New look for Durham's Morris building includes stores, condos

The clock is ticking on the timepiece atop 102 Morris St.

Architect Scott Harmon said developers have closed on the historic corner building in downtown's Five Points, which Harmon's Center Studio Architecture and its partners bought from the city.

The clock, added to the building in the 1980s, "is not long for this world," Harmon said recently. "I expect it to be gone in a week."

A Dumpster outside is the only clue to the renovation that awaits. When completed in about six months, the plan is to carve the two buildings on the property into four ground-level storefronts and three condo units on the second floor.

The work will re-label the two-story building:

101 E. Chapel Hill St., housing All City Pizza, Bullseye Bicycle and The Cupcake Bar on the first floor, and the condominiums, two of them rentals, upstairs.

107 E. Chapel Hill St., housing Harmon and partner David Arneson's Center Studio Architecture. They will occupy half the single-story building and lease half until and if they expand.

"It's going to be neat," said Bob Ashley, executive director of Preservation Durham.

The agency served as a pass-through partner, attaching covenants requiring the renovation to follow historical guidelines.

"That's a particular iconic building," Ashley said. "Scott's intent is to restore it with historic integrity. To see these buildings come back to life with attention to historic details is just another shot in the arm for downtown."

Anna Branly and her sister Katie Braam own The Cupcake Bar, a mostly delivery business that has been renting a commercial kitchen in Cary. Branly and her husband were walking around downtown Durham one weekend looking for a place to get a milkshake and saw an opportunity in the redevelopment.

"I've been watching downtown grow and really looking forward to being downtown and being close to work," said Branly, who lives in Old North Durham.

"We really wanted (the shop) to be in a place where people could just walk by," she said.

The seven new owners paid $224,850 for the property. The building's tax valuation is $899,000, and according to a city staff memo, its assessed value is $575,000. Its dilapidated condition and the cost of removing asbestos, however, justify the lower price.

The total cost of the project is estimated at $2.7 million, Harmon said.

The renovation will restore the building to its 1954 period look, what Harmon called "classic mid-century modernism."

"What we're doing is taking away all the wacky stuff that was done to the building in the '80s and putting it back to the '50s," he explained. "It was an era when everyone wanted to make buildings look sleek and space-age. It was all about smooth lines and clean surfaces."

But he's equally excited about the co-owners making the project - and the essential state and federal tax credits - happen. The tax credits will return 20 percent of renovation costs in state and federal tax credits on the income-producing units, and 30 percent in state tax credits on owner-occupied residential space.

"These are small independent businesses," Harmon said. "Not only do they get to own their own space, (they) control their own destiny."

Correspondent Elizabeth Shestak contributed to this report.