For the Commercial Rehabilitation & Adaptive Reuse of the Electric Motor & Repair Company, 412-418 South Dawson Street & 321 West Davie Street, Raleigh
Located in the Depot Historic District, the Moderne-style building was originally constructed c.1935 on South Dawson Street as manufacturing facilities and office space for the Electric & Motor Repair Company, Inc. The two-story, three-bay masonry construction warehouse possesses the large open space, concrete floors, and exposed wood joist ceilings typical of the utilitarian buildings that evolved in the early twentieth century around Raleigh’s railroad and distribution hub. To accommodate the company’s growth, Electric Motor & Repair Company built additions which encompassed the historic Dr. Pepper Bottling Plant, adjacent. The first addition, built in the early 1940s, is located internally on the block featuring perimeter block walls, steel beams and central steel columns. A second addition, built in the early 1950s, also uses steel framing, beams, and columns; and, it is this addition which wraps all the way around the Dr. Pepper Bottling Plant as well as encompassing the building that currently houses the Crank Arm Brewery, providing the complex with frontage on West Davie Street.
In total, the building contains over 40,000 square feet. After purchasing the property in 2013, Empire began the historic tax credit rehabilitation in 2014. The rehab progressed in phases – as tenants signed leases, financing became available to kick off construction – and was completed in late 2017. The buildings are currently occupied by Baldwin&, MADabolic Raleigh Fitness Center, and Reunion Marketing. The general contractor for all shell and tenant improvement construction scopes, Empire Hardhat Construction took extreme care to ensure that the historic integrity of the buildings remained intact. The buildings still look and feel like the original, historic spaces. Unseen and unnoticed are structural repairs, detailed finish restorations, and the careful integration of new features along with those modern electrical, mechanical, fire and plumbing systems required to operate a building today. This was precisely the goal of the project team when they first set out to bring these buildings back to life for the community. Further, the rehabilitation has transformed the industrial-era building into usable office spaces that have helped breathe new life into the Depot Historic District. This project was spurred by the use of Federal historic and state mill income-producing tax credits with a private rehabilitation cost of $5.4 million.
The Board of Directors of Capital Area Preservation, Inc. is pleased to present a 2018 Anthemion Award to Empire Properties; Empire Hardhat Construction; Alliance Architecture; Morrison Engineers; Atlantec Engineers, PA; Paragon Bank for the Commercial Rehabilitation & Adaptive Reuse of Electric Motor & Repair Company, 412-418 South Dawson Street & 321 West Davie Street, Raleigh.