The ground floor now includes public-facing venues, like a coffee bar and a retail space, and a restaurant (Maxwell’s Trading). Above, the second floor, shared with Flashpoint Innovation, a Chicago-based food and beverage consultancy, hosts a film studio for culinary media, test kitchens, offices, and a private dining and event space. At the rooftop, an urban farm and greenhouses—designed and operated by the client—supply produce to the programs below.

The existing warehouse was expanded and topped with greenhouses. Photo © Annabell Ren, click to enlarge.

“The client expressed their goals as exploring how the space could be used to work collaboratively with business partners, like the restaurants they provide produce to,” notes Bureau Gemmell’s Lynsey Sorrel. “There was also a strong desire to retain the patina of the building.”

Making room for all the additional programming required the removal of the warehouse’s timber roof trusses and the insertion of up to 10½ feet of wall height—concrete masonry units fronted with brick—to raise the roofline above the existing parapet. The new second-story floor plate and the roof slab are composed of precast concrete planks; both are supported by new and old masonry and structural steel. Additional shoring work strengthened the foundations below grade. The expansion yielded approximately 6,000 square feet of interior space and 9,000 square feet of outdoor space.

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The kitchens and restaurant are minimally detailed (1 & 2). Photos © Annabell Ren

The interior finishes throughout are subtle. Smooth and grooved plaster walls stand unadorned; century-old brick remains scuffed and unevenly mortared; and exposed structural elements, such as a handful of original steel columns tucked behind the restaurant’s bar, were cleaned and left exposed. Natural materials that include stone and wood comprise countertops and shelving in the kitchens, and white tiling serves as backsplashes and wall finishes. Overhead, wood ceiling baffles provide a measure of acoustical diffusion and also do duty in partially obscuring mechanical systems—pendant lamps and bulbs slip through their openings. Notably, approximately 40 percent of the baffles are recycled birch and maple planks, sourced from The Roof Crop’s temporary headquarters during construction. New and expanded windows, casement at ground level and glass-block on the second floor, provide abundant daylight within these spaces.

A rooftop farm provides produce to the programs below. Photo © Annabell Ren

From street level, the urban farm and greenhouses, which also function as a rentable event space, are the most conspicuous element of this recent intervention. Their minimal dark-steel silhouettes, sans bracing, were made possible by tucking structural anchors into the concrete masonry walls at the second level.

The sum of all these parts creates an inviting culinary destination that only enhances its formerly rough-and-tumble industrial setting.