Project ONE

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Greenville, SC

The Project

Project ONE is a complex urban, mixed-use development located in the heart of downtown Greenville. The project site was a Woolworth building that sat vacant for more than a decade before its demolition began in 2009. The location took its place in history with a racial protest sit-in at the old Woolworth lunch counter back in the 60’s. The counter was segregated and students from the all-black Sterling High School made their quiet stand for civil rights and against discrimination. After a few years, downtown businesses ended segregation peacefully. The Sterling High School students memorial statue will remain among the new buildings at its corner where Woolworth’s used to be.

Due to economic difficulties and property made up of various parcels with different owners, the city recognized the critical need for the redevelopment and took it upon itself to finalize acquisition of the various sites. The city contributed $4,000,000 for acquisition and site improvements and sourced a development team to redevelop the 179,000-square-foot nine-story mixed-use project into a dense program of ground-level retail and office space, university with green roof, corporate bank headquarters and training facility and a parking structure – all woven into an already spirited main street.

Community Impact

In addition to national retailer Anthropologie and a new headquarters for CertusBank, tenants at Project ONE include:

• Clemson University’s Master of Business Administration and Master of Real Estate Development programs will utilize 70,000 square feet. From Fall 2010 to Fall 2011, the MBA program saw a 15% increase in full-time student enrollment and a 41% increase in part-time enrollment. This increase precipitated the need for additional space. “Having our business programs in Greenville has been good for Clemson and good for Greenville,” said Clemson President James Barker. “This project allows us to have a premium downtown location in a new facility…which can be specifically designed for our needs.” Barker said the project would not have been possible without support from project investors. “This addition will transform Greenville, adding relevant business educational offerings to our existing, well-known and well-rounded community.”

• Tupelo Honey Café is a restaurant known for nouveau Southern Cuisine. Tupelo Honey owner Steve Frabitore says downtown Greenville was an obvious choice. “(It’s) just an incredibly beautiful downtown. Main Street is fascinating, and I think it already is and continues to be a true culinary destination. And we’re going to be a real small part of that. But we’re happy,” he said. “The culinary destination — and this main street, which is completely unique from anything that I’ve seen — and I get to see a lot of cities — is incredible. And this is a place that we wanted to be.” Tupelo Honey plans to hire about 90 people for the Greenville restaurant, about 75 percent of which will be full-time.

The project is striving for LEED Gold Certification from the US Green
Building Council.

“Without the new market tax credits provided by GNMO, the ONE project could not have happened. New market tax credits allowed us to afford a site that owners had been assembling for years — many of them the high-priced years. They also allowed us to partner with the city, requiring less city investment for a project intended to revitalize this entire end of town. Not only will there be new jobs, new retailers and new businesses on our site, there should be many more in the surrounding blocks.”

– Robert Hughes, President, Hughes Development Corporation

Since 2006 taxadvantagegroup has managed its affiliated $89 million Greenville New Markets Opportunity, LLC (GNMO) NMTC fund, which provides investment capital for real estate development projects in low-income areas throughout Greenville, South Carolina.

For more information contact:

Tammy C. Propst | 864.271.2737 | tpropst@taxadvantagegroup.com