SPRINGFIELD, Mass. (WWLP) – A new apartment building has officially opened in downtown Springfield.
A special ribbon cutting ceremony was held for the new ThirtyOne Elm Apartment at the historic 31 Elm Street building in Springfield’s Court Square. The new building will bring 74 apartments and 13,000 square feet of retail and commercial space to downtown Springfield.
WinnCompanies, along with their partner Opal Real Estate Group, will open the adaptive reuse development that will feature 59 market rate and 15 middle-income apartments, which leased immediately. A 9,000-square-foot ground-floor restaurant will open in the building this fall along with ground floor retail space. The $54.5 million building took two years of preservation and construction to give new life to the 132-year-old Court Square Building, which has been vacant for 30 years.
The Executive Vice President of WinnDevelopment Adam Stein told 22News, “This property leased up in just under two months. So we moved 74 people in let’s think about it it’s almost an occupancy a day you know over the two month period time sometimes two a day.”
And the love for the city is real. Peter Picknelly with the Opal Real Estate Group says downtown Springfield has a lot to offer which is what makes people want to move, “We were full before we even opened but people want to live downtown there is a renewed energy downtown with the MassMutual Center, Symphony Hall, MGM, and the Big Y Market downtown.”
Bringing ThirtyOne Elm to downtown Springfield was not an easy process. It was a $54.5 million dollar construction effort. It took 10 years to plan and two years to build.
This property came a long way, and Springfield Mayor Sarno explains what the building was like before the construction started, “I remember going through this building many times, floor boards, pigeon poop. It was just decrepit for nearly three decades. People said you will never get it done they said the same thing about Union Station–you will never get it done and working closer with Congressman Neal, we got it done.”
ThirtyOne Elm features 59 market rate and 15 middle-income apartments, and this new and improved space provides more than just new housing, it will soon have a 250-seat restaurant. The restaurant is called Copper and Kin and it is expected to open in the fall.
