Henry Uptown
Henry Uptown | Delivered: September 2015 | 50 E. Church St Martinsville, Virgina 24112 |
- Size: 28,964 gsf
- Use: Mixed-use: apartments (25), commercial (6,000 sf), storage
- Cost: $3,136,978
- General Contractor: Haase, Inc.
- Architect: Studio Ammons
- Historic Tax Credit: Commonwealth Preservation Group
GENERAL INFORMATION: The former Henry Hotel in Martinsville has been renovated into “The Henry”, a mixed-use development featuring 25 residential apartments on the floors 2 – 4, approximately 6,000 sq.ft. of commercial spaces, 1 ADA-accessible apartment on the ground floor, with additional laundry and storage facilities in the basement. The apartments are a mixture of studio and one-bedroom market-rate units. These new apartments help meet the existing and upcoming demand for high quality, new housing in the City of Martinsville. The redevelopment involved a total, top-to-bottom code-compliant restoration of the historic exterior and interior of the building, all proposed, approved and performed in compliance with standards established by the National Park Service and Virginia Department of Historic Resources (DHR). The City of Martinsville facilitated the entire redevelopment process, including garnering an Industrial Revitalization Grant.
ARCHITECTURAL FEATURES: The DHR nomination for the building states, “The Hotel Henry, while commercial in nature with its simple brick block form, features decorative brickwork patterns in the frieze and Greek-key designs in the tile floors on the interior and higher number of floors for the City (4 versus the normal 2), which gave it an elegant presence and made it a landmark in the community.”
HISTORY/SIGNIFICANCE: Built in 1921, the Henry Hotel was touted as “one of the greatest assets in Martinsville and Henry County” in a newspaper story featuring it as a soon-to-be-open hotel in 1925. It was designed by the same architect who designed its twin, the Beverley Hotel in Staunton, Virginia. The restaurant was built as a classic hotel restaurant catering to the business traveler and local business leaders. As the years passed, the building fell into disrepair and became a 33-room efficiency apartment building to house low-income residents as a project-based program. It is a contributing building in the Martinsville Historic District and Martinsville’s local historic district.
