The Past of RiverPark Placeby RiverPark PlaceThe current location of RiverPark Place – historically known as “The Point” – has long been a prosperous area and home to many upper income socialites and successful entrepreneurs. Starting in the 1840s, well-heeled residents of New Orleans moved to Louisville for the summer to escape the Louisiana heat. These movers and shakers gathered at The Point on the Ohio River and built mansions, relaxing on their verandas and balconies to enjoy the cool river breezes. So many New Orleans residents built summer homes in Louisville that The Point’s Fulton Street became known as “Frenchmen’s Row” because of all the French-speaking residents that lived there.Today, RiverPark Place carries on that distinction of elegance, relaxation and luxury. Nestled amid trees and greenery along the peaceful water, the new EdgeWater luxury condominiums harken back to an earlier time of summer mansions, boating, sumptuous meals and prominent friendships – a time when residents kept an exclusive and lively social calendar.
In the past, beautiful ladies in silk dresses strolled beside the river, fanning themselves with delicate lace fans. They carried parasols under the sun and watched river boats paddle through the crisp water. The Point was always a place to see and be seen, a chance to catch the eye of an influential new acquaintance. As ladies took in the sights and sounds of a stylish river life, well-bred gentlemen and entrepreneurs enjoyed cigars and afternoons on grand boats. Residing in homes at this fashionable and cultured location was the reward for financial success and business savvy. Today, the address represents similar accomplishments.One of the lovely old mansions, Padget House, still stands at 1562 Fulton Street and is now on the National Register of Historic Places. The restoration of Padget House is part of the RiverPark Place master plan — the elegant home will serve as part of a new restaurant that will have upscale pub food, light dinner and custom cocktails, the name of which will soon be announced.
In a vintage article in the Courier Journal under Women’s News, the author states that the Padget House “has always been known as ‘Mansion House,’ one of Louisville’s finest architectural landmarks.” The Padget House is the last remaining element of this once-gracious residential neighborhood, and its architecture shows a New Orleans influence that is not found anywhere else in Louisville.Paget House and, therefore, RiverPark Place have a long and distinguished history. Margaret Wright Paget, who purchased the original elegant house in 1838, is the great-great niece of Gen. George Washington, America’s first president. Washington himself is a descendant of King Henry II of England. The original structure dates back to the 1780s, and a five bay Georgian Style masonry addition was built in 1838 that included a unique ornamental cast iron balcony that spanned the front of the building. The romance and lineage of Padget House lends depth and meaning to the beautiful grounds and affluent amenities of RiverPark Place and the EdgeWater condominiums.In the 1840s, the mansion that stood next door was the Heigold House, completed in 1853. Its ornate, detailed façade with the faces of early American leaders engraved on it was the handiwork of immigrant stonemason Christopher Heigold. Also listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the Heigold House façade now stands at a welcoming intersection on Frankfort Avenue.Residences at The Point – both past and present – share in the sophistication and lively energy of affluent business leaders and wealthy women who long ago brought the charm and excitement of New Orleans to this gracious neighborhood. Today, the glamor and excitement of The Big Easy can still be felt in the lush lawns, extraordinary buildings, and upscale life at RiverPark Place.Please join Insider Louisville and RiverPark Place on July 29, 2015 for a fun, social meetup around the new resort amenity area at RiverPark Place.Insiders will gather around poolside starting at 4:30 p.m. Light appetizers will be served and a cash bar with beer and wine will be available. Representatives from Poe Properties will be on hand to showcase the EdgeWater condo tower plans.After you have enjoyed this poolside meetup you can take the path to Waterfront Park for Waterfront Wednesday and truly get a taste for river life. This meetup is not one to miss.
Tag Archives: construction
The people behind RiverPark Place: David Karem
Bringing a 40-acre, $1 billion-plus commercial/residential project to fruition that will alter the landscape and lifestyle of Louisville’s riverfront requires top talent. Rock stars of design and development, if you will. In the coming months, we’re going to feature the “Rock Stars of RiverPark Place” to help you get to know some of the brilliant and dedicated people behind the project.
The Ohio River is in David Karem’s blood, and he’s passionate about preserving the magic of life on the water’s edge for future generations.
Karem has been a driving force in the redevelopment of Louisville’s waterfront since 1986. The first and only president of the Waterfront Development Corp., he fell in love with the Ohio as a small child, spending summers with his family in a cabin on the water.
“I grew up by the river,” he said. “Once you have that kind of connectivity with the river’s edge, it remains indelible in your mind, and you have an affection for it.”
Karem earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Cincinnati College of Design, Architecture, Art and Planning. Then, like others in his family, he went on to earn a law degree from the University of Louisville. He served four years in the state House of Representatives before spending 29 years in the state Senate, leaving that post in 2004.
Karem and the Waterfront Development Corp. were asked to develop a request for proposals for the site of RiverPark Place, handle the selection process and ultimately oversee the project that was chosen.
“It is one of the most beautiful sites in the area,” he said. “It leaps out and says ‘this is wonderful site for a residential marina development to take place.’ Because of Towhead Island, the marina is very protected. The setting is so green and so wonderful for residential development.”
Karem knew from the beginning that he wanted a project that would fit with the park’s mission.
“Our mission was to build a green, urban, 85-acre park that would then compel development around it,” he said. “And that’s exactly what has happened. RiverPark Place is a perfect example.”
He added that he wanted a world-class development that would complement what has become a world-class park.
“We’ve been visited by officials from all over the United States, Europe and Asia, studying the park,” Karem said. “USA Today did a national poll, and Louisville’s Waterfront Park was ranked as one of the top 10 riverfronts in America.” The park attracts 1.5 million visitors a year and hosts an average of 150 events, which is a huge selling point for RiverPark Place residents and visitors.
Poe Companies is an ideal partner in the project, he said. “It’s a synergy of two very supportive elements. They know they enhance Waterfront Park, and we know the park enhances their development.”
The mix of residential uses at RiverPark “creates the kind of community that we had hoped from the beginning would come to that site. It’s creating almost like a small city with lots of diversity, which is very appealing” to young people, empty-nesters and everyone in between, Karem said. “I think it’s woven together as a wonderful tapestry of offerings that make it available to a broad spectrum of customers.”
Those customers will expect the Waterfront Development Corp. to maintain the park in a quality way, he said. “They will become allies with us to continue the world-class maintenance that this park deserves. RiverPark is our next-door neighbor who will insist, long after I’m gone, that the public and government entities maintain this park in the highest possible way. From a very selfish perspective, RiverPark Place is a great favor to the park because the residents will become the engine that goes to the mayor, goes to the Metro Council and says, ‘this is a fabulous park, and you’ve got to support and maintain it properly.’ RiverPark is going to be our best friend.”
Karem is excited that RiverPark Place is continuing the transformation of the waterfront that he and his team started.
“One, it’s bringing more people into an urban setting. That’s a national trend. That kind of movement enlivens the core, it strengthens the downtown area. RiverPark Place is a huge engine for the kinds of urban development you want to see in your city,” Karem said. “These folks will go the arts, the restaurants, the museums, to the YUM Center for ballgames. They will bring friends from out of town to the Hillerich & Bradsby baseball museum. They will take their kids and their grandkids to the Science Center.”
With all those elements in place, it’s a no-brainer that RiverPark would be a success, he added. “The numbers speak for themselves. Before the first building was completed, it was all rented. The second one is well on its way. It’s doing exactly what we hoped it would do.”
That success is due, in part, to the excellent working relationship Karem has had with Poe Companies and other players in RiverPark Place from the start.
“While we monitor and oversee the project for Metro Government, we also really see ourselves as partners,” Karem said. “Have there been bumps in the road? Of course there have. By and large, working with these folks has been great. We never have any problems communicating. It’s an easy marriage. All marriages should be as easy as this one.
The people behind RiverPark Place- David Spillane, master planner
Bringing a 40-acre, $1 billion-plus commercial/residential project to fruition that will alter the landscape and lifestyle of Louisville’s riverfront requires top talent. Rock stars of design and development, if you will. In the coming months, we’re going to feature the “Rock Stars of RiverPark Place” to help you get to know some of the brilliant and dedicated people behind the project.
David Spillane spent his childhood near the water in Ireland. No matter where he has lived since then, he’s never been far from it. In fact, as president of Goody Clancy in Boston and principal for the firm’s planning and urban design practice, Spillane has built his career on a passion for design that transforms waterfronts.
“We’ve worked a lot of places and done a lot of things, but the most exciting projects for me are waterfront projects,” he said. His firm has completed waterfront projects “all the way from Vermont to Texas.”
This lifelong passion is why serving as lead architect for RiverPark Place is an ideal fit for his talents. It also means Louisville is incredibly lucky to have him on board.
Fascinated by design since he was a child, Spillane earned a bachelor’s degree in architecture from University College Dublin (Ireland) and a master’s degree from Harvard University. His work has included planning in Mississippi and New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, replacing an aging interstate highway in Hartford, Conn., and redefining Boston’s Fort Point Channel waterfront.
His designs have been recognized with more than a dozen national awards from the American Institute of Architects, the American Planning Association, the Congress for the New Urbanism and the Waterfront Center, including the 2013 American Planning Association’s “National Planning Excellence Award for a Firm.”
As an extension of his affection for cities’ waterfronts, Spillane serves on the board of directors for Save the Harbor/Save the Bay, where he has been an active participant in promoting public access to a cleaner and more vibrant Boston Harbor and Massachusetts Bay. He has also served as a member of Boston’s Municipal Harbor Plan Advisory Committee and is a design advisor to the Capitol Center Commission in Providence, R.I.
Despite his experience with waterfronts across the country, Spillane believes there is always more to learn. That’s why he and the RiverPark team traveled to Boston, Portland, Ore., and Vancouver, Canada, to study what makes each of their waterfronts so successful.
“In all those cities, we saw principles of what it takes to create a great waterfront — providing public access along the water’s edge, creating public amenities with a mix of uses,” said Spillane. “Residential housing is a huge part of that, and so are open spaces and restaurants that draw people to the area who don’t live there. Also, they each provide water access for small boats, canoes and kayaks and have the ability to host events and other activities.”
As a result of these fact-finding trips, Spillane said he and the RiverPark team have been able to incorporate all of the very best elements from each city’s waterfront they visited, one of which is density.
“When Steve Poe invited us to be part of the team and the city started this project, I think that the kind of density that was envisioned was far less than what’s happening now,” said Spillane. “The density being envisioned now is like what we saw in Boston, Vancouver and Portland. It’s essential to RiverPark and what this project can ultimately become to the city. We’re seeing all around the country more and more interest in urban living and urban environments, where you can walk from your front door to a restaurant or a park or a marina and you don’t have to drive. Those are some the benefits we get from density.”
Spillane is proud that he’s had a hand in a project that brings people together in such a transformative way. “It’s a place that invites other people in, who don’t specifically live there, to have access to the restaurants on the water’s edge. I think the marina adds a whole other dimension to life, providing the ability to get out on the river.
“When you mix all those ingredients together — the mix of uses, walk-able areas, density, public access and access to the water, you have all the ingredients of a great waterfront. This is the vision we talked about from the very beginning — a place which is vibrant and active and dense.”
Spillane believes that an important part of the project, one that’s easy to overlook, is the way parking is being incorporated out of sight.
“Parking is below the building, and that creates far better views and access to the waterfront and the river. I think that’s really exciting,” he said. “There was a lot of very careful attention in design to maintain those views of the waterfront from as many units as possible, both the ones built to date, and the ones in the future.”
Though RiverPark is in its early stages, Spillane believes it already has lots of momentum. As it attracts more people and new amenities, it’s going to become even more compelling over time, he added.
“Louisville is a really vital place, and it’s become even more vital since I started with the project,” Spillane said. “At that time, Waterfront Park had just opened. I remember being in the offices of the Waterfront Development Corp., seeing the pictures of the wall of what it had been just a few years before where it was primarily industrial, and how quickly it has transformed into a major part of the city’s shared public space.”
Spillane added the he thinks the transformation of Louisville’s waterfront is an amazing story. “It’s one of the great waterfront transformations nationally, and it’s a model for many other communities. RiverPark is an incredibly important part of that story.”
The people behind RiverPark Place – The EdgeWater architect – Insider Louisville
Bringing a 40-acre, $1 billion-plus commercial/residential project to fruition that will alter the landscape and lifestyle of Louisville’s riverfront requires top talent. Rock stars of design and development, if you will. In the coming months, we’re going to feature the “Rock Stars of RiverPark Place” to help you get to know some of the brilliant and dedicated people behind the project.
Now a celebrated architect, Rob Chandler initially chose his field by accident. In fact, it happened while getting his hands dirty.
Chandler, principal with Goody Clancy in Boston and lead architect for the RiverPark Place condo towers, was pursuing a bachelor’s degree at Colby College in the late 1970s. The lack of jobs available to English majors prompted him to start a small construction firm. An architect with whom Chandler worked on home building in New England encouraged him to look into design as a career, so he did, earning a master’s in architecture from Harvard University.
Today, Chandler provides design leadership across a wide spectrum of Goody Clancy’s academic, civic and residential projects. His work for colleges and universities includes the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University, Rawls Hall at the Krannert School of Management at Purdue University and the College of Informatics in Griffin Hall at Northern Kentucky University. His residential work features many award-winning housing developments in Massachusetts, notably the internationally acclaimed Tent City, with its 269 units of affordable housing in Boston. He also has designed all of the homes he has owned since college.
Chandler said that academic and residential styles “reinforce each other, although they are very different in use. Academic buildings are made of different size pieces — they have auditoriums and offices. They are not repetitive, they are singular or one off.
“Great housing takes advantage of the fact that there are multiple small pieces that build up into a larger pattern,” he added. “There is so much promise in housing to shape cities.”
Urban housing is particularly exciting to Chandler. He said it connects places, shapes outdoor spaces and creates gathering places for people.
“It’s not simply creating objects in the landscape, but it’s part of a larger system that makes streets compelling places to be,” he said. “The great thing about urban housing is that it builds outdoor spaces that people love to occupy, and it lines them with active public uses on the ground floor.”
Chandler and the team at Good Clancy are known for transforming cities, and he said he was eager to use his expertise in urban housing to help transform Louisville’s downtown. “RiverPark is a destination that will reinforce the city’s investment in Waterfront Park. It’s going to build a community. Once it’s complete, it will be a neighborhood of its own with strong, memorable qualities that many of the other neighborhoods in the city have.”
Chandler was first introduced to Louisville when RiverPark’s lead architect, K. Norman Berry, brought Goody Clancy in on the project. Chandler is charged with designing the high-rise residential buildings at RiverPark Place, while Berry focuses on the low-rise structures. Chandler is currently in the process of designing the larger buildings’ core systems, character, appearance and building materials, and he’s excited to present the newest renderings in late April.
Chandler said he sees RiverPark as a chance to contribute to a development of comparable quality to the awarding-winning projects he designed earlier in his career. He also is thrilled to take part in the revitalization of downtown housing.
“I think Louisville needs even more people downtown,” he said. “There seems to be a larger number of young college graduates migrating to the city, and I think that’s going to continue to contribute to making it a vital place. Having housing and destinations like RiverPark are going to make the city an even more desirable and dynamic place for people who are young and starting their lives.”
When asked what his favorite elements of RiverPark are, Chandler said he couldn’t choose just one.
“I think the Plaza is going to be a great space,” he said. “I’d love to live in one of the units that are higher up because they are all going to have wonderful views. I also love the experience of moving up and down River Shore Drive, which visually connects to the river. You guys probably take it for granted, but we don’t have rivers of that scale in New England. It’s really beautiful and engaging.”
Chandler added that the marina, the paths on both the river level and plaza level, further connect residents and visitors to the Ohio, which he believes is a fundamental part of the RiverPark experience.
Density is a key element to the success of RiverPark, Chandler said. “By having the density, there are resources available to build public spaces, take advantage of the riverfront location. When you build that many units, you can also afford to build high-quality, open space and high-quality destinations that invite everyone onto the site.”
The high-rise buildings are large enough to accommodate retail, restaurants and other public-use components that will distinguish the development and make it truly an active, urban environment, Chandler added.
Through his work on RiverPark, Chandler said he has come to love Louisville. “Louisville has a great scale. I love walking around on Main Street — there are some great new developments there. 21c is a fun place; NuLu is really intriguing. Louisville has a really accessible social space for someone coming from outside. You walk up and down the streets and feel at home.”
Chandler said he has been especially impressed with Waterfront Park. “Louisville has a great park system that distinguishes it from a lot of other American cities. It has taken advantage of what was once an industrial waterfront and made it a central part of the experience of living there.”
RiverPark is simply a continuation of this great asset. “RiverPark isn’t a park itself, but it carries some of those same characteristics. It’s public, you can walk through it, it focuses on views to the river, and not just for the people who live there. It’s such a great spot … connected to the park, within walking distance from downtown, with those great views of the bridges looking out over the skyline. It’s really a distinctive and memorable public space.”
The people behind RiverPark Place – The EdgeWater architect – Insider Louisville.
RiverPark Place continues to grow on multiple fronts
Poe Companies has been hard at work during the 14 weeks of this series to make the RiverPark Place development a reality. With that in mind, it’s time for an update on all that has taken place:
One of the biggest stories on the Louisville restaurant scene was the closure of riverfront Tumbleweed on Nov. 15. Falls City Hospitality Group, which plans to open a restaurant at RiverPark Place, also reportedly is close to a deal to operate a Mexican restaurant at the 12,000-square-foot riverfront site.
That would give the group two restaurants within less than a half-mile. It operates Doc Crow’s on West Main Street and had La Coop, a French restaurant, on West Market Street, though it closed that operation on Jan. 1.
Taking on the Tumbleweed site won’t affect plans for the RiverPark Place restaurant at all, according to investor and attorney Chip Hamm.
“We had sort of settled on the RiverPark Place concept and menu before the Tumbleweed opportunity came up. We were already believers in the waterfront, so the Tumbleweed opportunity was an easy decision,” he said.
The RiverPark Place restaurant will serve roadhouse type of food – buckets of seafood and burgers – sort of like the chain Yard House, Hamm said, along with about 120 beers on tap.
Here’s the latest on the development overall from marketing director Nicki Sibley:
- Construction on the restaurant began during the last quarter of 2014; it’s expected to open in the third quarter of 2015.
- The first half of the new apartment building, Waterside East, is ready for occupancy and the first renters moved in last weekend. The second half should be ready within the next 60 days. About 30 percent of the units were pre-leased. The existing apartment building, Waterside West, remains 100 percent leased.
- Five condos in the planned 16-story condo tower have been sold, and interest remains steady.
- Poe Companies is close to securing the financing for the apartment tower, likely to be called EdgeWater East. “It’s quite possible we could be breaking ground on both towers this year,” Sibley said.
- The marina has been open for just over two years and is nearly 60 percent leased/purchased. She has fielded inquiries about reserving boat slips for Thunder and four major events are already on the schedule for the marina this summer.
- The amenity/pool area will be open by Memorial Day. “We expect it to be quite the hotspot with residents and their guests especially on nights of Waterfront Park events,” Sibley said. “We’re even looking at providing some kind of shuttle between RiverPark and Big Four or the Great Lawn for special events.”
For Louisville, the planned 16-story, 85-unit condo tower at RiverPark Place among the few luxury high-rise developments in the works.
The $289 million Center City project, to be developed by Omni Hotels & Resorts, however, has gained steam. The 30-plus-story tower, expected to be completed by 2018, will be topped by at least 225 swanky apartments. The complex also will include a 20,000-square-foot grocery store, a badly needed amenity for bolstering downtown living.
The views are high on the list of attractions in the Edgewater tower
The view out the floor-to-ceiling windows of the model RiverPark Place condo seems so realistic, you can imagine yourself sipping a cool drink and watching the sunset there.
Poe Companies’ planned 16-story condo tower at RiverPark Place, called Edgewater, was designed to be all about the views, says Rob Chandler, a principal at Boston-based architects Goody Clancy.
“Units on the west side will be looking out over downtown and the bridges; those on the east side will be looking back along the river. They all will have outdoor spaces [balconies], and they all will have lots of glass,” he said.
The luxury condo project calls for 15,000 square feet on the ground floor for a restaurant/retail mix; 40,000 square feet of office space on the second and third floors; residential units on floors four through 15, and a rooftop swimming pool, fitness center and clubroom with catering kitchen.
Developer Steve Poe has expressed confidence that the required presale of half planned 85 condos will be secured to land needed financing for the $65 million tower.
The condos – eight different models from 1,015 to more than 3,000 square feet – will range in price from $400,000 to $1 million-plus. There will be 10 one-bedroom and 72 two-bedroom units, plus three penthouses expected to fetch up to $2.3 million.
The condos aren’t exactly all about the views. Buyers will be able to select paint colors, countertops and flooring to suit their own tastes. The units will include huge closets and 10-foot ceilings – 16-foot ceilings in the penthouses.
Since the river level can vary as much as 32 feet, underground parking posed a challenge in developing the site, Chandler said, requiring a raised landscape. Plans call for about 250 spaces in the heated structure.
Along with another 14-story luxury apartment tower to be added later east of the Edgewater, the area is being developed as an active urban center, Chandler said, with shops, restaurants and an outdoor plaza, with space for events overlooking the river. A 12,000-square-foot restaurant – just the first of the planned restaurants – is scheduled to open next summer. It will be operated by the group that owns the local Doc Crow’s. It’s all designed to integrate into Louisville’s waterfront parks.
After mothballing the project in 2008 due to the economic downturn, Poe has resumed construction on the 40-acre project, completing a $10 million 150-slip marina in May 2012. The first phase of RiverPark Apartments was completed in May 2013 and a 160-unit second phase, both designed by local architects K. Norman Berry, is nearing completion.
The views are high on the list of attractions in the Edgewater tower – Insider Louisville.
Riverfront condo model open — for tower not yet built
By Braden Lammers, Louisville Business First, October 24, 2014
Poe Companies LLC has come up with a clever way to draw interest in its riverfront condominium tower that is not expected to be under construction until early next year. At the company’s office on River Road, Poe Companies officials have set up a model of what a fifth-floor, two-bedroom condo will look like in the 16-story EdgeWater at RiverPark Place tower.
Read the full story here
