Building owner plans spaces for artists at Mad River Lofts

WINSTED — Several proposed projects have fallen by the wayside at the former Winsted Furniture building on Bridge Street, but Marty Goldin, owner of Goldin Management of Brooklyn, N.Y., says there are now firm plans to make the building an arts community called Mad River Lofts.Originally built in 1887 and home to Winsted Furniture for many years, the building at 10 Bridge St. will be converted into artists’ lofts, Goldin said.Goldin said he looked into converting the building into residential units, but decided against it. “After several years of lying fallow, Mad River Lofts are being made ready for commercial use (sorry, no residential apartments),” the homepage says at www.madriverlofts.com. “We have lofts in all shapes and sizes from light and airy to dark, dank and scary. The plan is to create an eclectic, quirky and creative environment filled with energetic motivated people.”Goldin said the decision to build nonresidential lofts comes down to finances.“From an economic standpoint, it’s too expensive to convert it to residential,” he said. “We are basically taking the building as is. We have a lot of cleaning up and renovations to do, but it’s much easier to make it commercial.”Goldin said 10 Bridge St. consists of two buildings with approximately 100,000 square feet of space. He said the plan is to renovate and clean up the smaller back building first before working on the front building.The front building is the one that is most prominently seen from Main Street and still has a Winsted Furniture Company sign displayed on its exterior.“To get these lofts all ready, we need to do exterior work, replace the roof and various windows throughout the building, work on installing an electrical and heating system,” Goldin said. “I am hoping to get this whole project completed by the summer, but I do not have a committed date yet.”Goldin said he is trying to attract customer interest at the project’s website, which states, “We’d like this project to be tenant driven. As the basic lofts are reoccupied, specialty areas could be developed. There could be an area utilized to sell and/or display the products produced in other areas of the complex. We might create an outside eating area or small shops accessible from the courtyard within the front building or build a platform overlooking the river for late afternoon diners. Come join us as we make Mad River Lofts the jewel of Winsted and the Berkshires.”Goldin said the back building on the property is slated to have 12 artist lofts, and he has not determined how many lofts will be in the front building. He said he is not trying to compete with the Whiting Mills building in the east end of town, which provides artist spaces (see story, this page).“What I am trying to do is looking to bookend the town with artist communities, with Whiting Mills on one side of town and my project on the other side,” Goldin said. “This is a nice and pretty area, and I am hoping that people in town will help us to make this project work.”Before Goldin’s new project began, the last renovation activity at the building was in 2006 when a new roof was installed, windows were being replaced, and the building’s plumbing, electrical and sprinkler systems were set to be upgraded.However, as the renovation project continued, pieces of the building started to fall into the street.For some time, a fence was erected to surround the building, which prevented residents from walking along the sidewalk in front of 10 Bridge St.The fence was eventually taken down, but the renovation project remained dormant through the years, and the building remained empty.According to the assessors’ database, the building is appraised at $292,100 and is assessed at $204,470.