The original Bowl was built in Edward Drummond Libbey's Civic Center Park in phases from 1952 to 1957 through a community effort led by the Ojai Music Festival, with the shell designed by architects Austen Pierpont of Ojai and Roy C. Wilson of Santa Paula. Originally known by several names including Civic Center Bowl and Festival Bowl, it became known as Libbey Bowl in the 1980s after Civic Center Park was given to the City of Ojai and renamed Libbey Park. Aaron Copland inaugurated it at the 1957 Ojai Music Festival, and it went on to host several of the world's most influential artists while serving as the home of the internationally acclaimed Ojai Music Festival and as a venue for important community and cultural events including the Storytelling Festival, Illusions Theater, Fourth of July Celebration, Memorial Day Celebration, and Mexican Fiesta. By 2008, more than 50 years of wood rot, termite damage, and heavy use had left the Bowl irreparably damaged and in danger of being condemned. In the fall of 2008, the City of Ojai and the Ojai Music Festival began working together to build a new Libbey Bowl, hiring Ojai architect David Bury to create a design that evoked the aesthetics, intimacy, and harmony with nature of the original Bowl while improving backstage areas and audience facilities. With support from the Ojai Valley Service Foundation, the Ojai Music Festival raised more than $3 million from patrons, the Ojai community, and other donors to partner with the City of Ojai in building the new Libbey Bowl. On June 4, 2011, Dawn Upshaw, eighth blackbird, Claudio Ragazzi, Octavio Brunetti, and Michael Ward-Bergeman inaugurated the new Libbey Bowl, followed on June 5, 2011, by a free community Day of Music produced by the Ojai Music Festival and joined by more than 100 of Ojai's own musicians.
