Old Masters: A Look at Charlotte's Historic Buildings

Charlotte gets criticized for bulldozing its history, but there are several charming old buildings still in use—if you know where to look. We found them, and we found their stories, too

Charlotte Cotton Mill: Located on Graham between Fifth and Sixth streets uptown, this was once a place where entire families worked under extreme conditions for about $5 a week. Now, $5 may buy you a drink at tenant Crave Dessert Bar.

Andy McMillan

St. Peter’s

St. Peter’s
In 1992, this became the first big adaptive reuse project in the city, when a developer made it into condominiums, each one different from the other.

Through the efforts of a local Episcopal Church and Jane Wilkes, a New York–to-Charlotte transplant and philanthropist, St. Peter’s Hospital opened in 1878 at the corner of Fifth and Poplar streets. It went through a series of additions and renovations over the years. Today, it is a condominium complex.

“The additional building gave us eleven rooms for pay patients, with twenty beds and two free wards with five beds each,” Wilkes wrote of an early expansion in her history of the hospital, written in 1906. “Wide porches and a pretty front yard made the outlook pleasant, and the house is airy and convenient … the cost was $9,875.82.”

It operated as a hospital until 1940. Shortly thereafter it reopened as the Kenmore Hotel, and continued to serve in that capacity for decades. It was made into condos in 1982.

The first restoration-and-repurpose effort of its kind in the city, the building’s structural appeal serves as an inspiration for historical preservation throughout the city. “The age of the building and the attention to detail and craftsmanship was what originally attracted me to St. Peter’s,” says Kolleen Mikesh, a resident of the building and a real estate agent for ReMax and Associates. Her unit is on the ground floor. According to other residents and research she’s done, her apartment is in the same spot as the former hospital’s morgue. “People keep asking me if it creeps me out,” she laughs. “But it

NC Music Factory

NC Music Factory
Today, the old JFG Coffee sign, relocated from I-277 south of uptown, sits atop VBGB Beer Garden at this massive complex of offices and entertainment spots.

The NC Music Factory site is nestled among bridges, railroads, and a mix of industrial development, bordered by Elmwood Cemetery and the rebuilt Greenville neighborhood. Construction on this site, which originally housed the John B. Ross Company, began in 1904 and continued on and off till the 1960s.

Like most mills in Charlotte during the period, its roots were in the cotton boom, but that phase of production was brief. By 1920 its focus was asbestos-textile production, which lasted until 2001.
Thomas Sadler works in maintenance for the NC Music Factory today. He also worked there during the building’s period as an asbestos manufacturer.

“It was hard work, loading spools of material onto machines,” Sadler says. “But it was a good company and they provided a living for the community.”

Fiber Mills LLC purchased the site in 2001 and created the property that exists today. The complex, at 1000 Seaboard Street, boasts two original mill buildings, 200,000 square feet of space, and two live performance stages. Most of the tenants are entertainment or dining establishments, including Butter NC, Wet Willies, the Saloon, the Comedy Zone, Halo, Bask, and VBGB. It also hosts the American Institute of Architects and the Charlotte Lesbian and Gay Community Center.

The complex is one of Charlotte’s most successful restoration-and-repurpose stories, even more so when you consider its shift from being a place for back-breaking work to serving as a popular party destination.

Alpha Mill

A series of companies produced textiles at Alpha Mill from 1888 to 2001. It’s located at Twelfth and Brevard streets, just outside the I-277 loop.

Charlotte’s second industrial cotton production facility, Alpha Cotton Mill, opened its doors in 1888. Located at the corner of Twelfth and Brevard streets, it is less than a ten-minute walk to The Square and about a five-minute drive to NoDa.

Initially focusing on yarn production, the mill changed its name to Orient Manufacturing in 1901 and became a weaving mill that produced high-end finished cloth. As the century progressed the company and buildings changed ownership and production several times, though it maintained a consistent focus on textiles. All production ended at Alpha in 2001.

“The company changed hands so many times I don’t think any of the employees ever felt it was as stable a place to work as some of the other mills around town,” says former employee Herbert Faulkner. “I was there in the early fifties and I worked as packer and shipper. It was hard work, but it was a living.”

As a rental residential facility, most of the tenants are likely as transitory as the companies that came and went during the site’s 123-year history. With 167 rental units spread across more than 140,000 square feet, some additions have been made to the mill to offer more living space since it reopened as a residential property in 2005, but most is original construction.

600 South College Street

Now the headquarters for law firm James, McElroy, and Diehl, a livery stable stood on this spot sometime around 1902. In 1905, it was expanded and stories were added, but by 1908 portions of the building had been destroyed by a fire.

As the twentieth century passed, the building changed ownership and purpose many times: it was by turns a car dealership, a seed and feed, and even a Piggly Wiggly grocery store. One business, however, left an indelible mark on the city: Query, Spivey, and McGee. A hardware and seed-and-feed store, it opened in 1944 and continued there for forty years.

Pender McElroy, a partner in the law firm that occupies this historic uptown building, used to shop at the hardware store that was located here from 1944 to 1984. The checkerboard sign still remains.

In 1985, the building became the first historic building in uptown to be repurposed. Under the direction of the late real estate developer David Rogers, the structure underwent a massive face-lift and renovation, transforming from raw industrial to posh office space. Pender McElroy, of James, McElroy, and Diehl, beams when he talks about one of the building’s remaining elements.

“It’s the old checkerboard Purina Chow sign,” he says. “Everybody remembers that.” McElroy thinks the sign would make a great piece of art. “I just haven’t quite figured out what to do with it yet.”