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Mills are being reimagined as hundreds of luxury lofts in Lawrence. Image courtesy Lupoli Cos.
Lawrence isn’t exactly known for generating positive headlines. Its public schools have been in state receivership since 2011, a series of natural gas pipeline explosions devastated homes and businesses last year and governors from Maine and New Hampshire have blamed this economically troubled Merrimack Valley city for ferrying illegal drugs into their states.
But Arthur Sullivan, co-founder of Brady Sullivan Properties, and Sal Lupoli, head of the Lupoli Cos., are doubling down on the hardscrabble gateway city along the Merrimack River.
This spring, Manchester, New Hampshire-based Brady Sullivan began the latest 200,000-square-foot phase of its Pacific Mills conversion project, adding 200 new loft apartments to the 163 units it’s already carved out of a former six-building mill site in Lawrence.
Meanwhile, Lupoli Cos. earlier this spring began the next phase of its massive redevelopment of a former mill complex along the Merrimack River, adding another 272 apartment units to the 270 it’s already created at what’s now called Riverwalk.
High Ceilings and Mini-Golf
Both Sullivan and Lupoli, whose companies are known for mill conversions across the region, are using words not commonly associated with Lawrence, such as “luxury,” “boutique” and “high-end,” when applied to the residential living at their developments.
“It’s definitely luxury living,” Sullivan said of the high-ceiling, classic brick-and-beam lofts planned at Pacific Mills. Sullivan lists off the “amenity–rich” offerings available to all Pacific Mills tenants, including a fitness center, library and even miniature golf.
Lupoli said he lifted a page from boutique hotel living in selecting the amenity package for Riverwalk apartment tenants, including 18-hour-a-day concierge service, restaurants, salons and even discount physician and dental care. In addition, Lupoli Cos. is building a new 4-story parking garage at Riverwalk, with a regulation-size, synthetic turf soccer/football field and track on top for tenants’ use.
All the new units at Pacific Mills and Riverwalk will be market-rate apartments, and both Sullivan and Lupoli said they’re seeking mostly higher-end young professionals and empty nesters as tenants.
At Pacific Mills, rents will go for $1,600 to $1,700, while Riverwalk’s rents will range from $1,700 to $2,500 a month, levels that Lupoli proudly said will be the “highest rents in Lawrence.”
Based on the success of their recently opened apartments at Pacific Mills and Riverwalk, Sullivan and Lupoli said they’re highly confident they’ll fill their new rental units, mostly with tenants being pushed out of more expensive housing markets near Boston and seeking more bang-for-the-buck living space elsewhere.
Lupoli Cos. is building a new 4-story parking garage at Riverwalk, with a regulation-size, synthetic turf soccer/football field and track on top for tenants’ use. Image courtesy Lupoli Cos.
An Escape Valve from Boston Rents
Jessica Martinez, who is helping with the redevelopment of Lawrence via MassDevelopment’s Transformative Development Initiative (TDI), believes Sullivan and Lupoli will get those higher-end tenants, as areas of Lawrence slowly evolve and attract new residents fleeing higher housing prices elsewhere in eastern Massachusetts.
“These are gorgeous developments,” she said of Pacific Mills, Riverwalk and WinnDevelopment’s new Loft Five50 complex at the former Malden Mills site in Lawrence.
Loft Five50 has 137 apartments, most of them officially designated affordable housing units.
“There’s a lot happening,” she added.
Other developments have recently been finished or are now in the development pipeline in Lawrence, Martinez said, such as New Lawrence Development’s downtown conversion of a former industrial facility at 578 Essex St. into 28 market-rate units, Martinez said.
No one is predicting that Lawrence is going to become the next Somerville overnight.
Larry Curtis, president and managing partner at WinnDevelopment, a unit of the Winn Cos., said it may take another decade or more before Lawrence’s revitalization truly takes hold.
Transit-Oriented Potential
As rough-around-the-edges as it appears today, Lawrence has the potential to blossom into a classic transit-oriented success story, with its commuter rail service, easy access to highways and historic industrial buildings that many residential and commercial tenants love, Curtis said.
At this point, the key for Lawrence is to attract more restaurants and retail shops, in addition to new residential units, to give it more of a “live, work, play” feel that young people and empty nesters crave, he said.
“The commercial side sometimes just takes longer,” Curtis said. “It’s a big factor in any urban redevelopment.”
Merrimack Valley Chamber of Commerce President and chief executive Joe Bevilacqua conceded that “Lawrence has its problems. But business-wise, it’s doing a lot of things right, promoting development and businesses.”
He said redevelopments like Pacific Mills, Riverfront and Loft Five50 are “doing very well” and helping to transform Lawrence’s image.
“When you walk into the lobby of Riverwalk, you’d think you’re walking into a building in Boston or New York,” he said. “Lawrence is definitely on the right track.”
And that’s why Sullivan and Lupoli are so optimistic about their investments in Lawrence.
“The lofts we’re building are phenomenal,” Sullivan said of units at Pacific Mills. “Anywhere else, they’d be considered luxury living. And they are luxury living. It’s projects like this that are helping change the city.”
“Sure, Lawrence is a city with its share of challenges,” Lupoli said. “But if people respect the quality of the project, they’ll come.”
