50-Story Apartment Tower Could Come To Redeveloped Lincoln Park Shopping Plaza

LINCOLN PARK — The Clybourn Place shopping district in Lincoln Park could be the home of a 50-story apartment building, retail and more.

CRM Properties, a Deerfield-based property management and development company, is planning an overhaul of the 3-acre space at 1800 N. Clybourn Ave. The shopping center at Clybourn and Sheffield avenues has lost several major tenants over the years, most recently Goose Island Brewery.

Redeveloping the property to include retail and residences would help improve the local shopping district, said Jeff Malk, principal with CRM, which has owned the property since 1993. It would also contribute to the changing face of Clybourn Avenue and add to a residential development boom in Lincoln Park and Old Town, he said.

“The neighborhood has changed quite a bit since my father purchased and renovated Clybourn Place over 30 years ago, and we have been studying the site for several years before coming up with what we’re calling Willow Street District,” Malk said in an email.

Under CRM’s plans, Willow Street District will include more than 70,000 square feet of upscale retail space, up to 500 apartments in a single tower and over 440 parking spaces, as well as water features and green spaces.

The apartment building would be on Marcey Street on the southwest side of the site, replacing a vacant single-story retail building.

The plans include keeping the majority of the building where Bed Bath & Beyond used to be but removing the western portion to make way for a new structure with two levels of parking, Malk said.

The two decorative masonry towers will also stay. The rest of the site will be demolished for new construction, Malk said.

“We hope to build something very special here with a focus on a comfortable and inviting retail experience,” Malk said. “We want to incorporate oversized sidewalks, connecting both sides of Willow with crosswalks and a boulevard, and construct the buildings with glass, masonry and steel to make the project feel more transparent yet prominent, with a nod to the neighborhood’s history as a manufacturing hub.”

The proposal would require a zoning change and approval from City Council. A spokesperson for Ald. Brian Hopkins (2nd) said the alderman has recently been made aware of the proposal and is looking forward to a community review process soon.

CRM has had one meeting with the city’s Department of Planning and Development and is in the early stages of the approval process, Malk said. The plan is to get the retail approved first then work on the residential development, he said.

“There will be a residential tower, and the height will certainly be debated,” Malk said. “But we’d rather focus on the fact that we’re building one of the largest retail projects in the Clybourn Corridor in over a decade and our intention is to make it first-class.

“Our hope is that the site will look very different in the next 10 years as more large sites like ours transform into pedestrian-friendly, mixed-use developments.”

Clybourn’s Changing Character

The newly proposed development would continue the Clybourn corridor’s history of reinvention and redevelopment.

In the 1980s, Clybourn Avenue was a heavily industrial district with no retail or residential space. Early that decade, real estate developer Tem Horwitz bought a seven-story, Victorian-era building that was once a piano factory at 1872 N. Clybourn Ave.

“Back then, when you would drive down Clybourn on a Friday or Saturday night, you would often see four headlights coming straight at you at high speeds,” Horwitz said. “It was a street for drag racing.”

Nevertheless, Horwitz saw potential.

He bought the building in 1984, gutted it, renovated the interior, added a steel superstructure on the building’s north side and an enclosed parking lot, and leased 57 loft apartments.

A few years later, Horwitz and his team transformed a former Turtle Wax factory at 1800 N. Clybourn Ave. into a three-level shopping center.

“I tried very hard to get two tenants,” Horwitz said. “One was REI, which I did everything I could to get them but was unsuccessful in the end. The second was Trader Joe’s, which I knew from the Southwest and the West Coast. But I was totally unsuccessful.”

Instead, the retail space included high-end apparel and accessory stores, a travel agency, a nail salon and a family aerobics club. The redevelopment completely changed the character of the area, but progress at the site was soon stymied.

“A major recession and the fact that my lender went out of business really created a disaster for me,” Horwitz said. “The thing about development is that you can have a bright idea, but you have 2008 [financial crisis] or a pandemic and the best-made plans of men and mice go to hell.”

In 1993, CRM bought 1800 N. Clybourn Ave. out of foreclosure and repositioned the site from an indoor mall into a lifestyle retail center known as Clybourn Place.

Over the years, businesses such as Bed Bath & Beyond, Gap, Goose Island Brewery, Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices, Patagonia and others opened storefronts there.

Market demands, the COVID-19 pandemic and other factors have forced many businesses to leave. Developers hope an upgrade to the area will bring in new business.

“The Clybourn Corridor is undergoing a major transition,” Malk said. “Due to its underlying zoning, the strong retail core, its proximity to other affluent neighborhoods and its prime access, the area has become a mecca for residential development. We believe integrating residential and retail together will only elevate the overall experience, for both residents and retail customers.”

The proposed 50-story apartment building would be built less than a mile from Sterling Bay’s Lincoln Yards development. The proposed megadevelopment includes two high-rises with over 600 apartments, but the project has faced significant delays.

Further east in Old Town, developer Fern Hill is trying to build a 500-apartment tower at North Avenue and LaSalle Drive.

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