Lofty Ambitions
by K. Robert Wendel

New loft projects in Albuquerque's downtown are creating critical mass in the city's redevelopment efforts with the addition of a whole street of new lofts and apartments near the old Albuquerque High School.

Taking off from their hugely successful renovation of the old Albuquerque High School that turned classrooms into lofts, developer Paradigm Development teamed up once again with Albuquerque's Richardson and Richardson Construction.

"There's some really hip units in these projects," said Hap Richardson, a principal with Richardson and Richardson Construction.

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The project is actually four separate buildings lining Arno Street on both sides of Central Avenue. The lofts closest to completion are the $2 million Arno Lofts. The Arno lofts feature 18 apartments ranging from 800 sq. ft. to 1,400 sq. ft. The Arno Lofts also offer live/work spaces on the street level of the 21,000-sq.-ft., three-story building.

"It's kind of a commercial feeling at the street level," said architect Joe Boehning of Albuquerque's Dekker/Perich/Sabatini. "The ground floor has work/live entrances off of Central that are designed like a commercial project, so someone like a realtor could have their office as a residence."

Across Central Avenue are the $2 million Market Apartments with 10 units along with an 6,000-sq.-ft. space for a small neighborhood market. Those units range in size from 850 sq. ft. to 1,450 sq. ft. On the campus of the old high school, crews are erecting a four-story "Campus Lofts" building with apartments ranging from 800 sq. ft. to 1,500 sq. ft.

The lofts are sandwiched around a parking garage that was recently completed by K.L. House General Contractors of Albuquerque.

All three projects are steel framed with post-tensioned concrete deck with a brick veneer.

"We had some height restrictions on Campus and Arno because of historical height restrictions," Boehning said. "We had to go with thinner post-tensioned slabs because we didn't have enough height to go with another type of structure."

Albuquerque-based JP Erectors erected the steel, which was detailed by Forgemaster Ornamental Ironworks. G&H Construction did the concrete work and Precision Masonry >> laid the brick. Both are Albuquerque firms.

The fourth project, the $1 million Copper Apartments takes an entirely different tack.
The three-story, wood-framed building needed to serve as a buffer between the new projects and the existing residences nearby on Copper Avenue. The lofts feature 12 units on three floors with dormer windows and a stucco finish. The lofts have a northern New Mexico look.

"A brick veneer was originally planned for all four buildings, but the city broke them into four different project," Richardson said. "They also wanted a transition between the older neighborhood and this project, so we built the Copper units with stick and stucco."

In typical loft fashion, the bathroom is the only fixed area, allowing people to decorate their lofts in eclectic ways. Also in typical loft fashion, all of the mechanical ducting and piping is exposed.

"We had to make the duct work look really good because most of it is exposed," said John Garcia, vice president of HVAC contractor Metalcrafters of Albuquerque. "These are really neat apartments. They look like something back east with a big city look."

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