New ArenaPointe building downtown to echo Intrust Bank Arena’s design

Bruce Rowley and some new partners in the ArenaPointe building at the southeast corner of Emporia and Waterman are preparing to apply to the city’s facade improvement program to take “a warehouse that is essentially invisible to something that tips its hat to the arena.”

Rowley has long been an advocate for calling the area around Intrust Bank Arena the Arena District, and now he wants the area to look more cohesive, too.

From a design standpoint, he said he wants the 8,000-square-foot former warehouse at 400 S. Emporia to be redone to fit with the arena’s design, so he turned to arena architect WDM Architects.

“Because who better to try to tie these properties together than the people who designed the arena?”

The building was built around 1930 as a furniture warehouse and has been used as a warehouse ever since.

When the arena was built, Rowley said he kept eyeing the Waterman and Emporia building and thinking it needed to be reconfigured to face north.

“It has an amazing view to the arena.”

There’s no parking, but Rowley’s group has property and parking adjacent to it at St. Francis and Waterman.

He and partners Mike Snyder and Alan Banta’s Commerce Street Development initially acquired both properties but then decided to bring in new investors under the ArenaPointe name and take advantage of the area’s status as an Opportunity Zone, which is an area the federal government identifies as needing development and then defers taxes for investors who do work there.

They plan for both buildings to be mixed-used developments with office and retail. The Emporia and Waterman building has space on the east side for a sizable bar or restaurant patio.

Though 8,000 square feet may not sound like a lot, Rowley said he can see a number of tenants seeking small spaces there.

“COVID has certainly changed that. We see a lot of interest in smaller spaces for sure.”

He said reconfiguring the facade first will help with leasing at the building since sometimes it’s challenging to convey to tenants what a space might look like.

The group has to get bids for work and file plans with the city. Rowley said he hopes to finalize everything by late February and then start construction to be ready for tenants by the end of summer.

“God willing, COVID willing, whatever . . . next fall as we approach a new sense of normalcy . . . we’ll see a resurgence in this area, and we want to have this property ready for that new normal.”

At the adjacent property just to the east at St. Francis and Waterman, Rowley and his group plan a larger multistory building that won’t get started until the city has completed sewer work on St. Francis.

Rowley said WDM offered a number of options for echoing the arena’s design on the Emporia and Waterman building and chose one that “was really just perfect.”

He said they took “one of the most-recognizable elements” of the arena, which he calls a mast that “sticks up out of the southwest portion of the building.”

“WDM really took that very-recognizable element and added it to the front of this building.”

He said the firm also incorporated some of the limestone and metal elements from the arena into this building.

“I love the idea that we have the opportunity to make this appear a little more initially planned out as a district than perhaps it really was.”

This story was originally published December 28, 2020 at 2:49 PM.