A new three-story office building is planned for the corner of North Phillips Avenue and West Walnut Street.
An affiliate of Sid Grinker Restoration plans to demolish a vacant four-unit apartment building, located on the property at 1703 N. Phillips, to make way for the development.
It Had to be You LLC, which lists Sharon Grinker as the agent, purchased the property in 2020 for $306,900, according to city assessment records.
The building, which will be a combination of retail and office space, is among the husband-and-wife duo’s latest projects.
Sharon Grinker’s husband, Michael, runs Sid Grinker Restoration, located at 1719 N. Phillips Ave. The couple has bought and improved several properties clustered along Walnut Street between Phillips Avenue and Finlayson Street in the Bronzeville area.
They own the building that houses Pilcrow Coffee, 416 W. Walnut St. An addition to that building is now home to Sweetbush, an interior plant rental business, at 406 W. Walnut St. The couple bought and renovated the old Dillon Bindery building in 2017, which now houses RetailWorks, 424 W. Walnut St.
“We’ve been doing these types of projects in the neighborhood and in the corridor for quite some time,” Sharon Grinker said.
Grinker updated the Bronzeville Advisory Committee on the project during its March 16 meeting. The development will be smaller in scale from a prior version that had seven floors.
Korb Architects is the lead for the development.
The three-story office building will have either office or retail at street level, while the remaining two floors will house offices. Each floor will have one tenant with unit sizes approximately 2,500 square feet. The entrance will be on Walnut Street.
The building, which will be a mass timber hybrid, will maximize sustainable green building features, said Sarah Colacino of Korb Architects.
Mass timber hybrid construction combines engineered wood products with traditional building materials. Korb Architects was among the firms to work on the tallest mass timber hybrid structure in the world, The Ascent, 700 E. Kilbourn Ave. The 25-story building knocked Norway’s Mjösa Tower out of first place.
The design extends the couple’s green infrastructure efforts. Previously, they partnered with Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District to create green infrastructure projects for stormwater runoffs behind Dead Bird Brewing, 1726 Finlayson St., and Pilcrow coffee.
Colacino hopes to complete design and permitting by the spring followed by securing construction bids and financing in the summer. Colacino said construction could begin later in 2026.
Grinker said she hopes to identify tenants before the building is completed.
Ray Hill, executive director of the Historic King Drive BID, lauded the project’s redesign.
“I think this fits a lot better and more comfortably in the district’s aesthetic and also still gives great views to the downtown landscape,” Hill said.
Kari Smith, with Milwaukee’s Department of City Development, updated the committee on city real estate development along the corridor. March 23 is the deadline for requests for proposal on the Career Youth Development building at 2601-09 N. King Drive and its neighboring Victory Over Violence Park, 2615 N. King Drive.
The city is selling both together for $280,000. The city wants a developer to take on both properties.
The city is still holding out hope that a developer would come through for the Hummel/Uihlein Building, 2673-2779 N. King Drive. The historic landmark building has been on the market since January 2022 with an asking price of $5,000. The city hopes to identify a developer soon or the building could face demolition.
Smith said the city recognizes challenges in redeveloping a historic building and has been working to find funding sources to make restoration more feasible.
“We’re hopeful,” she told the committee. “We have a few potential leads and are just trying to exhaust all options so we can try to save that building.”
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Bronzeville to get new mass timber office and retail building
Reporting by La Risa R. Lynch, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
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