VINYL RECORD PRESSING
A HISTORY OF COMMUNITY – STORY AND EXPRESSION
Downtown Asheville’s Citizen Times building has long stood as an icon of regional storytelling. Through the years, it chronicled our area’s history with quality, honesty, and resilience.
Citizen’s Vinyl carries that legacy forward by writing new chapters. With music, food, and welcoming spaces, the vinyl pressing factory, cafe, meeting space, and CODA Analog Art & Sales, the aim is to build community and culture. To create new stories while honoring the old – an unfolding narrative of creativity, connection, and communication.
Music has returned to Asheville’s iconic 1939 Citizen Times building, where Bill Monroe first unleashed his bluegrass sound over the airwaves of WWNC am radio station. Now home to Citizen Vinyl, the historic art deco floors that once absorbed the twang of banjos, bluegrass and rustle of newsprint now herald the rumble of vinyl presses.
“We felt this was meant to be,” says founder Gar Ragland, who rents the space. Original printing presses in the basement inspired Ragland to manufacture new vinyl onsite, from hip hop to folk.
Citizen Vinyl fires up its presses seven days a week to churn out around 2,500 records daily – a first for North Carolina. Ragland launched in 2020 amidst challenges but also exploding vinyl demand.
Beyond manufacturing, Ragland aims to make Citizen Vinyl a cultural landmark, celebrating the building’s history while inspiring future artists. Free tours showcase the vintage studios and phonograph plant.
Upstairs, Esquire Magazine recently touted Session, Citizen Vinyl’s bar, for its drinks, view of the presses, and curated playlists.
For Ragland, Citizen Vinyl is all about honoring heritage while looking ahead. As vinyl enjoys a youth-driven revival, and vinyl record rooms are being added to newly built mansions,these walls echo decades of voices resolutely spinning on
