Jim Stevens and Carrie Masters knew downtown Lincoln needed more artists' studios and affordable space for creative businesses like their old clothing store O-Zone and contemporary art galleries.

So they put together Parrish Studios, turning second-floor space at 14th and O streets into a hub of Lincoln's downtown scene.

Parrish Studios had its origin in 2002 when a multi-tenant group bought the building. Four years later, work began to turn the raw upstairs space into galleries, studios, shops and offices.

Now home to photographers, design companies, clothing stores, a spa, studios and a handful of galleries, Parrish Studios has, over the past two years, become central to the local arts scene and creative community.

For their efforts, Stevens and Masters were given the 2009 Downtown Lincoln Association's Young Entrepreneur Award.

"I appreciate that, but I didn't have anything to do with it," Stevens said. "I gave people a bunch of empty rooms and they did it."

By empty rooms, he means empty.

"We're talking rubble off the walls; you could see the lathe," said Stevens, an electrician by trade.

"It had been abandoned since the mid-'80s. It was kind of like a trash heap," Sara Bucy said of the space she turned into Homemade Modern. Now she shows and sells jewelry in a room where an old airliner gas tank serves as a light fixture.

Even with the refurbishing work, it didn't take long for Parrish to fill up.

"We didn't advertise. Everybody just came to us once word got out," Stevens said. "I knew Peggy (Gomez), and I knew if we got Tugboat up here, the artists would follow."

Tugboat is the Tugboat Gallery, a space devoted to showing contemporary art, primarily by local and regional artists, that started in 2005 behind Gomez's art supply store near 10th and O streets.

"We worked hard on that," Gomez said of Tugboat. "We did posters, we did buttons, we did all kinds of things to get it known. It didn't just happen. There was such a need for a gallery like that, where anybody could show."

Gomez Art Supply moved to the 14th and O streets building in 2006 and began refurbishing the three upstairs rooms that became the new Tugboat. That space opened in April 2008.

"That first April opening was bonkers," said Craig Roper, who opened his gallery, Project Room, that same month. "Tugboat had a lot to do with that. We've had huge openings since that first month, hundreds and hundreds of people. ... If it wasn't for Tugboat, none of this would have happened. No doubt about it."

Gomez doesn't want to take credit for the success of Parrish Studios.

"It's Jim Stevens; he made it all happen," she said. "It was his idea that everything up there had to be something creative. He could have made a lot more money if he'd turned it into condos or just straight business space."

Among the businesses in Parrish are: Tangerine Hair Studio, Roundus, Chocolate Cake design, Aorta, Bella skin care, Handmade Modern and Masters' Robot Luv.

There are also a handful of studios where artists work on paintings, photography and jewelry.

"It's the best," Bucy said. "It's such a wonderful, collaborative group of people. Everybody's doing something different, but we get along so well. If you are stuck on something, you can walk down the hall and talk to someone. ... We can actually play our music. We're not bothering each other. Everybody's doing the same sort of thing."

Some businesses, including Homemade Modern, are open when the owner/artists are working. Other have regular hours.

But Parrish Studios gets its greatest exposure and biggest crowds on First Fridays.

In February, the crowds started streaming in just after 7 p.m. Hallways and galleries were full to packed until about 9, and the last stragglers headed home about 10:30.

"There is every type of person who comes through," Bucy said. "There are people who are in college. There are old people. There are wealthy people. There are homeless people. It really makes you unafraid, as an artist, to show whatever. That's what they came for."

Anthony Hawley has a brick-walled studio space he'll be covering with 100 small black-and-white multi-media pieces he'll sell to 100 people for $100 each during the March opening.

There's quite a contrast, he says, between his work days in the studio and the openings.

"It's kind of odd," he said. "There's nobody here for the month, then First Friday it's kind of chaotic. It's kind of like hosting a party for all these people you don't know."

This story is part of the New Directions series, an annual collection of stories about economic progress in Lincoln.

Reach L. Kent Wolgamott at 473-7244 or kwolgamott@journalstar.com or follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/KentWolgamott.