City Foundry STL

Challenge

Located in St. Louis’ vibrant, growing Cortex innovation district, City Foundry STL is a 15-acre adaptive reuse of the former Federal-Mogul foundry site into a 21st century mixed use development that celebrates creative concepts in food, commerce and entrepreneurship. Envisioned as a community of innovation where ideas thrive, this unique platform offers innovative food concepts, retailers and workspaces.

Solution

The first phase of the development opened in 2021 and includes a food hall, creative office space, retail space and parking garage. Phase Two of the project, One Foundry Way, introduces a mixed-use development featuring eight levels of luxury apartments anchored by two outdoor amenity decks, six floors of structured parking, and 12,500 square feet of street-level retail. The final site also features public plaza spaces, bike sharing, dedicated ridesharing drop-off, and new connections to the Great Rivers Greenway Regional Trail network and nearby Cortex Innovation District, activating the area to ongoing pedestrian and community use.

As a community-centric development, the site needed to accommodate diverse uses for food concepts, retail, workspaces, and public amenities, creating an environment that thoughtfully connects the past with the future. In addition, the team engaged with local leaders and civic groups to restore the site’s historic buildings and ensure the development fosters innovation, collaboration, and economic revitalization.

Lawrence Group worked closely with the integrated project team throughout all phases of development, following key design guidelines throughout the project such as:

• Preserving historical integrity while introducing new outdoor spaces.
• Fostering economic revitalization by attracting visitors and supporting local businesses.
• Engaging the community with parks, bike trails, and public amenities.
• Promoting environmental sustainability with eco-friendly practices like a plant palette based on existing on-site plants.
• Enhancing aesthetics to transform the brownfield site into a visually appealing space.

The final project applies these design guidelines to realize overarching development goals, creating a new landmark development with enduring positive public impact for the entire St. Louis community.

The project has received local and national recognition, including making the Forbes OZ 20 Top Opportunity Zone Catalysts list and being named to USA Today’s list of Top Food Halls.

Please visit our supplemental writeup for more detailed information on the site’s history, and how our team adapted the space to breathe new life into its surrounding community.

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