cornerhouse

The developer of a $42 million Bishop Arts project is saving this one house, at the northeast corner of Bishop and Melba, with plans to renovate it as a commercial property.

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The Nazerian family company, Exxir Capital, recently demolished a small apartment complex and nine single-family homes to make way for the first phase of the Bishop Arts project, which eventually will comprise about 95,000 feet of retail and office space and 400 apartments.

But this one little cottage on the corner, they’re saving.

“We really let the site speak to us,” Exxir Capital’s Thea Van Loggerenberg says of the house.

It is surrounded by big, old trees, and the company envisions the house becoming a bourbon bar or a wine bar or some kind of dessert place with a huge outdoor patio and strings of lights in the trees. They are thinking of it as a spot where diners can go at the end of the night for a drink or a sweet, and they admit drawing some inspiration from super popular Bishop Arts businesses The Wild Detectives and Emporium Pies.

The developer plans to break ground on the project’s first phase this month.

The project, which received a $2 million economic development grant and has been approved for $5 million in future tax reimbursements, also includes rebuilding wider streets and sidewalks, burying power lines and building a parking garage.