Sneak Peek: Garfield School Apartments

A historic school in Decatur will be transformed into affordable apartments for seniors.

We are thrilled to announce that the Garfield School Apartments project in Decatur, IL was awarded 9% LIHTC tax credits by IHDA in the past funding round and design work is now underway! The building was also recently National Historic Register listed and will be utilizing federal historic tax credits to preserve the historic character. The project was recently featured on WAND (We Are Central Illinois); you can see further details via this link.

The original part of the Garfield School building was built in 1925, with later additions in 1927 and 1952. It operated as an elementary school under both the Garfield School and Durfee School names up until a few years ago and has been vacant since. Thanks to the vision of our clients, Bywater Development and Simmons Development Group, along with strong support from City of Decatur staff, this historic building will be transformed into 63 affordable apartments for seniors. The plans include the adaptive reuse of the original building, preserving many of the historic details, along with a new construction addition and redevelopment of the existing site to create new parking and exterior amenity space. When complete, the building will include a mix of studio, one- and two-bedroom apartments along with a variety of resident common spaces. We are excited to be partnering on the architectural design with our JV partner Baba Architects. We also happy to be working with Ramsey Historic Consulting on the historic tax credit submission. Design work has kicked-off with existing conditions investigations at the existing building and we are looking forward to moving forward into the full design phase for this project.

Garfield School Apartments will also incorporate significant sustainable design elements, and will pursue Enterprise Green Communities Plus Certification, Department of Energy Zero Energy Ready Home Program (ZERH) certification, along with being an all-electric development.

Here is a sneak peek of the concept renderings for the project as well as some existing conditions photos from a recent site visit. Stay tuned for updates as this project progresses!