Saturday, April 26, 2008

Storefronts


Continuing the theme of creating and invigorating identity in a given area; consider the impact of a building's storefront on the pedestrian experience, and the bottom line of the shop owner. Laurence Aurbach summarizes the major points of good storefront design in this article at pedshed.net. In fact, the topic is so important to at least one city, that they've developed a complete guide targeted at shop and building owners looking to capture passing foot traffic. This guide is part of the larger business development program which aims to teach small business owners the technical and funding skills required for success.

A developer driven program to include great storefronts need not add tremendous cost, but it can help your building stand out among many and/or help your neighborhood become a retail and shopping destination which further elevates the rent. Also, with more successful retail spaces the risk of vacancy is greatly reduced.

Thursday, April 24, 2008

Welcome!


Welcome to the first of what we hope to many posts on the Asgard Associates, Inc. blog. This is intended to be a place for the announcement of important news, but also important concepts as they relate to profitable and sustainable real estate development.

Having just returned from the sixteenth Congress for the New Urbanism in Austin, TX one of the major topics I spent time addressing with colleagues and friends is the idea of civic identity and how a developer can support or ignore it. Mike Lydon writes this article on pride as a source of urban identity. When entering new neighborhoods for development it is extremely important to understand and support the local identity to maximize the economic appeal of the development. Many developers are so bottom-line oriented that they forget to consider the impact resonant architecture can have on their margins. Discovering and embracing that pride or neighborhood identity can be challenging, but when done right can have enormous profit potential.

To give a local example, compare the neighborhood response to Fifteen Central Park West with the response to Ariel East & West. The Ariel project has done well, but would have done better with the favorable press and support of local residents. The two projects illustrate a difference in perspective on the value of embracing the existing architectural climate.