Hartford spruce-up
Developers embark on an ambitious apartment project in Frog Hollow that residents hope will change ‘the expectation of what a neighborhood should be’
Frog Hollow residents Aaron and Maja Gill are making a difference in their Hartford neighborhood, embarking on a second, more ambitious apartment rehabilitation project near their first.
HARTFORD — Frog Hollow residents Aaron and Maja Gill are confident they can make a building-by-building difference in their Hartford neighborhood.
The couple has embarked on a second, more ambitious apartment rehabilitation project, less than a two-minute walk from their first on Capitol Avenue.
“In some ways, people say that you are just two people, you’re just one couple,” Aaron Gill said. “Well, yeah. We were able to make some positive change and that was part of why we decided to try it again.”
This time, the Gills bought and are renovating two blighted Italianates built in the 1860s that stand side-by-side on the east side of Lawrence Street. The buildings are diagonally across the street from The Lyceum conference and meeting center.
The $1.5 million project, which includes some public financing, will create 12 market-rate apartments and is expected to be ready for leasing this spring.
The Gills — he, a civil engineer and she, a Yale University human resources employee — live around the corner in one of the units in their first apartment renovation project. The three-story building, where the couple is raising their 21-month-old son, sits in the middle of the Capitol Avenue block on the south side between Lawrence and Babcock streets.
“I am very confident this is what this area needs,” Aaron Gill said. “Our city needs to have some areas like this that aren’t in the heart of downtown.”
Preservationists see the Gills’ renovation projects as vital to saving deteriorating historic structures. But they also view such projects as complementing more highprofile ones in the neighborhood, including Billings Forge Community Works, The Lyceum and the Capitol Lofts apartment conversion.
“Their work on Lawrence Street and Capitol Avenue are at locations with high visibility for residents, workers and visitors in the neighborhood,”
Mary Falvey, executive director of the Hartford Preservation Alliance, said. “And every time properties like these are rehabbed and renovated, it sets off a chain reaction with more sites getting better maintenance or being renovated.”
Frog Hollow resident Greg Secord, a homeowner on nearby Columbia Street for 21 years, applauded the efforts of the Gills. However, Secord said such strides also need to be better paired with larger strategic initiatives by the city and other partners.
“It’s more than about a building,” Secord said. “It’s about changing the expectation of what a neighborhood should be. If the building next door doesn’t buy into your vision. I don’t think it’s sustainable.”
Secord pointed to cars parking on lawns on Lawrence
Street, sidewalks in disrepair and the need for improved street lighting.
Lawrence and other streets in the neighborhood also have suffered from the dumping of mattresses and other bulky waste.
Along Capitol
Avenue where the
Gills apartment is, the recent painting of curbside parking spaces was a big step forward, benefiting the businesses on the block. The spaces came only after a three-year push, Aaron Gill said.
Changing the perception
The neighborhood, Aaron Gill said, also still struggles with perception that both the city and Frog Hollow are an unsafe place to live.
“The perception of Hartford and our neighborhood for those from Connecticut is very different from the reality here, and it is a shame that the stereotypes that have been Hartford and that have been Frog Hollow persist so strongly with so many people that don’t understand or don’t know the area,” Aaron Gill said.
“When we have tenants move in from out of state or have friends and family visit, people who don’t carry the stereotype, they are floored like, oh, no wonder you guys are doing this, this is great,” he said.
Aaron Gill said he sees clear rental demand in the neighborhood. The Gills’ first apartment building was fully leased within three months of its completion in 2016 and continues to be, he said.
On Lawrence Street, the Gills plan 10 two-bedroom units and two threebedroom units, ranging in size from 700 to 1,250 square feet. Like Capitol Avenue, plans call for higher-end finishes such as granite countertops.
Rents are expected to range between $1,400 and $1,700 a month. That’s about $1.35-$1.65 a square foot for a two-bedroom unit, between 11% and 27% lower than the average of $1.85 a square foot downtown, according to CRDA.
Financing for the project includes a $750,000 loan from United Bank, $215,000 in historic tax credits, a $305,000 “bridge loan” from the Capital Region Development Authority and $230,000 in private equity.
A force for change
In 2008, the Gills couldn’t have imagined they would become a force for change in Frog Hollow when they moved into Hartford.
The Gills planned to stay two years and then look at their options, but the city — just showing the first signs of revitalization — grew on them. They liked the people they met through community organizations, such as Young Professionals and Entrepreneurs of Hartford, or HYPE. They also found it easy to walk to Bushnell Park, downtown restaurants and the riverfront.
In 2013, they purchased the 125-year, blighted apartment building on Capitol Avenue from the city, which took ownership because property taxes had gone unpaid. The project cost $900,000, a combination of loans, including $40,000 from the city, and the couple’s savings.
“You’re not taking as much of a risk anymore because we’ve shown it works,” Aaron Gill said, of his latest project.
The Gills also are a critical force behind the early signs of a renaissance of the Capitol Avenue block. They include the addition of the Story and Soil coffee shop and Capital Ice Cream in the storefront spaces in their apartment building.
And for more than three years, Aaron Gill has taken a leadership role as chairman of the Frog Hollow neighborhood revitalization zone.
“I think once the momentum starts to roll,” Aaron Gill said, “and more people see the vision, it will just go quicker and quicker.”