The I-X Center (Cleveland, Ohio)

 convention center, exhibition centre

The International Exposition Center, also known as the I-X Center, is a convention and exhibition hall located in Cleveland, Ohio, adjacent to Cleveland Hopkins International Airport. The 2,200,000 sq ft building includes over 1,000,000 sq ft of exhibition and conference space. Originally located within Brook Park, Ohio, the building and 90 acres of neighbouring land became part of Cleveland in a 2001 land swap that sent most of the NASA Glenn Research Center to Brook Park. It was built in 1942 as a General Motors-operated facility and was used to build bombers during World War II as the Cleveland Bomber Plant. It later served for many years as a tank factory until becoming vacant in 1970. In 1977, the building was purchased by Park Corp. with the intention of turning the building into an exhibition hall. It reopened in 1985 under its current use as an exhibition center. The Park Corp. sold the building to the City of Cleveland in 2001, who continued to lease and operate it. The building has a 125-foot high ferris wheel which premiered at the 1992 Greater Cleveland Auto Show. At the time it was the world's highest indoor ferris wheel. It became a centrepiece of the annual I-X Indoor Amusement Park. A 2008 expansion added 185,000 sq ft (17,200 sq m) of exhibition space, increasing the exhibition floor to 985,000 sq ft (91,500 sq m). The entire ceiling was repainted for the first time since 1984, using 27,000 gallons of paint. At the end of 2020 the center closed down following economic damage caused by the Covid19 Pandemic. In 2021 it would be purchased by California-based IPG who would reopen the center.