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Museum Residences
156 West Superior
'PORTICO' Scots Church Redevelopment
Clipper Mill Assembly Building
De Plussenburgh
6747-6759 St-Urbain Street
Guerrero Street Mixed-Use Development
Viridian Noosa Residences
165 Charles Street
Lofts23Clipper Mill Assembly Building
New loft apartments celebrate a ruined building's industrial past
After being devastated by a fire in 1995, the Clipper Mill Assembly Building, built in 1890, was a ruin evocative of the rich industrial past of the 17-acre historic metal works complex of which it was a part. Ideally situated at the intersection of the light rail, public greenway, and a garden park, the Clipper Mill complex has been rebuilt into a mixed-use development, and Cho Benn Holback + Associates has adapted the Assembly Building at the center of the development into 36 loft apartments above a 10,000 square foot plinth of office space.
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The new structure has been inserted within the historic industrial shell, with an open-air courtyard as the building’s centerpiece. Contrasting with the heavy masonry of the shell, the new construction adheres to a lightweight machine aesthetic, in deference to the building’s past.
Each dwelling unit is double-storied taking advantage of extremely high windows and existing masonry walls and at the top level overlooking large, sky-lit roof spaces. The courtyard looks out to the public road and greenway, to the adjoining renovated structure, and to a sunken terrace where a pool is integrated into industrial ruins that surround the building.
Sculptural skylights adorn the landscaped upper courtyard above the office plinth. A light shaft has been cut out from the upper courtyard to the Mill Race Stream, which runs through the building. Cho Benn Holback preserved the existing roof truss and the historic crane overhead to complete the story of the ruin.
Formal name of project: Clipper Mill Assembly Building
Location: Baltimore, Maryland
Gross square footage: 84,645 sq.ft.
Completion Date: July 2006
Total construction cost: $9.1 million
Owner:
Struever Bros.
Eccles & Rouse, Inc.,
1040 Hull Street, Suite 200,
Baltimore, MD 21230
Architect:
Cho Benn Holback + Associates
100 North Charles Street
14th Floor
Baltimore, Maryland 21201
www.cbhassociates.com/
T: 410-576-0440
F: 410-332-8455
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