A synergy of historic preservation and downtown growth: Adaptive Reuse for Multifamily Housing.

Adaptive Reuse, Historic Preservation, Multifamily Housing

“Preserving the architectural fabric of our historic downtown is baked into our DNA as a firm,” notes Jim Bailey, senior principal and active advocate for walkable streets. “Bringing more people to live downtown through multifamily adaptive reuse of legacy buildings is a win for preservation, and a bigger win for a livable downtown.”

Senior principal Irby Hightower adds: “Since our earliest days as a firm, adaptive reuse has been an active part of our practice. We’ve surveyed – and designed for – any number of significant historic buildings downtown. Multifamily adaptive reuse serves the community well by preserving the character of our urban core, and as a means of bringing attractive new housing options online.”

Tower Life Building

Aurora Apartments

Blue Flame Building

Municipal Plaza

Continental Block Development

Milam Building

Marie Maguire Lofts

Hawn Arcadia Sears Redevelopment

Our work on the Fairmount Hotel relocation and adaptive reuse launched our firm. We are always proud to have stepped in to give a worthwhile legacy building a bright new future.

Irby Hightower, FAIA

Championing Historic Preservation

San Antonio has a strong identity as a city with a historic downtown. Alamo Architects has played a part to preserve it since our early days as a firm: we led the well-documented 1985 move of the Fairmount Hotel from its original location to its present home adjoining Hemisfair. The complexity of both the move and the historically sensitive addition earned us local reputation as champions of historic preservation.

The number of residential adaptive reuse projects in San Antonio grew in the early 1980s with federal tax credits. The pace of redevelopment picked up new steam after the City adopted the Strategic Framework Plan for the Center City in 2011. Residential adaptive reuse projects reinvest in historic urban blocks, and often provide much-needed affordable housing.

Adapting a San Antonio Icon: Tower Life

Our adaptation of the 31-story Tower Life Building (soon to be re-named) to residential units adds an exciting new chapter to our decades of experience with adaptive re-use projects here and in the region. Designed by noted San Antonio architecture team Atlee and Robert Ayers, the elegant neo-Gothic skyscraper was completed in 1929. The finished adaptation of this well-preserved gem will offer ground floor restaurant and retail space, opening to the River Walk. Floors above will become apartments in a unique new address.

“I love a challenge,” notes Beverly Baldwin, Alamo principal and manager of the Tower Life adaptive reuse project. “Adding new systems within legacy structures, in this case adapting a former office tower to residential functionality, is exacting work. Adaptive reuse projects strongly contribute, one structure at a time, to our sense of local identity as a historic city center.”