Immediately next door to the vacant lot that was once home to the Ortelibs Brewery at 3rd & Poplar, nine four-story homes have risen. These luxury units mark another stroke of the bell in the changing face of Northern Liberties from industrial to residential.
We first told you when plows began chomping the earth here along the 800 block of N. American St. back in the fall of 2011. Then worked stopped and a silence overtook the lot; late in 2012, new owners purchased the property for $1.1M. By the end of 2013, buildings had started to rise. At the time, we only knew that permits called for nine townhomes.
Developers Space & Company have dubbed the project Liberty Estates and the homes start at $1,050,000. Despite the high price points, a few of the homes are already under agreement/sold. Even the least expensive units have 3 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms, and nearly 4,500 sqft of living space.
Right now, except for the jazz club in the last standing parts of the old brewery, there's a large vacant lot where the rest of Ortlieb's once stood. Tower Investments demolished that old building last summer, and a big project is coming soon to that property.
Meanwhile, around this time last year, developers were engaged in the community process to demolish a shopping center just across the street from the former Ortleibs, on the west side of 3rd Street and in its place build 26 new units. Since then, the old shopping center was razed, and 26 units are indeed under construction, several of which you can see in the photo above. Actually, here's a better view.
Combine all this with the four-story building nearby on the 200 block of Poplar St., and you've got lots of investment and building in the general vicinity. And let's not forget, across the street from Liberty Estates, Kieran Timberlake has opened a new office in the former Ortlieb's bottling plant. All this is happening smack right in the nexus of Northern Liberties, close to parks, good eating, and shopping too. Man, we remember this neighborhood back in the day when none of this would have seemed possible. The last decade plus has brought incredible changes to this neighborhood, and more are still to come.