This year’s The Home Depot Hispanic Contractor of the Year company takes its name from the Bronzeville neighborhood on the south side of Chicago. For contractors who love adapting historic buildings for new residential uses—as do the three partners of Bronzeville Construction Co.—this Windy City neighborhood is a perfect challenge.
The three partners—Andres (Andy) Schcolnik, an Argentina-born, MIT-trained architect;
Adolfo Castellanos, a self-made Mexican immigrant-turned-developer; and Leigh Ballen, a Cherry Hill, New Jersey, native who previously worked as a lawyer—were each attracted separately to the south-side neighborhood, which has recently been undergoing a wave of renovation.
All three considered themselves part of “a movement to save the old brick buildings with timber frames in under-served neighborhoods,” says Ballen, “and turn them into up-to-date housing stock that provided a new economic stimulus.”
The company’s commitment to the community, as well as its artistic vision and quality workmanship, made an impression on The Home Depot, which named Bronzeville Construction its 2008 Hispanic Contractor of the Year. The award honors leadership and entrepreneurial qualities of Hispanic-owned or operated companies and was established in 2006 as part of an ongoing initiative by The Home Depot to provide products, services and materials to the Hispanic professional customer.
“Bronzeville Construction is helping to both preserve and rejuvenate properties that are important to the Chicago community,” says Alex Zepeda, senior manager of Emerging Markets for The Home Depot. “They have an amazing entrepreneurial spirit, and are very deserving of this award.”
Lyrical Beginning
The three partners formed Bronzeville Construction specifically to tackle one renovation project, a new residential adaptation of a warehouse that once served the famed Lyric
Opera Company’s set shops and costume storage. Their vision when they bought the building: to restore the sprawling structure and transform it into 93 residential lofts. Not far from the McCormick Place Convention Center, with views of the downtown skyline and Lake Michigan, the loft renovation seemed ripe for young professionals and families who couldn’t afford fancier neighborhoods.
The three partners knew the renovation of the 190,000-square-foot building would be a breakthrough project that none of the three could have handled on their own.
The result of this mini-merger is a true collaborative, each partner lending his own specialties and strengths. Schcolnik built his own company, Ansco Construction, on residential rehabs and conversions, such as the historical Grand Ballroom. He also owns
The Granite Source, which imports fine stones from South America.
A former electrical contractor, Castellanos brings deep technical knowledge of building systems and deep roots in the local construction industry and trades. As president of
Admar Construction, Castellanos had captained large historic renovations.
Ballen is a legal ace and entrepreneur. The three teammates all work together on site at the loft project. Their business approach is as unique as their personal stories.
“We’re a general contractor as well as a developer, so we self-perform a lot of our own trades, such as the metalwork, welding, stone and tile,” says Schcolnik. “When you’re doing a rehab job like The Opera Lofts, you can’t price the work unless you’re in it. You have to be able to turn on a dime, and change orders with subs can be onerous. So we try to do as much as possible ourselves.”
Preservation and Innovation
The team’s creativity and technical expertise is apparent in many of the solutions they created for The Opera Lofts. For example, with economy and environment in mind, the team reused all of the brick from demolished sections of the building for new structures including demising walls and elevator shafts. Radiator pipes were cut and refinished for use as guardrails and handrails. This interest in recycling and green building in general led Bronzeville Construction to build a 7,000-square-foot green roof and install dual-flush toilets throughout the building.
Other innovations at The Opera Lofts reflect the team’s search for quality and affordable luxury. All the baths feature slab marble, for example, sourced from Schcolnik’s company. The stone countertops are cut on site, so the builders can fit odd angles and wrap the stone around columns wherever possible. “And if we decide to make an alcove, we don’t have to issue change orders, with all the headaches and drama” that can come with outside subcontractors, says Ballen. “The market today demands ever-higher quality, and people want the additional spaces and features.”
Driven to Succeed
What drives these three professionals to take on such tough ventures and aim so high?
For Castellanos, who arrived in Chicago as a 19-year-old meat factory worker with nothing more than “hopes and American dreams, 20 dollars in my pocket and a sister who already lived here,” the impetus is deeply personal. “For Latinos, when we come to this country there’s a lot of opportunities for us,” he explains. “We can prove that we can do it, too.” With luck and pluck his American dream came true.
As an architect fresh from MIT, Schcolnik was already 35 years old when he arrived in
Chicago, and felt it would take too long to succeed on the typical designer’s track.
Sensing a chance to make money and a bigger impression, he jumped rails: “I scrambled and bought a three-flat in a very distressed neighborhood of Chicago,” he recalls. “I fixed it up, rented it out, and started my business that way.”
Ballen also came to Chicago looking for new challenges, after working as a lawyer in
Washington D.C. “I wanted to leave the practice to do something that was tangible. Law was too theoretical for my tastes. Real estate brings results you can see, and the economics and creativity involved was something I could identify with,” he says.
All three cut their teeth on historic renovations and adaptive reuse ventures, which demanded an appreciation of long-forgotten methods and materials – and sensitivity in incorporating up-to-the-minute technology.
“It’s important to us to preserve as many historic structures as possible,” says Schcolnik.
“People come to Chicago not just to see modern buildings. There’s so much history, like
The Opera Lofts, which has tremendous character.”
The Home Depot’s Commitment to the Hispanic Community
The Home Depot has several programs in place to support the Hispanic community. The
company:
- Rolled out the award-winning Hispanic color palette named Colores Origenes into all U.S. stores
- Sponsored nationwide bilingual safety fairs
- Proudly sponsors the Mexican National Futbol team and Major League Soccer
- Offers bilingual in-store signage and bilingual packaging
- Provides bilingual advertising on Spanish-language television and radio, and offers Spanish-language circulars in select markets both in-store and in Hispanic publications
- Dedicates Emerging Markets Managers to Hispanic contractor accounts in Miami, Texas, Southern California, Chicago and Atlanta
- Hosts Contractor Trade Show events in Hispanic markets