Name: Brunch & Brass
Start: 2025-11-08T11:30:00-05:00
End: 2025-11-08T16:00:00-05:00
Location: Cotton Club Museum and Cultural Center, Inc.

Leadership Gainesville Class 51 is proud to partner with The Cotton Club Museum and Cultural Center to host a unique fundraiser that blends rich cultural heritage with vibrant local music. We invite you to be a part of Brunch and Brass, a community celebration designed to help raise $200,000 for the renovation of the historic Perryman Building- a former grocery store and community anchor in the heart of Gainesville.
You will help us to preserve an essential piece of Gainesville's history while building a more connected, culturally enriched future. The event will feature a ticketed southern brunch with a mimosa bar inside the museum. The brunch will then be followed by a free, family-friendly jazz festival outside to follow.
The Cotton Club Museum and Cultural Center, Inc. (CCMCC) is a 50l(c)(3) not for profit corporation, located at 837 SE 7th Avenue in Gainesville, FL, that was established to preserve the historic Cotton Club building, and other buildings on the site, and develop a museum and cultural center. The 1.84 acre site includes the Cotton Club/Blue Note (often referred to as the Hall), the Perryman Grocery Store, and four shot-gun houses. All of the buildings are on the 1950 Sanborn Map in their current locations. Plans for the site, which were developed in collaboration with the University of Florida’s Powell Center for Construction and Environment in the Rinker School of Building Construction and Santa Fe College, will utilize all of the structures on the site.
The Cotton Club building and one of the shotgun houses have been restored. The Cotton Club building houses the museum and serves as a large-scale performance and rental space. The Perryman store is designated to become a café and mini museum with a farmer’s market for local growers. Plans for use of the remaining shotgun houses will be determined through collaborative meetings with individuals and organizations from the community. The development of the Cotton Club Museum and Cultural Center is creating a heritage, tourism destination that will provide a glimpse of African American life during the period of racial segregation in the United States and ensure that future generations never forget the historic richness and legacy of a time and place that impacted and enriched the lives of
an entire nation of people.
Join us in preserving the past and building the future!