Historic St. Louis County Jailhouse Sold, Being Converted Into Apartments

Gardner Builders is already at work redeveloping the building with its steel jail cells into 33 mixed-rate apartment units.

DULUTH, Minn.-The historic St. Louis County Jailhouse in Downtown Duluth is getting new life as mixed-rate apartments, after 10 years of trying to put the vacant building to use.

This October, the building on West 2nd Street was sold to New Burnham, an entity composed of Meghan Elliott of New History, Jon Commers of Donjek Consulting, and Grant Carlson, the previous owner of the building.

“We are taking a space that was historically used as a jail space and turning it into homes, and I think that that history and seeing that evolution is an important part of the story of this building,” said Elliott, Founding Principal of New History.

Gardner Builders is already at work redeveloping the building with its steel jail cells into 33 mixed-rate apartment units.

They hope to have the building completed by the end of 2022, in order to qualify for state and federal historic tax credits.

“Especially in this area there’s not really any dense housing, that’s a mixed-income approach,” said Jason Hale, Senior Housing Developer with the City of Duluth’s Planning and Economic Development.

“This is a great little addition and bookend to the historic district there and some really great local workforce opportunities, I think,” Hale said.

According to Elliott, certain historical aspects of the building will also be kept open for the public to view and learn about.