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Rex the dinosaur has a new home.
The 7- by 9-foot origami tyrannosaurus rex had long been a fixture at Wayne Powers' Tea ReX tea shop, which closed about a month ago. The folded-paper-and-foil dinosaur was a gift to Powers after his shop in South End sponsored an origami festival. Powers wanted to find Rex a new home where people could still appreciate him.
After an article in the Observer last month, Powers said he got dozens of offers for Rex, from as far as California and Pennsylvania. He even had an offer from Dallas of $1,200.
But Powers decided that ImaginOn in uptown Charlotte – a venue that combines the public library and Children's Theatre of Charlotte – was the perfect home for Rex.
Melanie Baron, ImaginOn's exhibits coordinator, saw the Observer article and was immediately interested. After arriving to work, she soon found she wasn't the only one.
“That same morning three other people rushed over to me with the article and said, ‘We gotta get this dinosaur here,' ” she said.
ImaginOn houses two other large-scale origami pieces from the same festival – a giant paper Pegasus and a rhinoceros.
Thursday morning in the ImaginOn lobby, Rex was set onto a scissor lift and ascended to a platform above the front doors.
Andrew Gibbon, ImaginOn's master carpenter, had the honor of settling Rex into his new home. He was also the one who performed surgery to reinforce weak spots so the dinosaur could stand upright independently.
“I just did a little reconstruction, and cleaned a lot of dust off of it,” Gibbon said.
After readjusting Rex's rib cage, Gibbon climbed down the ladder, and the dinosaur officially had a new home.
“It's great,” Powers said. “I couldn't have picked a better place. And he looks happy.”
