Milling around...
Mar. 15th, 2005 12:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jim_pA couple of weeks ago, Tam and I came across this listing for a mill building for sale in Holyoke, MA.
When we saw this, our reaction was, "What we could do with that space!!" We then started bouncing ideas off each other about buying it and carving it up into artists' lofts and using a bunch of it ourselves.
Then we found out that the City of Holyoke is trying to develop an arts-and-industry district in the area where the mill is. Which means that developing the building for artist live/work spaces might actually be feasible (zoning for spaces like this tends to be problematic).
We went 'round and 'round with numbers and ideas and scenarios, but we figured that we could only do any realistic planning after visiting the space. We were there yesterday. The seller is in New York, but her father uses part of the building for a stone-sculpting studio. He showed us around.
In a way, I'm glad that we went on a day right after a snowstorm where there was significant snowmelt on the roof. It gave us an idea what we were in for. We found significant leakage in a variety of places, which we'd kind of anticipated. The place was once a woolen mill, and I'd say about half the equipment had been abandoned in place. It took up a lot of the space.
To make a long story short, the place would need a lot of work to make it usable for artists' lofts. The roofs would need to be replaced, the machinery would need to be removed, most of the floors would need to be replaced; we found significant buckling in several places where the leakage swelled the old wood-strip floors. The wiring would also have to be gutted and re-done; again we found many places where the old wiring was just ripped out and hanging (from the machinery that was taken away).
All the windows on the railroad side of the building were bricked up, and all the windows on the canal side were glass block. Again, we'd need to bust these out and replace them with good clear-glass windows to make the space usable at all. More effort, more expense.
To its credit the building has, as Tam describes it, "good bones". The skeletal structure is superb. It's just everything else that would be a lot of work to deal with.
Looking at it, it just felt waaaay too overwhelming for us to deal with on our own. If we could scare up a bunch of partners to share in the expense and/or work of the rehab we might consider going for it. Right now, at this point in our lives, it seems to be too much to deal with.
We're also not quite sure what the market is for artists' lofts in that area. The city is trying to rehab that area and is doing a pretty good job, but there's only one mill that I know of that's in the process of converting to artists' lofts, and they won't be ready until later this spring. I don't know how many artists' lofts the market will bear...
Okay, so we decide that maybe this isn't for us. On the way home we stop for dinner at a favorite Italian place in Worcester. When the check arrives, it is for exactly $42.00. Scary. That number (42) has popped up again and again in our lives, usually at times of great change or upheaval. When I met Tam I was living at #42 Wadsworth Ave in Waltham. When we got married the maid of honor arrived on Flight 42. When we bought our first house the down payment was $4200. And so on.
The Universe is trying to tell us something, but I don't know what...
When we saw this, our reaction was, "What we could do with that space!!" We then started bouncing ideas off each other about buying it and carving it up into artists' lofts and using a bunch of it ourselves.
Then we found out that the City of Holyoke is trying to develop an arts-and-industry district in the area where the mill is. Which means that developing the building for artist live/work spaces might actually be feasible (zoning for spaces like this tends to be problematic).
We went 'round and 'round with numbers and ideas and scenarios, but we figured that we could only do any realistic planning after visiting the space. We were there yesterday. The seller is in New York, but her father uses part of the building for a stone-sculpting studio. He showed us around.
In a way, I'm glad that we went on a day right after a snowstorm where there was significant snowmelt on the roof. It gave us an idea what we were in for. We found significant leakage in a variety of places, which we'd kind of anticipated. The place was once a woolen mill, and I'd say about half the equipment had been abandoned in place. It took up a lot of the space.
To make a long story short, the place would need a lot of work to make it usable for artists' lofts. The roofs would need to be replaced, the machinery would need to be removed, most of the floors would need to be replaced; we found significant buckling in several places where the leakage swelled the old wood-strip floors. The wiring would also have to be gutted and re-done; again we found many places where the old wiring was just ripped out and hanging (from the machinery that was taken away).
All the windows on the railroad side of the building were bricked up, and all the windows on the canal side were glass block. Again, we'd need to bust these out and replace them with good clear-glass windows to make the space usable at all. More effort, more expense.
To its credit the building has, as Tam describes it, "good bones". The skeletal structure is superb. It's just everything else that would be a lot of work to deal with.
Looking at it, it just felt waaaay too overwhelming for us to deal with on our own. If we could scare up a bunch of partners to share in the expense and/or work of the rehab we might consider going for it. Right now, at this point in our lives, it seems to be too much to deal with.
We're also not quite sure what the market is for artists' lofts in that area. The city is trying to rehab that area and is doing a pretty good job, but there's only one mill that I know of that's in the process of converting to artists' lofts, and they won't be ready until later this spring. I don't know how many artists' lofts the market will bear...
Okay, so we decide that maybe this isn't for us. On the way home we stop for dinner at a favorite Italian place in Worcester. When the check arrives, it is for exactly $42.00. Scary. That number (42) has popped up again and again in our lives, usually at times of great change or upheaval. When I met Tam I was living at #42 Wadsworth Ave in Waltham. When we got married the maid of honor arrived on Flight 42. When we bought our first house the down payment was $4200. And so on.
The Universe is trying to tell us something, but I don't know what...
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no subject
Date: 2005-03-15 10:37 am (UTC)Is Waltham where Brandeis is located? I'm trying to remember. I'm considering going there for grad school.