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Navy base warehouse serves building arts college, local designers
By Dennis Quick
Senior Staff Writer
A former industrial warehouse on the old Navy base in North Charleston is evolving into a multi-use building with a distinct art-and-design flavor.
The American College of the Building Arts occupies about half of the 40,000-square-foot building, built in 1939 as part of the base’s Storehouse Row.
About 15 American College of the Building Arts’ students are taking woodworking, masonry, plastering, metal forging and other courses in the building. The college’s space includes an 18,000-square-foot shop area and 2,000 square feet of office space.
Twenty-foot shipping containers owned by the college serve as changing rooms for the students and storage space for equipment.
The space for the American College of the Building Arts has been designed with flexibility in mind. The college has a 2-year lease on the space with an option to stay.
If the college moves classes from the building to the college’s new, forthcoming home on McLeod Plantation on James Island, the vacated space can be adapted for artist studios and office space, Baxter said.
A restaurant, gallery, exhibition areas, artist studios and professional design offices will occupy the remaining space.
The Noisette Co. began its $3.2 million renovation of the building in April and expects to complete it in November. Kansas City, Mo.-based architecture firm BNIM designed the building’s renovation. New York-base Bovis Lend Lease is the general contractor.
The building’s features include concrete walls and heavy-gauge steel construction, plenty of natural light, a 35-foot-high ceiling and 15 garage doors. Noisette worked with the state Historic Preservation Office in Columbia to preserve these features and the buildings façade, according to Noisette project manager Jeff Baxter.
The building is being renovated with sustainability in mind. Natural light pouring through rows of full-length windows will reduce lighting costs. Many of the interior walls will be constructed with transparent materials to allow the passage of natural light. On cloudy days, a sensor triggers overhead electrical lights, Baxter explained.
Large, overhead ceiling fans keep the building cool during summer and eliminate air-conditioning bills. Heating units for winter are built into the ceiling.
Huge garage doors at the building’s east and west ends will serve as main entrances. It was through these doors that trains entered to unload their cargo by an overhead crane, which still remains and will serve as an art object. Glass entrances to the building will be built directly behind the metal garage doors, which will be rolled down in the event of a hurricane.
The other side of the building will house eight 300-square-foot artist studios, six of which have already been leased, plus 4,500 square feet of professional office space that can be subdivided into 750-square-foot increments for interior designers, architects and other art-and-design businesses.
Additionally, there will be 3,000 square feet of restaurant space and a 5,000-square-foot exhibition area.
Dennis Quick is senior staff writer for the Business Journal. E-mail him at dquick@charlestonbusiness.com.
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