So much for turning the empty, graffiti-covered Powell Square building into an arts center.
Demolition of the five-story factory began last week, ending years of effort to make it the focus of an arts district at the southern edge of downtown St. Louis.
Artists and preservationists lament the destruction, saying the 97-year-old building could have been rehabilitated.
City Hall has a different view. The city considers Powell Square such a highly visible mess — the property is right off Interstate 55 — that it initiated the demolition and is paying for it.
Jeff Rainford, Mayor Francis Slay’s chief of staff, said the city faced an uncooperative owner “who doesn’t care a lick about the appearance of” downtown and it felt compelled to act.
People are also reading…
“That building is the most visible eyesore in the city and has been for a long time,” Rainford said. “It’s become a symbol of something really negative.”
Stephen Murphy, a lawyer in Clayton, has owned Powell Square since 2001. He had led an effort to redevelop Powell Square and nearby warehouses as an arts district called Chouteau’s Landing.
Efforts to reach Murphy for comment were unsuccessful.
Under his plan, Powell Square was slated for 122,000 square feet of studios, galleries and retail space. The project made little headway. After the building’s windows were removed years ago, the amount of graffiti grew inside and out. Homeless people used the building as an encampment.
CONDEMNED
By last fall, city officials had seen enough. The city condemned the building and got a demolition permit. It is paying Z&L Wrecking $265,000 to take down the reinforced concrete structure, which opened in 1916 as a chemical factory.
Frank Oswald, the city’s deputy building commissioner, said this week that Powell Square will be gone in 30 to 60 days. He said Murphy had been unresponsive to the city’s requests to secure the building.
Murphy did not appeal the city’s condemnation, said Oswald, adding, “He knew it was coming.”
Rainford said Powell Square owner’s is not getting “a free teardown” from the city.
The city adds demolition costs to property owners’ tax bills. If the taxes go unpaid for three years, the city can seize the property.
Oswald said that in a typical year, the city recovers up to half of the $1 million to $3 million it spends to tear down buildings, most of them abandoned houses.
City-financed demolitions of large buildings are rare, but paying to flatten Powell Square is worth the effort, Oswald said.
“I don’t think it’s a bad investment for the city to clean up our skyline and, hopefully, get our investment back,” he said.
Preservationists disagreed.
Michael Allen, head of Preservation Research Office, a consulting firm, said Powell Square’s demolition is shortsighted.
“The rush to tear down doesn’t make sense to me,” he said.
Powell Square is structurally sound, Allen said, adding that it is among three old downtown buildings that are either coming down or endangered.
One is a building at the former Crunden-Martin Woodenware Co. complex. A five-alarm fire in December 2011 heavily damaged the building. Murphy owns the brick structure a block from Powell Square and within the Chouteau’s Landing district.
The third is Cupples 7, part of the Cupples Station area west of Busch Stadium. As a result of years of neglect, much of Cupple 7’s interior has collapsed.
Condemned by the city in 2008, Cupples 7 could be near collapse. It’s outlook grew more tenuous after no one appeared to have responded by the city’s deadline Thursday to submit a rehabilitation proposal. City officials hope to save that building and note that historic preservation tax credits could be available to help fund a rehab.
But such a project could cost tens of millions of dollars and would have to include payment of back property taxes owed by the Cupples 7 owner, Ballparks Lofts III LLC.
Allen said Powell Square, which was used as a rug warehouse before Murphy bought it, was the sturdiest of the three buildings.
“I think it’s foolish the city would fund the demolition of the building that would be easiest to rehabilitate,” Allen said. “We could be losing all three of these buildings when we could have saved at least one.”
artist’s vision
Although city officials viewed Powell Square and its graffiti as an eyesore, others saw the spray-painted surfaces as a redevelopment opportunity.
Peat Wollaeger, a St. Louis artist who has been hired to paint stenciled murals on structures in several cities, said Powell Square could have been St. Louis’ version of 5Pointz, a graffiti-covered New York factory turned into an arts center.
“My dream was that,” Wollaeger said. “That’s kind of how I wanted to roll.”
He formerly rented a Chouteau’s Landing studio from Murphy and in 2010, with the owner’s permission, painted a 250-square-foot mural on Powell Square’s rooftop.
Two weeks after its completion, someone painted “CLUB” over Wollaeger’s artwork. He responded by covering the word with his take on the familiar “Mr. Yuk” face.
Wollaeger said this week that public attention similar to what led to renovation last year of the “flying saucer” structure near St. Louis University might have saved Powell Square, which is quickly vanishing.
Or as Wollaeger put it: “That canvas is gone.”