KCRag Forum

KC-wildcat wrote:Jeezus, what happened to the bottom of the building? The nice deco vanier and windows around the street level were just stripped bare, leaving ugly concrete. Maybe a structural improvement was necessadry or something.

kcjak wrote:Looks like the bottom floors were turned into a parking garage.

mgh7676 wrote:How long have the businesses on the ground floor been boarded up? I noticed there was a pretty wide variety of cafes there at one point in time. FWIW, I also noticed that the barriers around the building say something along the lines of "Beware: Dangerous Building". Sounds a lot like the barriers that were up around the Cosby Hotel at one time. Hopefully something good is happening, but with KC's history, I have my doubts.

lock+load wrote:Barbershop was still open in August 2005, but pretty sure it closed soon after.

Such a beautiful building (minus the horrible concrete cladding). Really hope someone can turn it into something useful.

Midtownkid wrote:Alright. Who wants to start a "Save the Brookfield Building page?"

This iconic view would never be the same.

Unitog Co. employees will get a chance to work off their Thanksgiving dinners over the coming weekend as they move into their new headquarters at 1300 Washington St. in downtown Kansas City.

The uniform company, which has been based in the Brookfield Building at 101 W. 11th St. for 21 years, will occupy the top two floors of its new three-story headquarters.

Executive Roundtable: A Group of Kansas City's Foremost Business Figures Survey the Year Ahead and Spot Some Economic Peaks and Valleys.

Abstract: Interview of a "group of Kansas City's foremost business figures," including Dutton Brookfield, president of the Unitog Company of the garment industry, with discussions about business projections for Kansas City in 1979 and into the 1980s.

Jones began learning the ropes in the early 1980s as an industrial broker for Jones & Co. — no relation — and then a spinoff, Kerr & Co. Founder Whitney Kerr Sr. said Jones gained an understanding of all sides of real estate deals, complementing his strong work ethic and aggressive but fair nature. Jones employed those tools in his business after a 1990 foray into property ownership made him his boss’s landlord.

Kerr & Co. was based in the Brookfield building in downtown Kansas City, Jones said, and when Unitog Co. sold the building, Jones and a partner bought it and gave Kerr & Co. the management contract.

Wayne Reeder, whose family owns a two-thirds interest in The View, said the building was bought for $1.5 million and redeveloped with help from a 25-year, 100 percent property tax abatement. It is nearing a $40 million sellout.

Meanwhile, The View co-developer Richard Turner is trying to unload the Brookfield Building at 11th Street and Baltimore Avenue -- one of the few blighted buildings remaining in the loop.

Turner bought the 11-story building at the bargain price of $720,000 two years ago, Reeder said. But a fire in a ground-floor sushi restaurant and flooding from a broken water line chased away its few remaining tenants.

Now, litigation initiated by a subcontractor is preventing Turner, who's no longer interested in redeveloping it, from selling.

"It's an eyesore, and he's the first to admit that," Reeder said. "But the lawsuit will be resolved right after the first of the year, and you will see something happen shortly thereafter."

Face magazine publisher Camilo Estremadoiro hopes to breathe life into the stately but neglected Brookfield Building at 11th and Baltimore. Estremadario is launching an effort to restore retail at the ground level and convert the upper floors into condominiums and apartments.
...

Turner purchased the Brookfield Building in 2004. Nine months later, city declared it a public nuisance. Its last tenants were driven out by a burst pipe in December 2005.

Why did Turner purchase the building then seem to ignore it? A lawsuit brought by a contractor against Turner and Reeder suggested that the Brookfield Building had been bought in order to avoid taxes on real-estate sale Turner made in California. (In court papers, Turner's lawyer denied the claim.)

The contractor's suit is ongoing. Meanwhile, Estremadoiro has emerged with a plan to remake the Brookfield as the Gotham Building.

Estremadoiro hopes to make green building practices a centerpiece of the renovation. He's also created the Gotham Arts Project, with the stated intent of changing the way properties are developed in Kansas City’s urban core and surrounding neighborhoods.

Estremadoiro leased space in the Brookfield at one time. "We need to do something with that building," he tells me. Estremadoiro says he's finalizing the contracts that will allow him to market the building to buyers.

Estremadoiro is not new to real-estate deals. In 1998, he sold the building that became 21 West Ten Lofts.

City officials say it has been allowed to decline to the point the sidewalks were closed last week after a chunk of the terra cotta facade fell from the 11th floor.

“It’s located next to City Center Square, and it’s a busy part of town,” Mike Schumacher, a Neighborhood Community Services official, said Tuesday. “We can’t take chances.

“If the owner doesn’t take care of this issue, we will. We want to protect the public.”