HANCOCK COUNTY — Nearly $1 million in facade improvements is coming to nine properties in Greenfield and Fortville.
Installing new windows and doors, tuckpointing bricks and other enhancements make up the projects, made possible by the municipalities’ involvement in the state’s Stellar Communities program. Several of the jobs will hearken back to their respective buildings’ historical roots. Property owners also say the improvements position their real estate well for the future.
The funding comes from the Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs’ Main Street Revitalization Program Community Development Block Grant. Fortville and Greenfield are entitled to the award after they and Hancock County were accepted in 2018 into Stellar Communities, a program providing funds and funding opportunities for community improvement projects.
Greenfield is getting $500,000 from the grant, but with its local match, more than $700,000 worth of facade improvements are coming to seven buildings downtown.
The H.B. Thayer building, owned by Tom Marten, is one of them.
“Most people, when they see that building, automatically assume that that is what the original facade looked like,” Marten said. “Originally it was quite a bit different, especially on the street level.”
When it was built in 1895 at 13 N. State St., windows and doors spanned its first-floor facade, rather than the arched entryway and abundance of brick that’s there today.
“The original storefront is what we’re trying to achieve, which is a lot more glass, it’s more of your traditional Main Street, retail-looking storefront with the shop windows and glass doors and stuff like that right off the street,” Marten said.
A law firm operates on the property’s second floor, and Marten said the facade improvements position the first floor nicely for future leasing.
“We really want to bring back more retail shopping to downtown,” he said.
The Hancock County Community Foundation, located in a former house at 312 E. Main St., is also slated for a bit of a blast from the past.
“We’re hoping to bring back some of the flavor of that building,” said Joan Fitzwater, Greenfield planning director, at a city redevelopment commission meeting earlier this month.
So much has been done to the property over the years that it won’t be able to look exactly like it did, but plans are in place for a second-story balcony, wood railings and windows closer to the kind it had when it was first built.
“To receive such a substantial update to our historic building with the help of this grant affords us an amazing opportunity, and one that would not happen in its absence; however, it’s more than about the face lift of a building,” foundation president and CEO Mary Gibble told the Daily Reporter in an email. “It’s an opportunity to contribute to the vibrancy of downtown Greenfield and well worth our co-investment with the city of Greenfield.”
In decades past, 11 American Legion Place housed the Why Not and Riley theaters and had windows lining its third-floor facade that have since been removed and filled in with brick. Sonicu, which develops remote-monitoring technology, currently operates on the building’s first floor and is looking forward to returning windows to the top of the building as well as adding storefront windows and new doors at ground level.
“I could not have been able to do all that work without the help of the state grant,” Sonicu CEO Nick Tuttle said.
He hopes to expand the company into the second and third floors in the future.
“I think it’s a good thing for the city of Greenfield to get this money,” Tuttle added. “All the building owners really get a big benefit out of this.”
The grant will also provide tuckpointing and copper cleaning on the outside of Bradley Hall Grand Ballroom & Events Venue, located at 2 W. Main St. Bradley United Methodist Church, 210 W. Main St., will replace its aluminum entry door with one made of wood and add a wheelchair-accessible ramp. Tuckpointing and window repair will occur at Greenfield Christian Church, 23 N. East St. The Greenfield Area Chamber of Commerce, 1 Courthouse Plaza, will also get tuckpointing, along with other repairs.
The funding makes up Greenfield’s second facade grant in the past few years. Between both, about $1.5 million in exterior building improvements will have been made to historical properties in the city.
Fortville is getting $250,000 from the grant, along with $36,000 from the town’s redevelopment commission and $2,000 each from both of the benefiting property owners.
Exterior improvements coming to FoxGardin Kitchen and Ale, 215 S. Main St., include new windows that will be able to open.
“We’re going to do some retractable windows — give an indoor-outdoor feel to the front of that space, really open it up,” Jake Burgess, the restaurant’s co-owner, said.
The COVID-19 pandemic has driven interest in fresh air and open space, Burgess continued.
“I think the general public is really enjoying that outdoor feel of restaurants,” he said. “God forbid we have to go through something like this again, I think it’s a great advantage — having some open-air concepts in such a cool space.”
The Veterans of Foreign Wars property, made up of two buildings at 206 S. Main St., will get exterior improvements as well. Pat Jacobs, an architect with Indianapolis-based ARCHitecture Trio who’s helping the town and Greenfield with the projects, said at a Fortville Town Council meeting earlier this year that the property will get new windows and have its first-floor limestone facade removed.
“We’re going to be reopening the storefronts to hopefully reactivate the connection between the streetscape and the activities in the VFW and enhance the visibility,” Jacobs said. “We’re also going to be opening up the second-floor windows and reintroducing the historic character.”
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Facade improvements on the way
Greenfield
- Bradley United Methodist Church, 210 W. Main St.
- Bradley Hall Grand Ballroom & Events Venue, 2 W. Main St.
- H.B. Thayer building, 13 N. State St.
- Greenfield Christian Church, 23 N. East St.
- Hancock County Community Foundation, 312 E. Main St.
- Sonicu, 11 American Legion Place
- Greenfield Area Chamber of Commerce, 1 Courthouse Plaza
Fortville
- FoxGardin Kitchen and Ale, 215 S. Main St.
- Veterans of Foreign Wars, 206 S. Main St.
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