[soft music] - I know I've never seen art that represented someone with a disability.

I've never seen that.

Well, I had a daughter, and her name is Sherri.

Well, she was the oldest of our three girls.

She had some pretty severe disabilities.

When I had her at home, it was really hard.

She was watching her younger sisters prepare for college, and start driving, and dating, and she realized she couldn't do any of those things.

And so she kept asking, "Well, what will I do after high school?"

You know, "What about me?

What do I get to do?"

And there wasn't anything.

All the years of caring for her, I think we were just trying to get through each day, and I didn't really think about, well, what about after?

But she did.

That's when we realized there was a need in our community not just for her, but for other people.

That's what sparked the need for this.

[uplifting music] Our church invited me and a friend of mine, she had two children with disabilities, to join their summer camp.

They let us do, like, an eight-week pilot program that summer.

First day of that camp, we had four.

The second day we had 24.

So the goal was, what made their day meaningful?

What made them happy?

It was about socialization, and friendships, and, like, art and crafts.

And it was learning, but fun.

- Hanging out, fellowship with other people, just be in the community.

- And getting back to Sherri, she had all her friends there, and she loved the activities, and it gave her friendships, and something she looked forward to, and it gave her purpose.

At the end of the summer, we talked to them and said, "You know, what we really need is a year-round program."

And the associate pastor, I'll never forget it, he said, "If the community needs this, we're gonna do it.

Where God guides, He provides."

We went from two Sunday school classes to three, and then they moved us across the road to what used to be the parsonage, and then we filled that up.

We were busting at the seams.

Kinda jokingly, I said to Paige, my daughter, you know, "Maybe God would give us one of his houses."

And we found the property that we are at right now, and it was a church that had closed earlier in the year.

So we had a new home.

[bright music] Our members love it.

So we're a lot about choice.

You don't have to do everything we do.

You can pick and choose.

We also work on goals that we do, you know, learning skills like money, and measuring, and- [coin clattering] - And it glows in the dark.

Ooh.

- [Staff Member] Picked a good one.

- Thanks.

- [Peggy] We do field trips.

We go to, like, parks, we go swimming, and maybe, like, safety skills, like, how to be safe out in public, that kinda thing.

- [Paige] Let's stay together.

- [Participant 1] Okay.

- [Paige] Why do you think there's so many flags out?

- [Participant 2] For Flag Day.

- [Paige] For Flag Day, that's right.

Let's go up and find our first bear.

- [Peggy] We go downtown and look at the bears in Hendersonville.

- Is that kinda like the sunflowers we're growing in our garden?

- [Participants] Yes.

- [Paige] Yes.

We might see some of those soon.

Nice.

All right, light change.

Let's walk together.

- [Peggy] And then last year, we painted our own bear.

- [Paige] One, two, three.

- [Paige And Participants] Fun Friday.

- Well, it has some butterflies, [chuckling] - Butterfly.

- There was different butterflies on there, [chuckling] I think.

- Because that is our logo.

- [Interviewer] You like butterflies?

- Kinda.

[Erin and interviewer chuckling] [bright music continues] - This is apple country, so we are right down the road from some apple orchards, right across the road from some apple orchards.

Beautiful part of the country.

When we started here, there's a back building, that's where our program is, and it was a fellowship hall.

The front building was an actual church.

It looks like a church.

It's not that I mind it looking like a church, but it really isn't anymore.

Well, we have a grant writer, and she goes, "I found this art grant, and I think this would work really well.

And you know, our people really like art."

And I said, "What are you doing?"

[cart rolling] She goes, "It'll make our building look great and it'll be about them, and they'll get to paint themselves, and it'll be fun."

She told me all this stuff, but I wasn't really feeling it 'cause I didn't think we would get it.

So she applied for it, and we got it.

[laughing] We had a huge celebration party, talking about it.

Both artists come in and talk to them and explain to them what that was gonna look like, showed them renderings.

And this is how we're gonna do it on this building, and that's gonna make this building yours.

- It's part of our project that we're doing so that they know more of what we are and what we do.

[gentle music] - The artist that did the mural, she is a local artist in Henderson County, and she's fabulous, but she also has a son that has a disability, so she understands us.

- Hi, Emily.

We really have a heart for people with special needs, and just want to give them a voice and let the world know that they're important.

Hi, Trey.

How are you?

We sat down and chatted with each one of 'em.

Oh, your name is Marlon.

- Right.

- Right?

- [Becky] Asking their favorite things, and favorite colors, and all that.

What other things do you like to do?

Then we started drawing the members out on the wall.

The hardest part is the drawing part and trying to figure out where everybody's gonna go.

Painting is the easy part.

So we outline, like, maybe their shirt or their pants, the color that it's supposed to be.

And then we leave the space in the middle for them to come in and fill in as much as they can.

The church here is settled in the middle of an apple orchard, and so the members are carrying apples.

The butterfly is the Hope Center logo, and so there's lots and lots of butterflies.

- Yellow's my favorite color.

- [Peggy] What a lot of people don't understand about people with disabilities, they want what everyone else wants.

- [Becky] Look at that.

- Ooh.

- [Becky] What's your favorite color, Emily?

- Pink.

- [Becky] Pink?

- [Peggy] They want relationships and friendships, to do things, and to be involved, and to have purpose.

- Trey's gloves always match whatever he's wearing.

- [Becky] Whatever you're wearing?

- He accessorizes very well.

- [Becky] That's good idea.

I love it.

- One of our girls, she has Down syndrome, and I mean, I've always known she kinda like, she liked to draw, and this and that.

When she started painting her mural, she did it for the longest time.

She really enjoyed it.

After that, we thought, we need to offer her more opportunities to do different kinds of artwork, because it means a lot to her.

Even though she can't always verbalize that, she showed us.

- [Becky] Art is able to say words that we can't find.

Art speaks to people's emotions.

- [Interviewer] You seeing the monitor, Cam?

You're making the shot there.

Looking at it?

- Ooh, yeah.

- [Peggy] Art does, it says things that you can't verbally say sometimes.

- Yeah, like when you come in, I'm on this other wall.

- I'm on this side.

- And the supplies.

- [chuckling] I'm on the the side door.

- [Becky] I loved putting 'em on the wall.

Tried to capture the life that they live and the happiness that they have.

It warms my heart to know that as soon as people start driving by, they're gonna be like, "What is this place and who are these people?"

[light music] - The other part of that grant was metal sculptures.

Well, my husband, he's a very talented artist.

He'll tell you he is not.

He is.

- I brought this thing out here this morning.

Hoping it'll work.

[chuckling] - You made it, Robert?

- Yes, ma'am.

- I've known him since I was 14.

Very, very talented.

[saw buzzing] We were like, you could do this, because not only could you do this, but you know them.

[gentle music] - What are you doing standing back there?

- And they know you.

- I'd like to thank the wife for encouragement, the support she's given during this project.

We gotta have wire for our big sculptures.

You see that?

There's seven wires in the middle of that.

But we gotta unravel it.

See that, Cam?

- Yeah.

- Faith, you see that?

- [Faith] Yeah, yeah, I see it.

- Give her a spin.

Awesome.

See how that's unraveling?

- Yeah.

- [Robert] There you go.

[metal creaking] - [chuckling] I got it.

- Yeah, you got it.

Some of the members came to the shop, helped me bend and bolt together the metal.

[gentle music] - Bending the metal, and to get it the shape where it'll connect when he welds it.

[flame roaring] He's welding the wire together.

[flame roaring] [flame roaring] - [Robert] Each one of these sculptures is named.

"Alpha" represents the hearing impaired.

The sculpture is giving the I love you symbol.

The next one is Kentron, [flame roaring] and he represents the seeing impaired.

And then you have Omega.

[flame roaring] This one represents individuals with physical disabilities.

- There you go.

- [Peggy] That's my favorite sculpture.

- The wheels, and the wheelchair.

- The wheels.

The person, the heart.

- [Peggy] Because of that heart.

I like that because to me, that makes us unify.

[flame roaring] - One is a wheelchair with a heart.

- [Robert] He has a hand-blown heart.

It's illuminated, so it'll constantly be lit.

The lit heart represents all people are the same, regardless of the disabilities.

- Well, that's why that sculpture has the heart in it, to say, just like you.

We all have that.

Even though every single person on the planet's different, that makes us the same.

[solemn music] Sherri would love where we are at right now.

She is on the wall here in the mural.

She has, like, a prominent place there.

I walk by her every morning.

Most mornings, that's great.

Some mornings it's hard.

Sadly, before we got this property, she passed away, so she never saw this, but we exist because she needed a place.

[birds chirping] [traffic whooshing] [gentle music] I would love if she could see it.

[tarp crinkling] [crowd applauding] You know, like, if God would let her get a glimpse, [crowd applauding] it would mean so much to her.

[crowd cheering and applauding] - [Becky] It's not a church anymore.

This is their property.

This is their place.

- This is my mural picture that I painted.

- Oh, me.

[chuckling] And that's me.

[chuckling] - [Peggy] I hope that they'll take a moment to look at the sculptures and the murals, and to realize how important people with disabilities are.

- Me.

- [Interviewer] That's you.

- And my sister.

- Uh-oh, that's- - That's it.

- [Peggy] They're not treated like everyone else a lot of times, and people think they don't notice, and they do.

- [Interviewer] You did a great job painting that.

- Thank you.

- [Interviewer] Mm-hmm.

- So I'm hoping this will be, maybe, if anything, a conversation piece.

- Yeah, and that's a sweater that I used to have.

- [Peggy] And maybe it would encourage somebody to include them in something, to be inclusive.

- [Interviewer] That's very cool.

- It is cool.

It is cool.

- [Peggy] We've done our job if they understand how important they are.

- [Interviewer] So when you're coming into the Hope Center, the first thing we're seeing is what?

- Me.

- [Interviewer] You like that?

- Uh-huh.

- When I see them feel important, that's a great thing.

[gentle music continues] In this community, in Henderson County and up into Buncombe County, there's a lot of great artists and there's a lot of great artwork, but I feel like this is one of a kind.

[gentle music continues]