WHO IS HOMES BY HELEN?

Giving with “Warm Hands”
Helen Torres Supports Opera Tampa
and the Homes by Helen Opera Tampa Series

For the past 13 years the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center’s resident opera company, Opera Tampa, has produced highly successful, critically-acclaimed operas, which have had the enormous good fortune to be supported by one of the Tampa Bay area’s great benefactors — Helen Torres.

Ms. Torres has contributed annually to TBPAC ’s opera program since its first production, Madama Butterfly, in 1996. Due to the overwhelming positive audience response to TBPAC ’s operas, Opera Tampa produced two operas in the 1999-2000 season — Hansel & Gretel and La Traviata. This season, TBPAC is proud to present three opera offerings as part of the Homes by Helen Opera Series, named to reflect the Bay area real estate company that Ms. Torres founded and still runs today.

“I firmly believe that if you give, give with ‘a warm hand,’ which means give while you are alive and still here to see what and who it will benefit,” says Ms. Torres. “Rather than leave your estate in its entirety in a will, why not give part of it now so that you can see the good that it can do?”

With support from “the warm hands” of Helen Torres, Opera Tampa celebrates its 13th Anniversary season. Clearly, Helen Torres’ support has allowed opera to blossom at TBPAC — to the great appreciation of patrons.

What makes Ms. Torres so interested in opera and all of the performing arts in Tampa?
“I was born in New York City, the national hub for the performing arts. As a child, I was taken to the old Metropolitan Opera House before it was torn down,” says Ms. Torres. “I found opera to be spellbinding. From there my interest in the performing arts grew.”

Later, as an adult, she was passing by the Met when it was being demolished. A man was selling pieces of wood that were once part of the stage floor — $25 for a 12-inch strip. When Ms. Torres asked him why, he said, “Madame, you forget that Caruso sang on this wooden floor!”

“That made a long-lasting impression on me,” says Ms. Torres, “so much so that I still have that piece of wood, as well as a piece of the gold-leafed proscenium, which I had made into a wall sconce.”

After 27 years in New York, Ms. Torres moved to Boston, where she continued her career in retailing as a buyer for Filene’s and later with her own boutiques. She also renovated houses and brown-stones in Boston before moving to St. Petersburg, Fla., where she lives today.
In 1988 she started Homes by Helen, Inc., her thriving real estate company. Several years ago, when Ms. Torres was “getting burned out” due to her hectic work schedule, a friend suggested that she needed new goals. Her new “career” as a patron of the performing arts was born when — finding that The Florida Orchestra was in financial trouble she promised to subsidize their free concerts in Straub Park for 20 years. What started out years ago with an audience of 1,200 people has grown to more than 8,000 enjoying the free concerts held in the cool evenings of October each year.

Besides supporting opera at TBPAC and Florida Orchestra concerts, Ms. Torres actively contributes to other music programs and organizations in the Tampa Bay area. She gives two scholarships, one for each side of the Bay, toward student musicians who play in the Side by Side concerts with The Florida Orchestra. She also gives scholarships to Eckerd College.
It is because of Helen Torres’ dedicated work with her clients that she is able to support the arts. Her career has given her the opportunity to give back to the community and to spread her enthusiasm for helping the arts thrive. As she often comments to her clients upon the completion of a successful real estate transaction, “Thank you for helping me support the arts.”

“I’ve been a patron of all the arts because I realize their importance to the maturity of any city’ says Ms. Torres. “Tampa/St. Pete has grown incredibly in the past few years and it is beginning to take its place as one of the great cities of the United States. Part of being a great city is the presence of the arts, especially the performing arts. All major cities in the U.S. have opera companies, so for Tampa it is a must.

“Opera is part of our heritage, perpetuating wonderful stories and music. And the Bay area community can see it right here in Tampa at the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center.”

Visit Homes by Helen on the web at http://www.homesbyheleninc.com.