Bedrock, Curis Enterprises Buy L.B. King Building
Curis Enterprises, a Detroit-based real estate development and management firm, has teamed up with Bedrock Real Estate Services to purchase the L.B. King Building, located just east of the former Hudson's department store building.
"We are pleased to add this beautiful, historic building to our growing real estate portfolio as our first acquisition of 2015," says Jim Ketai, CEO and managing partner of Bedrock Real Estate Services in Detroit. "The building is in close proximity to The Z garage and the art-filled alley known as 'The Belt.' The dining and entertainment venue Punch Bowl Social is just around the corner and Citizen Yoga, 7 Greens, and Nojo Kicks are down the street.
"This block has become one of many great downtown destinations with restaurants, retail, art, and entertainment."
The project builds upon a growing portfolio of collaborative efforts between the two real estate firms, says Anthony Curis, vice president of Curis Enterprises. Curis is also a partner with his wife, J.J., at Library Street Collective, the art gallery that helped bring in nearly 30 artists to design murals at The Z, as well as curating the HENSE mural on the south wall of the Madison Building.
"We've had the pleasure of collaborating with Dan Gilbert and Bedrock Real Estate Services on a handful of cultural projects in the city," Curis says. "The L.B. King Building [[1274 Library Street) is an architecturally significant property adjacent to several of these projects including the Belt, a newly renovated public alley in downtown Detroit."
In the early 20th century, the six-story building at Library Street and Grand River Avenue served as the headquarters for china merchant L.B. King and Co. It was also the home base of Annis Furs from 1932 through 1983.
Today, the building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is home to tenants including Parjana, Hair Lab Detroit, and the law firm of Phifer, Phillips & White.
According to the historical marker adorning the Chicago commercial-style building, the structure "features a steel frame, terra cotta skin, three-part vertical division, and banks of 'Chicago windows.'
"As always, we will give careful thought and consideration to plans for the building," Ketai says. "We will maintain the integrity of the historic architecture, as we always do, and attract dynamic new tenants to work alongside existing tenants."
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The Belt
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