greyrat

Really sad to see the condition that the CAC has been allowed to deteriorate to. It looks like the lousy owner has not ran any type of HVAC for 8 years to the degree that the interior is in shambles. Having been in this building a few times before it closed - it is a shock that someone would be so negligent allow this to happen. I had viewed the CAC to be civic treasure and this investor allowed the place to rot.

never seen that "colorized" picture before either. amazing what people find on this site. thx for posting it.

I love this building. Anybody know why on the 5th floor from the top, the windows seem to be about a foot (or more) shorter than the rest of the floors. So many unique features to this building that I can't keep from looking at it when in that area.

That's the place. Interesting history of the "Mad Hatter". Thanks.

Watch the video(or not). It's not a hatchet job on Cleveland though. For nothing else it has some interesting video of the city that you may not have seen. I think many northern industrial cities in the 60's and 70's and even 80's were feeling pressure to "do something" to revitalize their city cores - and the issues facing these cities were not simple issues. Almost a perfect storm of loss of manufacturing jobs, urban renewal planning, racial issues. One thing that I get out of the "Making Sense of Place - Cleveland: Confronting Decline in an American City" video - that I believe in, is that it's the smaller local grass roots groups and entrepreneurs that have a lasting positive impact on the city and it's landscape as opposed to the big ticket plans, with big ticket money and big ticket backing.

In the video - which is recent, they show a security guard going from vacant floor to vacant floor of the BP building. I guess it was implied that the building was vacant. Certainly looked like it. I'm not looking to change history. If the BP building has little to no vacancy - then I'm wrong and was making an assumption based on the Urban decline video.

There is (was) a 2 story warehouse next to the Salvation Army bldg. on E.18th street that I drive past on my usual commute downtown. The warehouse was in a sea of surface lots. I often wondered if some entrepreneurial soul might someday do something with this building or just what could go in there. When I drove past on Wednesday the place was 80% demolished. Thursday 100% down with just rubble being picked through by a back hoe. I assume Monday it will be as if there was never a building there. Not a spectacular or grand place - just another old place that has bit the dust. I imagine the footprint of this place will become a surface lot.

I.M. Pei still gets work after designs like this?? The ny times article is interesting - the title and claims of boom and rebirth, amount to hyperbole for the most part. I think this kind of stuff gets repeated so much that people start to believe it. People still think Voinovich was some kind of savior that "turned around" Cleveland. The part of the article that rings true in retrospect is the counter point 'In fact, some urban experts here argue there has been little real growth but rather a shift from the older buildings to the new. There is concern that overbuilding on the edges of downtown will leave a vacant core area. ''Our market is not growing,'' said Norman Krumholz, a former city planning director and now an urban affairs specialist at Cleveland State University. ''The big users just want this year's location.''' The BP building which the NY Times article points at as being part of the downtown rebirth now sits mainly vacant - as can be seen in this 2011 video at the 8 minute mark on urban decline - focused on Cleveland: http://youtu.be/KpWS4_YtkUg The BP building is no longer the new/desired place to setup office evidently. Maybe Wolsteins new Ernst & Young tower is the new BP building? It's evident to me that political leaders nor the big money powers in Cleveland really have had a plan on stemming urban decline. As can be seen at the 11 minute mark - city officials responded to the flight to the suburbs with plans to wholesale tear down of vacant buildings in order to create parking. Ostensibly this was done in an attempt to compete with retail suburban Malls with huge parking lots. Cleveland is not alone here - this template played out in many industrial Midwest cities across the country. Sad. The medicine was to tear down downtown to save downtown. I think tearing down buildings is and has been an easy way to show "progress" during any given politicians tenure. Any plan that could of stemmed urban decline would of been a long term 10-20 yr plan which I just don't think our political system at the local level is capable of. And let's not forget what the BP building replaced - with Voinovich's blessing, and to the cheers of the public who viewed this as progress. I guess when the media is telling you this is progress, the politicians are saying this is progress, it just becomes conventional wisdom to talk about this as "progress"

Looking Good! I assume the brick replacements will be painted to match the original bricks, which I also assume were not painted originally.

Shipping containers club?? Was that in the original vision of this space? I know it's changed from neighborhood, to movie theater district, to condos, to public beach to generic mediocrity. The FEB could of been such a great area, and I am not impressed with the long and winding development that has taken place there. Maybe I am not the target audience for this "new" area - which is fine by me as I do not plan to ever visit this area nor hang out at the shipping container club. (R.I.P. Kindlers)

This building is such a stunning, eye catching building. It really dominates the landscape and draws your eye. At least mine. Was googling around and found some of the most stunning high res pictures of some of Clevelands lost architecture treasures including a shot of the City Savings bldg. circa 1905 (City Club) here: http://www.shorpy.com/node/11184 You can see the edge of the Schofield building in the pic. In this pic the Schofield would of been 4 years young. I also recommend checking the high res pics of the Hollenden Hotel circa 1900 and the Williamson bldg. 1905. Wow.

Small update on this. I noticed today that the workers have added a section to their lift that will allow them to remove the remaining panels on the corner. I would imagine (if they work like they have been) that they should have the corner totally exposed in a couple of business days.

Htsguy - if you don't want to sound pissy - then don't BE pissy.

Another drawing eh? Looks radically different from the recent movie theater village drawing. Put them next to each other and they aren't even close in resemblance. Seems like a lost opportunity to me - flats really had some uniqueness and history - oh well, "what is done is done" as the mafia would say. And for the office building - would of been nice to have it down on one of those 3 or 4 blocks of surface lots from public sq. to the warehouse district. So many blocks of surface lots in the city core that could really use something like this. Seems kind of disjointed putting this in the flats - from a city wide planning perspective. Speaking of which - is there a masterplan to this type of wacky of growth? Anybody have any links on how the city leadership want to grow this city? (building wise). I would like to check it out - seriously. I highly expect the current drawing to change this fall if the Casino issue passes on the ballot. I would expect Wolstein to make a pitch for a casino on these grounds. I'm sure he would rather have that than green space. I can't say I blame him.

Another tax code idea i was thinking about that could be altered to stop these demolitions would be to have a reverse tax abatement then what we have now. Start reducing taxes on buildings 50 yrs. older or more, and at 80 yrs. or more abate them altogether. This will allow the owners to make repairs and upkeep as needed. At the same time do away with new construction abatement which we currently use now (ie abate for 15yrs of new construction). This seems to put existing structures in an adverse competition with new abated structures. From the speed we demolish buildings we obviously have a glut - why abate just to have new when we throw away so much that is not even 100 yrs old?? I realize there are alot of holes in such a proposal - but this is just a quick idea that generally seems reasonable.