Shopping Center Business

MAY 2017

Shopping Center Business is the leading monthly business magazine for the retail real estate industry.

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HISTORIC BUILDINGS 168 • SHOPPING CENTER BUSINESS • May 2017 W ant to know a little about a city's culture and history and go shopping or eat a meal pre- pared by a local chef? Examples abound across the country of retail centers that marry historical archi- tecture or neighborhoods with shops that specialize in local or regional brands. In Atlanta and Dallas, for example, momen- tum is building to develop and tenant in ways that are a refreshing alternative to the mall or strip center and that really give online shopping a run for its money. KROG STREET MARKET Atlanta has always been a commer- cial hub in the South. As such, the city is something of graveyard of aging, historic buildings from its industrial-age boom. Today, these buildings are routinely being acquired and redeveloped into shopping, dining, living and working destinations that can't be replicated. Their history, lo- cations, design and tenant mix are hitting the bull's eye in the way people want to interact with dining and retail today. Krog Street Market is a mixed-use site inside an 1889 building that once man- ufactured kitchen pans and pot-bellied stoves. Along with Jamestown's Ponce City Market, a retail, dining, office and multifamily reinvention of a beloved 1926 Sears building — the largest brick structure in the Southeast — Krog Street Market has been a catalyst for similar developments throughout the metro area. Nothing like a mall, nothing like a gro- cery-anchored center, these projects are like no other because their settings are one-of-a-kind and connected to the city's history. In 2012, the Krog Street site, which in- cludes another building, The Stoveworks, across the street, was acquired by Paces Properties, an Atlanta-based developer with a mission to imbue new life into many of the city's industrial-age buildings. Krog Street opened in 2014 and fea- tures casual food spaces run by local chefs interspersed with retail that is, except for one tenant, comprised entirely of local or regional businesses. Getting this mix of retail exactly right results in a dining and retail experience the developers are striving for — one in which each tenant gels with the project so that ultimately the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. "Everyone on our team would tell you that we say 'no' to tenants far more often than we say 'yes'," says Paces Properties Partner Merritt Lancaster. "Just because you can pay rent doesn't necessarily mean we want you to be there. Developing these types of properties is a very thoughtful process. We curate, physically, the identity of the building and its function but then In The Past Of Progress Retail "experiences" housed in historic buildings or neighborhoods are in peak season. Lynn Peisner In operation for 2.5 years, Atlanta's Krog Street Market has served as a model for converting historic properties into modern food and retail venues. Photo credit: Barry Cantrell

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