NEW ULM - Are you an artist or creative type with a need for additional space? If your answer is yes, New Ulm has the perfect place for you. The historic Grand Hotel at 210 N. Minnesota St. hosted a grand opening Friday night to show off its renovation. Renamed as the Grand Center for Arts and Culture (GCAC), it will now serve as studio space for local artists.

Open house guests were given a guided tour of the various studio spaces created from old hotel rooms, along with a history lesson about the building which covered topics such its use as a hospital during the U.S.-Dakota War of 1862. The process of converting the GCAC into an arts center was nearly three years in the making and required substantial fundraising. A portion of the reconstruction was funded through historical grants. To receive grants, the building needed to meet certain criteria. As one tour guide put it, "You can't just replace every window."

Building architect Andy Engan was present during the open house and explained that fixing the floors was a huge challenge. According to Engan, both the second and third-floor boards were beginning to sag. Engan compared the floor to walking on a diving board. While floor repairs were necessary to qualify for historic grants, the replacement floor needed to resemble the original. In addition, all door frames to the studio are originals, including the transoms. In fact, to preserve the historic look of the building, the building features a couple of doors that go nowhere. Those doors and door frames simply serve as a reminder of the building's past.

Staff photo by Clay Schuldt been converted

Anne Makepeace, instrumental in the renovation and a descendant of the man who built the hotel, tours the basement, which she hopes will some day house a ceramics studio.

Staff photo by Clay Schuldt

Many of the old hotel rooms at the Grand Center for Arts and Culture have been converted into studio spaces for local artists.

Staff photo by Clay Schuldt

Local artist Jenny Fitzen makes herself at home in one of the The Grand studio spaces.

Staff photo by Clay Schuldt

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Grand Opening at Center for Arts

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Augmented Reality for Architects
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These Colours Don #39;t Run by Architects (Cover)
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Tioga, ND (PRWEB) February 07, 2014

Miller Architects & Builders has recently broke ground on MainStay Suites in Tioga, North Dakota.

Owner, Ernie Graham of Graham Development, Minot, North Dakota, has been a long time commercial developer in the state of California. In 2011 Mr. Graham started researching the Bakken area and in 2012 he made a few trips to Western North Dakota. With those findings he and his wife Janice sold their California home and moved to North Dakota, eventually settling in Minot where they have relocated their business. His son Corbin has also moved to Minot to help in the business. The Tioga hotel project is his first North Dakota development. Mr. Graham has an identical MainStay Suites hotel scheduled to start construction early spring in Stanley, North Dakota.

The MainStay Suites hotel is an 89 unit, extended stay hotel. The hotel features a spacious great room with three distinctive areas that include a breakfast bar, fireplace lounge area, and guest bar. The hotel also features a weight room, meeting room, guest pantry, outdoor covered gazebo for cooking and relaxing, and electrical plug-ins for autos and trucks. Rooms feature full kitchens, granite countertops, large bathrooms, office/work desk, comfortable chair, and connectivity. Dora Hospitality will manage the hotel.

Miller Architects & Builders is extremely proud to have the opportunity to team with Graham Development on this project. This makes the fifth hotel project we have provided construction services for in the Bakken area.

Established in 1874, Miller Architects & Builders is one of the Midwests premier design/build commercial construction firms specializing in commercial construction. Miller Architects & Builders constructs all its facilities using your local labor where possible. Miller Architects & Builders (http://www.millerab.com) is headquartered in St. Cloud, Minnesota.

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Miller Architects & Builders Breaks Ground on MainStay Suites Hotel in Tioga, North Dakota

This rendering shows one idea for a pedestrian crossing over Interstate 5 from a trolley station into Pacific Beach. AIA/SDAT

This rendering shows one idea for a pedestrian crossing over Interstate 5 from a trolley station into Pacific Beach. / AIA/SDAT

Local architects moved forward Friday with big thoughts about Pacific Beach and Mission Beach as a possible model for all San Diego neighborhoods.

The American Institute of Architects' local urban design committee mulled over ideas as simple as artistic crosswalks and roundabout intersections and as a ambitious as a major transit-oriented, mixed-use development around the coming trolley station at Interstate 5 and Balboa Avenue.

"This is an opportunity that has popped up immediately," said Dan Stewart, the committee chairman. "It would be nice if we take advantage of this."

Ideas included holding a spring workshop and fall symposium on innovative planning ideas, such as:

A roundabout is one idea for slowing traffic at busy intersections. Such an idea is being considered at the Grand/Garnet split off Interstate 5. / AIA/SDAT

The discussion grew out of a community workshop session last summer and a followup in December from a $10,000 sustainable design assessment team, sent by the national AIA, based in Washington, D.C., to look over the gritty details of living, working and visiting the beach areas.

The team in its analysis, to be followed up in the next few weeks by a formal set of recommendations, noticed that the two beach communities are too dependent on cars, spew too many green house gases into the air and need to think about an environmentally-oriented future.

Danielle Buttacavoli, who chairs the AIA's local Committee on the Environment, said the biggest threat -- sea level rise over the next generation -- does not yet figure into beach residents' and business owners' immediate priorities.

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Pacific Beach, Mission Beach: Redo model for the county?

Rendering of the retail space at 935 Madison Avenue

Renderings have been unveiled for a roughly 14,000-square-foot Madison Avenue retail space next to the Whitney Museum of American Art.

The project, still under construction at 935 Madison Avenue, is part of a renovation of a historical 1876 property on 74th Street. The retail portion includes roughly 7,200 square feet on ground floor and 7,100 on the lower level, said Isaacs & Co.sJoel Isaacs, who is marketing the retail space with colleagueJosh Lewin. Itwill have over 100 feet of frontage on Madison Avenue.

The whole project is being developed by real estate investor and health care entrepreneurDaniel E. Straus.

Each of the ground-floor spaces will have a lower-level space which can be used for selling and storage, Mr. Isaacs said. On the ground floor, asking retail rents are $1,200 a foot on the corner and $1,000 a foot inline and on the lower level they are $50 a foot, he said. Ceiling heights can reach 18 feet on the ground floor and 10 feet on the lower level.

Rendering of the interior of the retail space at 935 Madison Avenue

The area is expected to generate more foot traffic after theMetropolitan Museum of Art takes event and exhibition space at the WhitneysMarcel Breuerbuilding, at945 Madison Avenuenext year.

Mr. Isaacs said there has been considerable interest in the retail space.

We are talking to a broad range of high-end brands, he said.

Upstairs, 10 new residential units, with an address of 33 East 74th Street, are under construction. Home prices will range fromabout $15 million to in excess of $30 million, a spokesperson for the project said. Douglas EllimansKatherine Gauthier and Karen Mansour are marketing the residential space.

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Revealed: Images, Prices of Retail Space Next to Whitney

FREMONT -- A thriving outdoor mall could expand to meet one of the area's biggest retail needs, if the City Council approves its plan to open the city's largest sporting goods retailer and other storefronts.

The Block at Pacific Commons' proposal to add Dick's Sporting Goods in a 50,000-square-foot store and Buffalo Wild Wings, a restaurant in a 6,500-square-foot building, will be considered Feb. 18 by the council. The Planning Commission last month unanimously recommended approval.

Fremont has coveted a large sports equipment retailer since Tri-City Sporting Goods closed in 2006, city leaders said. "Right now, a lot of people step outside Fremont to buy a ball or other basic sporting goods," said Christina Briggs, the city's economic development manager. "We're filling key voids in our retail, and it speaks to The Block's existing success that it is adding to it."

The 27-acre shopping hot spot -- bounded by Boscell Road, Bunche Drive and Curie and Christy streets -- opened two years ago next to Pacific Commons, an 80-acre outdoor shopping center that opened in 2004.

Catellus, which developed both retail zones next to Interstate 880, sold Pacific Commons two months ago to Heitman, a Chicago investment company.

But Catellus still owns The Block, envisioning it as a food and entertainment mecca when it built a cinema multiplex and several restaurants there in 2012. Its first phase landed stores such as Target, Men's Warehouse, Ulta and Sleep Number, as well as The Habit Burger Grill, Which Wich and other eateries. Now on the verge of adding two large retail spaces in its second phase, The Block also might include another store in a 3,000-square-foot building, said Catellus spokesman Sean Whiskeman. "We're in pretty active discussions to find a tenant for that third space," he said. "We've had great interest from restaurants for it."

The Block originally was meant to be what the developer calls a lifestyle center, where a cluster of small retailers would encourage customers to walk within the mall, staying for food, entertainment and shopping.

That specific goal was a casualty of the 2008 recession, Whiskeman said, saying the economic downturn made it "difficult to bring in the right critical mass of those small-shop retailers."

The Block vision has not been abandoned -- Catellus still aims to build a promenade linking the sporting goods store and the restaurant.

"There still will be beautiful plaza spaces and great opportunities for outdoor dining," Whiskeman said. "We still have elements of the original plan; it's still intended as a lifestyle center."

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Fremont's biggest sporting goods store, restaurant may come to The Block shopping center

Plans for redevelopment in downtown Towson have prompted area merchants to consider face-lifts of their own, spurring renewed interest in a Baltimore County program for commercial revitalization.

To keep up with projects that will bring new stores, restaurants and residences to Towson's core, several York Road businesses are working through county programs that offer design advice from architects and interest-free loans for exterior improvements.

"They know that things are changing, so they want to take advantage of the change so that all boats will rise with this tide of change," said Andrea Van Arsdale, director of the county's Department of Planning.

Businesses located in the county's 16 commercial revitalization districts, which range from Arbutus to Reisterstown to Dundalk, are eligible for 10 free hours of professional design services from an architect, interest-free loans of up to $30,000 for exterior improvements, or five- or 10-year commercial revitalization tax credits.

There's been strong interest in the storefront program, which is designed to help businesses in aging commercial corridors with that critical first impression. The planning department took over the program, which dates to the 1990s, from the economic development department as part of a 2012 reorganization.

Sixteen small businesses have turned to the "Architect on Call" service over the past two years for projects in Catonsville, Essex, Nottingham, Parkville, Pikesville, Randallstown, Reisterstown, Towson and Woodlawn, said Fronda Cohen, a county spokeswoman. Funds for the service come from larger architectural contracts with the county's Department of Public Works.

"Right now, there's a lot in the pipeline," said Troy Leftwich, a commercial revitalization specialist in the planning department. And he expects activity to pick up this spring.

The Melting Pot in Towson plans to update its front from a "Western town look" with an outdated awning to a new flatstone front with a colorful pitch roof, said Jeff Nichols, co-owner of the restaurant.

After getting help from an architect on the design, Nichols is preparing his loan applications. Because the Melting Pot takes up two storefront addresses, each is eligible for a loan. The rest of the project, which Nichols said would cost more than $100,000, will be privately financed.

The improvements not only will help the restaurant keep up with the area's renaissance but participate in it, he said.

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Baltimore County merchants tap into county revitalization program

Fire And Smoke Damaged Home Restoration
Behind the scenes footage of framing, electrical, and drywall restoration work due to smoke damage.

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