Jan. 26, 2009

Downtown renovation almost complete

By Kevyn Bowling

CENTRE — In many cities and towns, the appearance of the downtown area reflects how well the city is doing overall. If that's the case in Centre, its stock, unlike Citigroup's, is on the rise.

The Ward building on West Main Street, built in 1882 by -- you guessed it -- the Ward brothers, was recently purchased and renovated by Stonegate Homebuilders. The company, headed by Byron Slaughter and Kevin Green, spent over six months restoring the building to its “original integrity plus.” In fact, 95 percent of the hardwood floors were restored.

The 7,000-square-foot building has two floors. Slaughter and Green built four apartments upstairs (all have been leased) that are 800 square feet each. There is also a coin-operated laundry.

The downstairs has two offices. One is occupied by Rodney Stallings and Chad Stallings, attorneys at law. The other will be home to St. John's Nutrition, an herbal shop featuring, among other amenities, free Wi-Fi. It is scheduled to open Jan. 31.

Owner Matt St. John has seven other stores in locations from Cedartown, Ga., to Oxford. There's another in the Smokey Mountains of Tennessee.

In the past the Ward building has been home to a dentist's office, a general store and a furniture store, among others. The Jordan family bought the property in 1929 and converted it into a dress shop for a number of years.

Slaughter and Green have been working together since 2006, but both continue to do some things on their own.

“My partner has had some success with this format in other areas so we're trying it out here,” said Green.

Actually, St. John's first store was in one of Slaughter's buildings, Green added.

Stonegate Homebuilders has also bought the building next door to the Ward building. They plan to use the same model: apartments upstairs and businesses downstairs. This building is slightly smaller, at 3,200 square feet per floor. Green said the history of the building hasn't been uncovered.

Green and Slaughter are looking forward to getting the second renovation underway.

“It was incredible to work with the city of Centre,” Green said. “I couldn't imagine doing this anywhere else and it going as smoothly as it did here.”