Pace picks up for building conversion

Eastside Brick rebounds from financing setback

The Daily Inter Lake

Eastside Brick at last has a new window on the world. Literally.

With almost all new windows in place - a couple still are on order - the 1911-vintage Kalispell General Hospital-turned-Courthouse East is edging closer to the day when four floors of artist studios, condominiums, retail spaces, offices and professional suites will be brimming with life.

For Dave Rickert, Eric Berry and Vince Padilla, managing members of DEV Properties, current news is good news for the $8 million project.

All 19 residential condominiums sold out within 10 days of being offered. It's a tribute, they figure, to the emotional cachet the historic building carries for many who want a unique home with local significance.

The 32 office and professional spaces are going at a more measured pace. Two are sold, two are leased and talks are under way with a potential buyer for a coffee house in the boiler building to be rebuilt out back. A couple of glass blowers are interested in the studio/professional space in the coffee house.

In the lower level, seven of the nine live/work artist studios are sold. "There's a lot of potential" for marketability here, Padilla said. "There's a lot of history."

But Eastside Brick, the full-block project between Fifth and Sixth avenues east and Seventh and Eighth streets east, hasn't been an easy enterprise for the developers.

DEV Properties is the second private owner of the former county-owned property, buying the historic building from another developer in April 2005.

The initial buyer had purchased Courthouse East at auction in 2002 and angered many people when he tried to level the building and replace it with high-density housing without seeking the necessary zoning change.

That bred discontent which wafted into the current project, even after DEV Properties won the zone change in June 2005.

Traffic, particularly with its location in the block adjacent to Hedges Elementary School, was a concern in the well-established neighborhood of narrow streets. But Padilla and Berry said traffic in the mixed-use residential and commercial building will be no greater, and may be less, than what it was when still used as Courthouse East.

Asbestos removal also sparked alarm. But the rumored $1 million bill ultimately amounted to just $17,000.

DEV Properties moved ahead with plans, preserving the brick and salvaging 90 percent of the building's interior walls after original demolition efforts were stopped. They were too late, however, to save the boiler building and now plan to rebuild it on its original spot.

After a financing setback, triggered Aug. 1 when one of the principal private investors backed out of the project, construction work stalled. But First Interstate Bank just stepped up with new financing in the past couple of weeks, so Padilla is hard at work scheduling subcontractors to restart their work crews.

The 65,000-square-foot Eastside Brick project will include a 126-space paved parking lot with another 60 or so overflow from streetside parking.

A new sidewalk on the east, along Sixth Avenue East, will connect with existing walks to ring the entire block with pedestrian-friendly concrete.

"The east side is quite a walking neighborhood, even when it's bitter cold," Padilla said. "We hope to be an asset."

And a new storm sewer will divert runoff away from the city's sanitary sewer system. A system of swales, cisterns and an exterior berm around the yard will retain rainwater for landscaping use.

It's just one of the many "green" construction features Berry has designed into Eastside Brick.

Tenants and purchasers have interior-finish options of highly renewable bamboo, recycled and sustained-growth exotic hardwoods, 100-percent wool carpet, soft limestone tile, travertine, cork and more.

Six-inch and eight-inch concrete floors and 18-inch brick walls provide a level of solidity and soundproofing not commonly found in modern construction. Three-inch-thick, true plaster walls will muffle sound. Many other features of construction used in 1911, then in 1948 and 1964 when additions were built, also were salvaged.

Berry figures a half-million tons of concrete, brick, steel and other materials were saved from the landfill.

Their choices for lighting and other features should cut electricity usage by 30 percent over what conventionally designed operation would have cost.

Aesthetics will be a plus, too, Berry and Padilla said.

A pressed-tin ceiling with modern chandelier and sculptures displayed on a rotating basis will greet visitors at the main entry. Hallways will be lined with lighted, recessed art nooks. Exposed mechanical systems in the ceilings will be painted flat black for an open but unobtrusive feel. Sitting rooms beside large windows will be sprinkled along the way.

With living spaces ranging from 405 square feet to 1,700 square feet, and prices ranging from $80,000 to $299,000, the developers hope to offer something for everyone.

Renovation on the 1964 north addition is well under way and should be available before long. Work on the 1911 main center section is slated to be finished by the end of June. The coffee house, they project, should be ready by this fall if negotiations with the buyer proceed well so construction can get under way.

Both Berry and Padilla will live in Eastside Brick condominiums themselves and are excited about remaining as part of the community.

"We want this to be a long-term, nice project," Berry said, one "that most everyone will be happy with."

Reporter Nancy Kimball can be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at nkimball@dailyinterlake.com