By KERRY SMITH, EDITOR, ST. LOUIS CONSTRUCTION NEWS AND REVIEW MAGAZINE
More than 100 design and construction industry professionals virtually toured City Foundry STL on Tuesday afternoon, learning more about the inspiration behind the development along with its projected Phase 1 opening time frame.
Lawrence Group CEO/Developer Steve Smith, Lawrence Group Design Architect/Senior Project Manager Bridget Bogan Keitel, Lawrence Group Director of Development Services Todd Rogan and Great Rivers Greenway CEO Susan Trautman offered perspectives on the $210 million, 330,000-square-foot, mixed-use, historic renovation of the 14-acre former Federal Mogul foundry site in Midtown at 3700 Forest Park Avenue.
Smith and Keitel said Phase 1 of the project – which includes the 20-vendor food hall with 500 seats in a public market layout, is projected to open in Q3 or Q4 of this year.
Smith shared with the SLCCC virtual audience his vision that propelled the development. The genesis of that vision hailed from a leisure trip he took to Atlanta with his family in 2015. “We visited Krog Street Market in historic Atlanta and immediately saw its vibrancy and dynamism,” said Smith, noting that the building that served for nearly 100 years as Atlanta Stove Works’ manufacturing hub for making the cast iron Barrett Range closed in 1987. It stood dormant for 15 years but was redeveloped into an historically redeveloped, mixed-use development. “Within two weeks of returning to St. Louis, I visited the Foundry site and saw the same potential,” he said.
Reusing a unique, historic building rather than tearing it down to build a generic new one appealed to Smith – and to investors – and City Foundry STL was born.
Future phases of the development, he said, include completion of the Brickline Greenway (formerly known as Chouteau Greenway) – which will run through the heart of site, additional office and research space, plazas, a grocery store and housing.
“Our aspirations include being authentic in how we memorialize the past while continuing to create the public face of innovation and the storefront to creativity for St. Louis,” Smith said.