Preservation Iowa Presents Awards for Excellence in Preservation

Preservation Iowa Presents Awards for Excellence in Preservation

Davenport, IA – September 15, 2016 – Preservation Iowa announced their annual “Preservation at Its Best Awards” at the Historic Adler Theatre in Davenport, Iowa. Preservation Iowa awarded 9 awards in eight categories. Each year Preservation Iowa seeks to honor historic preservation successes. In doing so, we hope to inspire others to take action to preserve, protect, and promote Iowa’s historic resources. Additionally these projects highlight the work being done around the state to preserve our historic infrastructures by repurposing them to allow reintegration into their local communities. Many of these projects encourage community growth by stimulating the local economy through housing, food industry, and bringing Iowans back into their historic districts which encourages the preservation of the Iowa’s rich heritage.

Awards presented in 2016 included the following projects: (additional project information below)

Adaptive Use:
Project: Historic Cedar Falls Post Office
Recipients: AHTS Architects
Recipients: Cedar Falls development Group
Recipients: The City of Cedar Falls
Recipients: Peter Construction Corporation

Commercial Small:
Project (#1): Walden Block
Recipients: AHTS Architects
Recipients: Cardinal Construction
Recipients: JSA Development

Project (#2): State Theatre
Recipients: ASK Studio
Recipients: Koester Construction
Recipients: R.L. Fridley Theatres

Commercial Large:
Project: AEG Building
Recipients: Christensen Development
Recipients: BNIM
Recipients: American Enterprise Group

Community Effort:
Project: Grand Mound Fire Station/City Hall
Recipients: Clinton Co. Historic Preservation Commission
Recipients: The City of Grand Mound

Public Structure:
Project: Historic Polk Co. Court House
Recipients: OPN Architects

Residential:
Project: Randolph
Recipients: Hess, Roise, and Company
Recipients: Sherman Associates
Recipients: Substance Architecture

Rural Preservation:
Project: Worth Brewery
Recipients: Peter Ausenhus & Margaret Bishop

Sustainability in Preservation:
Project: Mott Lofts
Recipients: Mott Lofts & Hobart Historic Restoration

About Preservation Iowa: Preservation Iowa is the statewide nonprofit historic preservation organization dedicated to advocacy, education and creation of partnerships that enhance our economic and cultural future through the preservation of Iowa’s historic resources.

Adaptive Use:
Project: Historic Cedar Falls Post Office
The former Cedar Falls Post Office was built in 1918 as the first federal building in the city. This Neoclassical building was part of a nation-wide movement to standardize the size and design of federal buildings. The 4200 sf building served as the city’s main post office until 1961.
After the post office left, the space was adapted to office space by installing partition walls and dropped ceilings. Fortunately, much of a neoclassical building remained behind paint, ceiling tile and partition walls.
In 2012 the city voted to demolish the building; however, the building was spared and the Cedar Falls Development Group worked with Bick Tech, a local business, to restore the post office and make it function as BIck Teach’s new home.
When the infill partitions and dropped ceilings were removed from the building, many of the older finish materials – like wood floors, plaster ceilings, transoms above doors and marble panels – were uncovered and were refinished. The teller windows and terrazzo floor were discovered and incorporated into the new design. Additionally, a multi pane window was found in the building and returned to its original place as part of the beautiful glass and wood vestibule.
In order to accommodate a bicycle shop, a large sliding door was added to the rear entrance; however, the principal facade was left in its original form. The bike store proved to be a good use for building because the new program required a large open space – just like the original post office lobby.
This building is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In addition to stakeholder investments, th eproject successfully leveraged state and federal historic tax credits.

Commercial Small:
Project: Walden Block
This project involved four discreet historic buildings in downtown Waterloo. The buildings, built between 1880’s and 1950s, displayed the transitions of Waterloo from the 180’s through the art deco period of the 1930’s and into the growth of the 1950’s. It is a visual architectural history lesson. At the project outset, this once thriving block Waterloo filled with shops, people, and life was boarded up, vacant, and desolate.
Through working directly with the state historical preservation office, every effort was coordinated to push forward in rehabilitating these storefronts with apartments above. Like many preservation projects, discoveries during construction provided both challenges and rewards. In the case of the Walden Block, charred floor joists were discovered and required correction; however, skylights and metal ceilings were also hidden and recovered.
The end result is a vibrant block in downtown Waterloo that brings new life in the form of modern, upscale housing and shopping/dining options.

Project: State Theatre
As preservationists, we are always looking to the secretary standards of the interior standards for rehabilitation. Those guidelines clearly state that a property shall be used for its historic purpose or be placed in a new use that requires minimal change.
Theaters are particularly difficult to sensitively repurpose, so the judging panel was thrilled to see reinvestment in Washington’s State Theater – preserving the hometown theater for future generations and rehabilitating this community gathering place to its former glory.
The State Theater – originally called the New Graham – opened in 1893. The theater holds the Guinness World Record as the oldest continuously operating cinema theatre, having been in operation since May 14, 1897.
The rehabilitation included removal of the blonde street level brick and exposing the original arcade storefront. Existing stain glass windows were found buried in the wall above the theatre’s entry doors. Much of the original stained glass was intact and gave cues to original colors of glazing and trim paint.
The preservation of State Theatre is a celebration of structure and rural community. The theatre is part of the Washington Downtown Historic District and acts as a time capsule of architecture, entertainment, and technology. While it continues to play first-run movies, the theatre itself is scheduled to be the subject of an upcoming documentary.

Commercial Large:
Project: AEG Building
The American Republic Insurance Company Building is an 8-story building located on the northeast corner of Sixth Avenue and Watson Powell Jr. Way in Des Moines.
Designed in 1965 by one of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP’s legendary principal architects, Gordon Bunshaft. The American Republic Insurance Company headquarters features floor-to-ceiling windows on the north and south ends, exposed precast concrete ceilings, eight exterior steel hinges to support its structure and a floor plan void of interior columns that might obstruct the view of the Des Moines skyline. In 1966, Life magazine called the building “the talk of the Midwest.”
The exposed precast concrete “T” and cast-in-place coffered floor structure is one of the defining characteristics of the building. The duct work, lighting, and acoustical systems are meticulously integrated within the ceiling in a unique manner that forms an elegant ceiling expression, creating a glowing series of coffers of light. The most challenging aspect of the project was installing a fire protection sprinkler system in this intricate ceiling design. The project reconstructed the exposed duct-work and chamfered the top to allow the almost-completely concealed sprinkler system, lighting, and communication data cabling to be located on top of the duct.
The addition of life-safety systems as well as installation of new thermally broken windows while maintaining the character defining features resulted in a building that is both listed on the Nation register and is LEED Silver Certified.
The project was funded by State and Federal Historic Tax Credits, State of Iowa contributions, City of Des Moines contributions and private equity.

Community Effort:
Project: Grand Mound Fire Station/City Hall
In 2008, the Clinton County Historic Preservation Commission and the Grand Mound town council started working together to save the only wood frame fire stations in the state. The 1892 building was used as a fire station for decades until the town constructed a newer, larger station across the street. The town continued to use the building for storage, and Cub Scout and Boy Scout groups used the upper level for meetings into the 1980s. By 2008, the building was in bad shape and demolition was one proposal for the old building.
The Fire station had been placed in the National Register in 2008 and a consultant – supported by a Technical Advisory Network or TAN grant – had already conducted research on the building. Many stabilization and rehabilitation projects occurred between 2008 and 2014.
The Clinton County supervisors were very supportive of the project and financed the majority of the restoration through budget requests from the preservation commission. Grants were applied for from the Clinton County Community Development Association and the Lincolnway Foundation. Many volunteer hours were spent on the various projects by the preservation commission members as well as local town citizens – from stripping the walls for plaster repair to setting up refreshments for the open house. Those smaller projects and volunteer involvement allowed this small community to gradually complete the work over several years.
Today the building is proudly being used by the Grand Mound community as a local museum. The town has landscaped the area around the building and has installed a chair lift for handicapped accessibility to the upper level where historic displays are found.

Public Structure
Project: Historic Polk County Courthouse
Designed by the Des Moines-based architectural firm of Proudfoot & Bird, the current Polk
County courthouse was built in 1906. Constructed for $750,000 on the site of its 1858 predecessor, the
Beaux-Arts style courthouse was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979. Typical to
the neoclassic style, the courthouse’s design incorporates over scaled cornices, faces carved in the
keystones above the windows, swags and other sculptural details on a stone tower.
Work at the Historic Polk County Courthouse is part of a multi-phased process that began in
2010 when the design team began working with the county to determine the viability of renovating
multiple Polk County Courts system structures. Exterior restoration to the historic courthouse was a
precursor project to stop water entering the Courthouse building before the larger interior project
scheduled to start in 2018. Completed in 2015, the scope included Exterior restorations focused on
stone cleaning, stone spalling, lead-coated copper detailing added to each belt course, lead coated
copper flatlock was added in the balcony recesses, and lead-coated copper detailing was added at the
tower and roof levels

Residential:
Project: Randolph
The Randolph—previously the Hotel Randolph—combines three historic buildings into one
complex. The three buildings—dating back to 1876, 1896 and 1912—had been combined into one hotel
with 101 tiny units. Though it was one hotel, the three buildings were different both in their style and in
their construction. Part of the project was rehabilitating facades of three different periods of
significance. The most visible exterior changes are the reconstruction of projecting cornice on the 1912
building and that building’s open, glass, and street level storefront.
The project team took care to create different housing layouts that respond to different
downtown demographic needs, including efficient, small apartments to larger two-bedroom/twobathroom
units. The project also includes retail and restaurant space. The location, at the corner of
Fourth Street and Court Avenue—provides new housing units in downtown Des Moines and provides a
very visible example of high-quality historic rehabilitation.

Rural Preservation:
Project: Worth Brewery
Northwood—a town with about 2000 residents—had problem that many small towns in rural
Iowa face—a vacant building in the historic downtown. In this case, it was The Oddfellows-Erickson
building. This two-story brick structure in the Italianate style was designed by J.L. Rood of St. Paul, who
had also designed the nearby Worth County Courthouse. When the rehabilitation project started, the
building was vacant—one side having been empty for 6 years. The roof and non-historic storefront was
replaced to prevent further water infiltration and damage. Many original elements were saved and
restored, including the metal cornice. Those surfaces were scraped, cleaned and painted.
Worth Brewing Company converted the first floor of the Erickson Building into the brewery; the
first floor of the Odd Fellows building into the brewery Tap Room, and the second level Odd Fellows
hall into an event center space. On the interior, asbestos was professionally abated to expose the
original wood flooring. 1980s infill partitions and drop ceilings were removed. The original wood bead
board ceiling was uncovered and carefully restored. Additionally, The IOOF meeting hall’s tin ceiling
and molding was restored. Other restored elements included two of the original entry doors, all of
the original doors on the second level of the Odd Fellows and the c. 1940 windows and doors on the
second level of the Erickson Building

Sustainability in Preservation:
Project: Mott Lofts
Originally the Iowa Wind Mill & Pump Company, the building was constructed in 1902 as part of
a larger industrial/commercial complex. The company eventually closed its doors in 1951 and the
building gradually became the only remaining of the original complex. Linn County purchased the
building in the-mid 1990s and retained ownership through the notorious floods of 2008, up through
2015.
The industrial space contained large, expansive spaces with heavy timber and exposed brick. Though
the original freight elevator has been gone since the early 1950s, the remains are still present in the
form of the wooden braces and large metal gears and pulleys.
The existing stairwell was retained and was lovingly restored, looking as new as the day
it was installed. The historic plaster and tin ceiling found in the office space on the 1st floor was
retained, as well as the repair and re-use of all of the historic windows that remained on the
first floor. The historic vault was retained, and the original freight elevator shaft remains visible
in the corridor on each floor, historic artifacts from the building’s history are featured in the halls
and in the lobby. Even fine details—like wood trim—were retained. This reuse of existing
building components is both preservation at its best and sustainability at its best.

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