The three-story opera house is reminiscent of an Italian Romanesque church. Three stories tall, five bays wide, and faced with local “yellow-dog” brick, the building’s facade is ordered by brick pilasters that rise to a double cornice of corbeled brick and modillions. Although the first story has been altered, the upper portion is splendid. A range of round arched windows with corbeled arches marches across the second level, flat-headed windows with rusticated lintels occupy the third, and a gable, interrupted by the two central pilasters, spans the central three bays with Lombard arches. Retail spaces occupied the ground floor, with a central entrance to the lobby and stairs leading to the second-floor auditorium. Local investors A. W. Johnson and D. Williams, with Thomas Vetch as contractor, built the opera house for a range of community events as well as theater productions and movies.
The corner building to the east at 1102 11th was Anson State Bank (1907). Its standard corner entrance is marked by two pairs of small red granite columns supporting an elaborate brick entablature. The ensemble of opera house, bank, and retail buildings to the west of the opera house represented a substantial commitment to Anson’s future. The quality of the brickwork in the opera house and the bank indicates the availability of skilled craftspeople and materials brought by the new railroad. Other brick storefronts around the square display similar, if simpler, pilaster and corbeled cornice compositions.