, with a laugh.
After being slapped with two $1,000 fines for improper use of space, Stone went legit in 2018 and received a formal business license. He’d lost some momentum, though, as the early excitement surrounding those parties on Swanson’s Court had faded over the years.
Stone himself, now 38 years old, serves as president of Stone Property Management and has a full schedule beyond the passion project of his youth.
But in place of those old parties, Stone looked at ways to create a true music venue that would meet a need in Greenville, a place to showcase unique up-and-coming artists on a smaller, more intimate stage–much in the same way that Marcus King, the now-famous Greenville-born guitarist and songwriter, once played at their parties on Swanson’s Court.
Basement Atmosphere, Recording-Studio Sound
The interior of the space today reflects its ad-hoc past. A subterranean quality imbues the venue, and upon walking inside, one gets the feeling of stepping down into a quintessential 1990s basement, complete with old refrigerators, vintage metal signs, and an overall atmosphere of laid-back, thrown-together warmth. There’s also a unique sort of personality that comes from the authenticity of its decor. Those metal signs on the walls, for instance, are not fake or merely decorative, as one might expect, but are instead legitimate heirlooms of Greenville’s history. These are signs that once hung on Main Street and advertised now-dead businesses of a bygone era, signs his grandfather gathered and kept, if only to avoid seeing them disappear.
The space is the result of years of careful accumulation, and that goes for the technological side as well. Set against the deliberately casual aesthetics of the warehouse, the top-notch lighting and sound equipment provide the best of both worlds: the laid-back atmosphere of a basement jam session, combined with the professional attributes of a recording studio.
“The acoustics, which we can’t really take too much credit for, are surprisingly incredible in here,” Stone said as he walked through the venue on a recent afternoon.
Up a set of stairs, which look down over the stage from the side, is a literal recording studio, with a recording booth, a mixing panel, a control room, and sound-proofed walls. But just like the venue itself, you wouldn’t know the studio is there unless you knew where to look.
Stone said he hopes to begin recording local artists both in the studio and during live shows, which can then be streamed online and edited into music videos.
All of it drives his intention to make some noise in this currently hushed atmosphere, regardless of how financially sound it may be.
“Is this the best use of a space like this to make the most money possible? Probably not,” Stone says. “But if I’m going to live in Greenville and call it my home, I want to enjoy living here. So finding ways to create these unique concepts that you can’t find or replicate elsewhere is really what I’ve been focused on building.”
His goal is to create not just a warehouse space but a new district of sorts for downtown. He’s in the early stages of drawing up plans to work with the city to shut down Irvine Street and activate the area—which includes the restaurants Sum Bar and Swordfish, along with the brewery FireForge—and start hosting true events, like night markets and block parties.
And if the secretive aspect of Swanson’s Warehouse gradually fades, he’s fine with that.
“Grassroots passion projects are what make a place special,” Stone says. “I’d just love to see how we can make the city a little bit brighter with some unique and eclectic projects. I don’t think this is an end goal. We’re only just starting to see what Greenville has to offer.”
Swanson’s Warehouse, 12 N. Irvine St., Greenville,
Music venues around Greenville
Bon Secours Wellness Arena
650 N. Academy St.
Capacity: 19,000
Peace Center
300 S. Main St.
Capacity: 2,115
Gunter Theatre
300 S. Main S.
Capacity: 439
Radio Room
110 Poinsett Hwy. (moving to Laurens Road this year)
Capacity: 250
Swanson’s Warehouse
12 N. Irvine St.
Capacity: 150
CCNB Amphitheatre at Heritage Park (outdoor)
861 SE Main St., Simpsonville
Capacity: 10,000
Peace Pavilion (outdoor)
300 S. Main St.
Capacity: 1,200
NOMA Square (outdoor)
220 N. Main St.
Capacity: 5,000+
