PLATTSMOUTH – Lofts on Main is today an apartment building that provides unique and much-needed living space, but stepping onto the property also leaves no doubt about the building’s roots as the Plattsmouth High School.

Michael Sothan of History Nebraska said it makes a great start to this year’s Rehab Roadshow.

 

Before photos courtesy of Alley Poyner Macchieto Architecture 

Sothan: “The Plattsmouth High School here is an excellent example of historic preservation work and historic rehabilitation. It was a building that was essentially falling apart, had been long vacant. The community came together with developers and several other partners and just made a project that is amazing.”

Ryan Durant of RMDX Development said the $16 million project would not have happened without rehabilitation. Funding sources, such as federal affordable housing programs,  historic tax credits, History Nebraska’s valuation incentive program and LB840 funds from the City of Plattsmouth are all critical.

 

Durant: “It would never look like this today. We would never build a building with the facades or the woodwork. It truly preserved a building from getting destroyed and knocked down.”

Abby Hegemann of Alley Poyner Machietto Architecture said the building was built in 1918 in a time when society was advocating for school reforms to improve lighting and natural ventilation. It was decided to preserve the auditorium to reflect the desire of its World War I-era community by showing the dazzling skylights and expansive windows.

Hegemann: “At the end of the day, they want a successful project that is going to work functionally for them as an apartment building, but it also has to preserve those character-defining features that mean so much to the integrity of this building.”

The architect recognizes the cultural tale revealed by the thick masonry walls and shafts for natural ventilation to the classrooms, as well as the realities of damage while the building sat vacant for over two decades  from 1996 to 2019.

 

Sothan: “Historic properties need to be reused. They need to find new purposes, new futures.”

Sothan said blue lockers lining the hallways and even a trophy case are tributes to the building’s past.

Sothan: “The building still tells the story of what it was meant to be here for historically, but yet we know it needs to find that new use, so we try to blend some of the old with the new.”

The Rehab Road Show will continue this year with stops at Red Cloud and Norfolk.