Back in the fall of 2014, we brought a development opportunity to your attention, as 1523 N. Front St. was listed for sale for $2.1M. We noted that the property included a building that had been built as the United Presbyterian Church in 1850 but had been used as a warehouse for a contractor in recent decades, and worried that a developer buying the property might tear down the former church in favor of unexciting new construction. It seems we weren’t alone in that concern, as it was nominated to the local historic register shortly after we wrote our story. No question, designation depressed interest in the property and resulted in a reduced sale price of just over $1.5M when the building finally changed hands about a year ago.

When we checked in on the property last fall, we learned that Domani Developers had purchased the property and noticed that renovation work was just getting started. But we didn’t know exactly what was in store for the building. Commenters living in the neighborhood gave us the low down, explaining that Domani was converting the building into office space and had plans for their own offices as well as office space for the quickly growing City Fitness empire. Looking at the outside of the building today, we see that there’s been some major progress, with new windows installed in many places. We have to assume that there’s been good progress inside as well.

Just to the south, beyond a few vacant lots, there’s a new building under construction. The initial plan for 1509 N. Front St. entailed a four unit residential building, but somewhere along the way the developers changed their mind, opting for three apartments above a commercial space. ISA did the design work for the project, choosing a funkier look than we’re accustomed to seeing these days. This is a bit of a trend under the El of late, a combination of aesthetic form and the function of stepping back parts of the building from the trains as they rumble past. The building looks like it’s more than halfway done, and the commercial space is now available for lease for a cool $2000/mo.

We’re pretty sure that Domani owns the vacant land in between the renovation and the new building. With more projects than we can count coming along up and down Front Street over the last few years, developing these lots at some point would seem to make all kinds of sense. We can also envision a situation, though, where they would opt to turn the lots into parking for their church turned office building next door. Obviously, we’d prefer development over surface parking, but we can certainly see both sides here.