In an urban real estate market that leaves little room for expansion, some Boston-area schools have moved away from constructing modern, hulking high-rises in favor of renovating historical landmarks to solve their student housing woes.
The Boston Redevelopment Authority approved bids from Suffolk University and Emerson College to renovate the Modern and Paramount theaters last week, BRA spokeswoman Jessica Shumaker said.
“[Suffolk’s bid] logistically furthers our projects with many benefits to the city,” she said. “The local residence groups all wanted to see this building activated. They wanted Suffolk to fulfill its goals of housing and the city’s goals to reuse and reactive the Modern.”
Mayor Thomas Menino initially pushed for the inclusion of the Modern and the Paramount on the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s 11 Most Endangered List in 1995 and said he is happy the universities are moving to preserve the city’s architectural history, a BRA press release states.
“We’re happy Suffolk is taking it on,” Shumaker said. “It’s not an easy project — I think that’s why a lot of people hadn’t stepped up before.”
Built in 1876, the Modern originally served as a storefront and warehouse until it was converted into Boston’s first movie house in 1913, according to the release.
Before shutting down in 1980, the theaters showed the first movies with sound in the city and later screened adult films.
Shumaker said the decision to lease the building to Suffolk is “a good fit” because it will serve the university’s housing needs while helping the city save the building from inevitable destruction.
Reconstruction will restore the Modern’s facade and will add an art gallery and pre-function space, a 2,400-square-foot black box theater as well as 180 to 200 bed spaces, according to the release.
“[It will] completely transform lower Washington Street and fulfill our plans,” Shumaker said. “This is going to make the area feel safer . . . It’s better for people trying to enjoy the city at night.”
In addition to Emerson and Suffolk renovation plans, Tufts University is expanding and beautifying its dental school while Boston University regularly remodels buildings in the area, converting hotels and brownstones into residence halls and administrative facilities.
“[The university] spends roughly $1.1 million renovating and restoring each of the brownstones,” BU Housing Director Marc Robillard said in September, adding one of BU’s main housing priorities is the annual systematic makeover of Bay State Road brownstones.
Robillard said BU typically revamps one brownstone each year.
“The Bay State Road project is a good model of a college taking care of its resources,” Executive Director of the Boston Preservation Alliance Sarah Kelly said.
Though Kelly said she has not yet met with Suffolk University officials to discuss the school’s plans to remodel the Modern, she said the Preservation Alliance believes it will be a valuable project.
“The key is continuing to have a dialogue and come up with ideas that will result in win-win situations, so that the developers’ goals can be met and our historic resources will be protected,” Kelly said.
“Preservation can be interpreted in a lot of different ways,” she continued. “We’ll always try to be clear about our intentions and opinions early on. We try to offer assistance in helping to rethink a plan that’s going to have negative impacts [on a historic location].”
Kelly said though expansion can benefit city residents, university officials must carefully toe the line between being proactive and imposing.
“The challenge I see is that a lot of institutions are looking to expand, and student dormitories are very important, but this is a very dense city, and a lot of campuses are in the middle of other neighborhoods,” she said. “There is always going to be give and take on both sides. [But] there are more benefits than negatives to having all the colleges and universities that we have in Boston.”
