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GRANITE CITY — The altar and pipe organ had been got rid of from the outdated church in downtown Granite Town, and the Nineteen Seventies-era carpet has been changed with paneled floor.
The place the pipe organ as soon as was once, there’s now a level the place up-and-coming bands will play subsequent 12 months, and podcasters will grasp are living tapings. The place the altar was once, there’s a VIP seating house. Storage-style doorways had been put in in two of the brick partitions in order that when the elements’s respectable, folks will clear out simply between the occasions inside of, the meals vans within the sq., and bocce ball suits at the patio.
However the chandeliers and stained glass home windows have been left by myself.

President and senior venture supervisor of Manufacturing Improve Products and services Robin Nunn leads a functions presentation for presidency officers and venture contributors at The Mill, a brand new leisure venue, on Friday, Dec. 30, 2022, in Granite Town. The venue was once built out of an outdated church and can host concert events.
“We’ve attempted to go away some odes to the previous,” stated Michael Parkinson, the mayor of Granite Town.
The conversion of the Niedringhaus United Methodist Church into an leisure venue referred to as “The Mill” is one in all a handful of monetary construction initiatives the town has been quietly advancing, as its trade and govt leaders paintings to push Granite Town’s symbol past what it’s lengthy been referred to as: a metal the city, house to the sprawling Granite Town Works.
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Simply 7 miles northeast of downtown St. Louis, the Illinois metropolis is house to 27,000 folks — down from 33,000 in 1990.
This 12 months U.S. Metal introduced plans to promote a big portion of the mill that has anchored the town’s financial system, in a deal this is anticipated to scale back the plant’s group of workers by means of two-thirds.
Parkinson perspectives the aid as a topic for the area, no longer simply his metropolis. The mill has 1,500 workers. Handiest about 300 individuals who paintings for the mill are living within the 62040 ZIP code, Parkinson stated, the place Granite Town, Pontoon Seaside and Mitchell are positioned.
“There will probably be a chew from it,” Parkinson stated. However, he added, “Granite Town has moved previous being a the city that’s simply depending on U.S. Metal as an employer.”
Officers had been running to fill once-vacant industrial structures, and foster companies and match areas downtown within the hopes of drawing folks and jobs to the realm in industries past production.
The acquisition and renovation of the church will mark a few $3 million funding, Parkinson stated, which comes from the town’s downtown tax increment finance district.
On a up to date afternoon on Nameoki Street, probably the most major corridors in the course of the metropolis, a building workforce was once renovating a former Ok-mart right into a showroom for a furnishings retailer. The trade will sooner or later get pleasure from a localized gross sales tax incentive.
Within the subsequent development over, employees have been solving up an area previously occupied by means of Store ‘n Save, left vacant when the grocery store exited the St. Louis area in 2018. A part of that development will develop into an Ollie’s Discount Outlet, metropolis officers stated, and some other section will probably be occupied by means of Buck Tree and Circle of relatives Buck.

Development employee Matt Rose mounts {an electrical} field at the wall Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2022, in what’s going to be a joint Circle of relatives Buck and Buck Tree retailer in Granite Town.
Parkinson, who took place of job in 2021 after twenty years running for the Granite Town Police Division, stated that the brand new retail retail outlets gained’t essentially develop into the town’s huge “bread and butter” employers just like the metal mill or the clinic. However the furnishings retailer will want salespeople. Ollie’s will want cashiers and stockers.
He believes that some farmland alongside Path 3 can also be advanced into commercial and warehousing area.
As Parkinson drove down Nameoki Street with Cathy Hamilton, the town’s financial construction director, Hamilton gestured to now-vacant structures that may quickly be house to the brand new bargain shops.
“There’s one domino,” she stated. “There’s some other.”
That afternoon, around the park from the Methodist church downtown, shoppers started arriving on the bar, Tinseltown, that opened in November 2021. Proprietor Emily Gavilsky was once busy making vanilla chai masala easy syrup for cocktails, and the kitchen nonetheless smelled of the cayenne cinnamon easy syrup she’d made previous that day.
Gavilsky, 35, has lived maximum of her existence in Granite Town. She opened Tinseltown within the former First Nationwide financial institution development downtown, initially as a six-week pop-up.
She hopes the town can develop into a spot the place folks come to spend their entire night — and she or he thinks that’s starting to occur. Consumers devour dinner at eating places within sight prior to preventing by means of Tinseltown, after which finish the night time on the Prohibition-themed speakeasy subsequent door.
“We don’t need folks to return as soon as, and feature one drink and depart,” she stated.
Brenda Whitaker, who runs the speakeasy, labored for 15 years on the metal mill. She opened her first trade, the Lawn Gate Tea Room, in 2000. On the time, she was once nonetheless running “nighttimes” — the 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. shift — as a coiler operator on the mill, and juggled the 2 jobs for 2 years till she was once positive the tea room may just live to tell the tale.
Up to now 3 years she’s opened a film theater and a podcast studio in an area that adjoins the tea room. She’s renovating a board sport café and diner within the area subsequent to it.
Whitaker has lived in Granite Town her entire existence, and recalls when it was once a retail vacation spot. If folks wanted new garments or footwear, they went to brick-and-mortar retail outlets downtown. However that was once once more, she stated, and within the age of e-commerce, the town wishes to evolve.
“We need to reconsider issues,” she stated. “Granite Town turns into a spot the place you do issues. You give folks puts to head, and issues to do.”

Granite Town Mayor Mike Parkinson issues at building performed on a brand new leisure venue on Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2022, in Granite Town. The venue is being created from an outdated church as the town goes thru a duration of monetary redevelopment. Parkinson stated he hopes those new traits will exchange the picture of the town, which has traditionally been referred to as a metal the city.

Improve technician Michael Lee, left, level hand Shanon Mayes, heart, and level hand Christian Rivera, proper, roll a field of gear right into a truck at The Mill, a brand new leisure venue, on Friday, Dec. 30, 2022, in Granite Town.

Lights fashion designer Mark Schilling, entrance, and video engineer George Smart, again, gentle the level all the way through a functions presentation for presidency officers and venture contributors at The Mill, a brand new leisure venue, on Friday, Dec. 30, 2022, in Granite Town. The venue was once built out of an outdated church and can host concert events. Picture by means of Christine Tannous, [email protected]
A choice of pictures from 2022 by means of Laurie Skrivan, who has coated St. Louis from just about each attitude as a Submit-Dispatch personnel photographer since 1998. She gained the 2017 Robert F. Kennedy Journalism award home pictures and was once a member of the 2015 Breaking Information Pictures Prize awarded to the St. Louis Submit-Dispatch pictures personnel.
https://www.stltoday.com/trade/native/in-granite-city-civic-leaders-prepare-for-a-future-with-less-manufacturing/article_9bdbe1e5-7d50-5b94-8b02-f487758a16b3.html