During this early period, struggling sculptors, painters, photographers, dancers, and musicians needed cheap space in which to work and rehearse, and leased lofts for studio use in vacant industrial buildings in what were then desolate, dangerous, risqué neighborhoods throughout Lower Manhattan. To save even more money, artists eventually began moving into them altogether and converting them into residences. The leases were commercial, with no residential tenant protections. The agreements with landlords were sometimes based on nothing more than a handshake.

 

It was in this environment that Michael, one of dwellstead's founding principals, learned about restoring and converting buildings and neighborhoods.

During Michael senior year at Cooper Union’s Art School in 1976, he decided to build his own living/working loft. He paid $3,000 for the right to a classmate’s lease (this was called "key money") on Cooper Square and set about converting what was a relatively raw loft into a habitable space in an industrial warehouse.

 

Michael knew a bit about carpentry, electrical work, and plumbing—having picked it up from his grandfather in his high school years. This space tested all those skills and gave him a lesson he never forgot: that vacant, neglected historic buildings could acquire new life by becoming comfortable homes within which to live and work, that this could be done affordably, and that these rehabilitated buildings could become anchors in the renewal of their neighborhoods.

 

The rent, although only $331 a month for more than 2,750 gross sq ft, was expensive for those days, so Michael built 3 bedrooms so he could have roommates to share expenses.

 

THE CHALLENGE

 

The building had two residential units and a sound studio occupying 11,000 of the 49,000 square feet. The rest of the building was empty.

 

The front seventh floor (top) unit that Michael acquired was virtually "raw" space:

• A completely open plan, with plastic curtains hung from the ceiling dividing the space into "rooms".

• A floor with decades of parakeet seed and poop ground into the floorboard gaps

• Drafty windows that did not close tightly

• An industrial fan in one window

• A bathroom across the hall

• A "kitchen" that included a 1920's oven and stove, a 1950's fridge, a laundry room sink and a shower stall

• A very leaky, rusting tin ceiling

• Brick walls with decades of coats of lead paint

• Non-code compliant electrical

• Non-code compliant plumbing

• A manual elevator

• The neighborhood was sketchy at best, even though it was across the street from The Cooper Union, a world-class school of science, engineering, art and architecture

 

Michael never bothered to document all the work that he did on this loft or any of the others he worked on in those days. The picture below is the only one surviving, taken a few weeks into construction by a photographer classmate and friend, after one of the roommates had already started moving in (too much of) his stuff.