An 87-year-old building about a block east of the Maplewood-St. Louis border (7150 Manchester Avenue), is being renovated be an event space to seat about 450.
Pat and Carol Schuchard (husband and wife) bought the 12,000 square foot property for $370,000, which includes a 150-space parking lot, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported last August.
Pat Schuchard was there overseeing the buildout on Monday. He said it will be called The Majorette, and plans to open in December. It will be available for parties and corporate events. See also: Former Lion’s Club to be storefront, offices, event space
“We broke out the ceiling. It’s a beautiful building,” Schuchard said. He said it was previously a call center and was once a furniture store.
The main floor is now open to the second floor the length of the building, which ends at staircases going up to a second level and down to the basement for a planned game room (pool, ping-pong, half scale bowling alley) and a caterer’s kitchen.
The Schuchards are both visual artists and designers (see his website). He said the art and design is their main focus in the rehab. They bought and rehabbed the former St. Louis Artist’s Guild, on Union Boulevard in the Central West End, and reopened it last year as the Boo Cat Club event center.
Schuchard said they’re investing about a million dollars in the project. He said if they have any problems with the city, Ward 24 alderman, Scott Ogilvie is “extremely responsive.”
I’m so glad someone is saving this cool old building in my neighborhood. It’s very cool that it comes with 150 parking spaces, although I have no idea where that might be, since it’s a very congested area through there.
It looks to me to have once been a movie theatre, since it has a movie marquis out front. Does anyone know anything about that?
Was this building ever a funeral home?
I am glad to see that building being renovated. I always thought it was an interesting place, when I played Bingo there, years ago.