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Recommissioned
Officers’ quarters finding new life as part of Noisette Co.’s plans
By Kathleen Dayton
Staff Writer
The ghosts of military families from long ago and of the high-ranking Navy brass that steered the former Charleston Naval Base through the 20th century will soon make way for new occupants of the former base’s officers quarters.
Finding new uses for the base housing is part of The Noisette Co.’s master plan for the property, now known as The Navy Yard.
The site is at the northern edge of 340 acres The Noisette Co. purchased at city-appraised fair market value from North Charleston after the base closed in 1995. In return, Noisette has master-planned not only the base but also 3,000 acres surrounding it, including some of North Charleston’s oldest neighborhoods, in a city-within-a-city concept. The entire project is an ambitious public-private venture between North Charleston and Noisette that hopes to forever change the North Charleston area.
The officers housing district is one of three historic areas Noisette has identified on the former military base; the others are the old Navy hospital and the shipyard district.
The former site of the officers’ quarters is a crown jewel in the Noisette project, resting on about 25 acres with a number of elements not often associated with North Charleston. The property is waterfront and festooned with live oaks, azaleas and magnolias, remnants of a bygone area when the famed architectural firm of Frederick Law Olmstead laid out a public summer garden there and called it Chicora Park.
Earlier still, Chicora Park was the site of a succession of plantations: The Retreat, Turnbull Plantation and Oak Grove. The land is located on the highest ground within the former base and fronts the Cooper River, where Noisette has already opened a $5 million riverfront park as the focal point of its new urban city.
Adjacent to the park, former military housing includes Panama houses that were built above garage space in a style frequently found on military bases in the 1930s.
Roger Noyes, Noisette’s director of development, said the company is in active negotiations with a restaurant operator for one of them.
“I think this area badly needs some good restaurants, and waterfront dining is fairly rare in Charleston, in spite of the fact that we have all this water around us,” Noyes said.
Other buildings nearby could become an inn and conference center.
Quarters a likely spot for inn
When the Navy began developing the base at the beginning of the 20th century, it built two of Chicora Park’s outstanding structures. One is an immense administration building with an Italianate piazza, now called One Admiralty. The brick manse is being marketed as deluxe office space and could become a conference center and potentially include a day spa.
The other is Quarters A, the former home of the base’s top commander, which could become an inn. The Greek revival house sits on a hill near the river on property wrapped in Spanish moss-draped oaks.
Negotiations are underway with an inn operator who has yet to make a commitment, Noyes said.
“I honestly think they would like to do it, but they’re waiting to see how the market evolves,” Noyes said. “I think the market is already here. There are 5,000 people working on the base footprint already and the only hotels for business people are out on (Interstate 26 and Interstate 526).
“I feel it would do extremely well on the weekend, with Charleston being a major player in the wedding business, combined with the emotional ties people have to the old Navy base. I think the inn would have no problem in having a wedding every Saturday and Sunday. Some of them would probably be the children of Navy personnel who had been based here. You’d probably have ship reunions as well.”
The old officers’ homes are not likely to be private residences again. The company’s main plan is to keep Chicora Park as a public green space and keep the waterfront accessible to the public.
There are about 20 homes in the district, including One Admiralty and Quarters A. Most, but not all, of the homes are considered historic and will be restored. A few brick-veneer homes may be demolished.
“The garden aspect of that whole area is what a lot of people value. It’s like walking through a college campus,” said Jim Augustin, Noisette’s vice president and co-founder.
A former Navy Civil Engineer Corps captain, Augustin was the base closing officer in the mid-1990s. After retiring, he started working on sustainable development projects.
He and John Knott, Noisette’s president and co-founder, were drawn to the base and North Charleston because the area was so depressed economically, environmentally and socially.
Saving the relics
These building are worth saving, but renovating the older homes will cost more than building new ones, Noyes said. The Navy Yard’s former military housing was not maintained after the base closed and rests in an odd, time-warped condition. One of the Panama houses has the remains of an old-fashioned clothesline in the yard, with a swing and trapeze hanging from an oak limb. Vandals have shot out the leaded glass panes surrounding the front door of Quarters A and many of its windows. A musky smell mingled with heat and humidity is heavy inside, the paint is peeling and birds have come to roost on the porch.
“The trouble is, the Navy just shut the door behind them and walked off. They
didn’t do anything to cocoon or preserve them,” Augustin said.
Noisette has turned the air conditioning on in buildings where it is working and found some temporary tenants to occupy the houses.
Noyes said everyone wants to see the base buzzing with the same energy as before.
“It will never buzz with the same specific energy, because it is no longer a Navy base,” he said. “You have to find something respecting the past, but not crimping the future.”
Augustin said the community has a lot of connections to the old Navy base.
“It’s like we’re the caretakers of something that’s connected to all the people,” Augustin said. “They invested a lot of themselves here—a lot of blood, sweat and tears.”
Kathleen Dayton is a staff writer for the Business Journal. E-mail her at kdayton@charlestonbusiness.com.
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