Photograph by Lara Swimmer
American firm Lever Architecture used weathering steel and original timber in the adaptive reuse of two factories built over 70 years ago for a hay-baler manufacturer.
Source: Lever Architecture turns Portland factories into creative workspace
Devna Bose / The Meridian Star
The old cotton press warehouse structure stretches along a portion of Front Street in downtown Meridian. Part of the building is being dismantled and the rest will be saved and repurposed. Material from the building is being reused in buildings across the street and around Mississippi.
“The pine, it’s being shipped and flooring is being made out of it, and its bricks are being used in buildings all over Mississippi,” Massey said.
Source: Brick by brick Meridian cotton warehouse dismantled | Local News | meridianstar.com
Old-time radiators are common items seen at salvage shops like Historic Albany Parts Warehouse. (Photo: Provided)
In honor of Earth Day on April 22, consider purchasing used items that promote the motto of the three Rs: reduce, re-use and recycle. By incorporating architectural salvage items into your next project, you not only keep usable items out of the landfill, but you can also add a bit of history into your own home at significant savings..
ReHouse Architectural Salvage in Rochester has a variety of door plates and other items from older homes upstate. (Photo: Provided)
Woods Bagot and Tridente’s collaborative effort in repurposing an Adelaide car manufacturing warehouse in into a vibrant mixed use precinct has earned them a place on the six-strong shortlist for the program’s Adaptive Reuse category. The Main Assembly Building and Pods (MAB) at Tonsley Park, Adelaide was commended by the jury who said they loved the way the architects repurposed the existing structure of the old Mitsubishi manufacturing building, saving 90,000 tons of carbon without compromising on functionality. “It’s taken a dinosaur of hugely embodied energy and turned it into a contemporary series of places of quality and functional relevance,” said one jury member. “It’s beautiful, I love the way they’ve retained most of the structure,” said another.
“Our combined initiatives to preserve and reuse our historic industrial sites reflect our growing understanding that Connecticut’s identity is encompassed in its industrial past not just its iconic town green,” said Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation Executive Director Helen Higgins. “Creative and feasible re-use of industrial buildings will transform our state and infuse economic vitality in our towns and cities.”
via Program focuses on revitalizing historically significant structures around state | Monroe Courier.
Comprising four new 5-6 storey apartment buildings and extensive landscaping over 18,500sqm, Gantry integrates new residential buildings within refurbished historic elements such as the 1920’s Motor Car Works and Fowler Pottery warehouse facades, and the gable ends of the historic High Bay Building.
This is Brian Kappel. He makes things Happy. Including me.
Brain is the creator behind Space Monkey Designs. He recently made me Happy Demon Hot Sauce. I saw his work years ago and never forgot it. When I contacted Brian about his amazing designs he also let me know much of what he builds is from reclaimed warehouse shipping crates and other materials he finds.
This salvaged table top became Big Bot (see below).
Laser cut letters and images are applied to salvaged warehouse wood to make Happy Demon Hot Sauce.
Space Monkey Designs is filled with Brian’s amazing artwork. Stop by and get Happy!
Is this is sign of times to come?
A grungy NoLibs warehouse slated for adaptive reuse has been put on the market for an asking price of $1.395 million, just months after it received zoning variances which would allow for condo conversion. The developers, Urban Steel LLC, who bought the property for $700K, according to Naked Philly, would stand to make a pretty nice profit from their hard work at zoning meetings.
We are seeing a lot of warehouse adaptive reuse projects lately. Here is a lovely one from South London on Dornob.
Price’s concept was to more or less insert a home into the existing building by dividing the space in half. Since the mezzanine provided a natural separation of the vertical space, that side of the warehouse was naturally to become the living area.
via From Warehouse to Wonderful: Double-Duty London Home | Designs & Ideas on Dornob.
If you are going to read one article referenced by us please, please, go read this one on Makers. It is more than inspiring.
Thank you Kevin Lee for writing it.
And thank you Ruth Trocolli of the District of Columbia Historic Preservation Office for bringing it to our attention (see Archaeologists are cool – right?).
“A lot of the art gets built for the love and the challenge,” Michael Snook, the founder of this 65,000 square-foot maker space, told TechHive. And as it turns out, NIMBY is just a small part of a large and storied maker scene that dates back to the 1960s and, surprisingly, has managed to stay a well-kept secret.
A confluence of factors have driven Oakland’s maker renaissance. The city has plenty of large industrial spaces that are perfect for makers to erect so many of the massive projects found here.
via Made in Oakland: How one city turned into an art and maker mecca | TechHive.
The architects have preserved the building’s industrial feel in the 13,000-square-foot workspace, which features custom steel entry gates, a load-bearing glass facade looking out onto a sunny enclosed courtyard, and 18-foot ceilings in the original wood — longleaf pine — with 26-foot pop-up clerestories. The building’s history is etched in the cracked and pockmarked concrete floors, while the refurbished red-brick walls attest to period craftsmanship.
“We wanted to uncover the embedded potential of the existing building and show its inherent beauty of material and space,” Shelton said.
In the feature titled “Warehouse Chic,” author Iyna Bort Caruso said the seven selected locales embody the successful execution of a concept known as adaptive reuse.
In cities and towns across the country, areas of industry – with warehouses and manufacturing plants dating to the early part of the 20th century – have “essentially become urban ghost towns,” Caruso said.
“With adaptive reuse, these buildings have been reclaimed, rehabbed and become lynchpins in creative new zones.”
via NoDa gets national nod as a warehouse arts district | CharlotteObserver.com.
The Great Company has a great space!
The original wood flooring from 1906. The floors had been painted over several times during its century of use, so we had to sand-blast the floors then sand them over twice. Then we used three coats of water-based varnish to bring out its elegance. The sanding took three weeks (we just projected one week), and our exhausted contractor shared with us that in over 20 years of contract work, he had never worked with wood of such fine quality. It still amazes us as we step on these floors each day.
via An Industrial Los Angeles Workspace Creative Workspace Tour | Apartment Therapy.
Domani Developers, the minds behind the shabby-chic aesthetic of much of Frankford Avenue is looking to expand their dominion with two new apartment buildings. Both proposals involve factory conversions, in keeping with the aesthetic and MO laid out by the string of adaptive reuse projects throughout Fishtown. But one of the projects, the conversion of the old REACH factory (located right off of Frankford Avenue,) involves a feature which would be a first for Philly, a bicycle garage.
Here at the RA we recently posted photographs of a cold storage warehouse in Chicago.
Well, those amazing photos were taken by Gary Robert (that’s not really his last name) an awesomely talented photographer.
He was nice enough to send us some more. Go see his other wildly wonderful images on Gary Robert Photography!
I’ve always been into toys, gadgets and figuring out how things work. As a child I came across my mother’s old 126 mm roll film camera in our crawlspace and asked my father to teach me how to use it… I guess that was the start of my photography career some 40+ years ago. The 126 mm film camera and flash bulbs soon turned into my father’s Maymia/Sekor 35 mm manual film camera and flash which I learned how to shoot slides, macro photography and use of a tripod. I remember shooting the inside of frogs for my 8 grade science project, it was better than having to cut the poor little guys up.
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