Y-town's Ugliest Building

Your opinion may differ. My least favorite building downtown has found it's way onto our Classic Youngstown painting, and it's no Classic. In fact, it's younger than I am, at 28, and the youngest building in this painting. It's The International towers. It's made of plain, rough, gray concrete, no windows on the north and south, and tiny windows in between concrete grooves on the east and west. It looks like something out of communist Russia. If I were going to guess what it was from looking at it, I'd guess a prison. Turns out it's  low-income senior's apartments. Here's a recent article about International Tower from The Spindicator. YOUNGSTOWN — The 12-story low-income senior-citizen International Towers in downtown Youngstown has a new owner. Millennia Housing Management purchased the 28-year-old building at 25 Market St. for $4.9 million. Millennia, based in Valley View, near Cleveland, manages 5,735 low-income housing units in five states. The company operates Arlington Gardens, Heritage Apartments and Jubilee V Homes in Youngstown and Sebring Manor in Sebring. When asked why Millennia would spend nearly $5 million in a weak housing market, Amy Castelli, the company’s spokeswoman, said: “We’re very impressed with the downtown Youngstown area. The Youngstown area has a lot to offer. There’s more life in Youngstown than people think and we are impressed with what the future of Youngstown can be.” You may be wondering why I included it if I dislike it so much. The answer is that it's situated right next to The Realty Building, which is a, "classic". Here's a bit about it from Cleveland skycrapers (don't be confused, they have a Y-town page.) Realty Building - 1924 47 Federal Plaza East Youngstown architects Morris Schiebel and Edgar Stanley designed this building for the Realty Guarantee and Trust Company in 1924. Opening the next year, the twelve story structure exhibits elements of the Commercial and Neo-Classical Revival styles. Click here for a detailed view of the facade. The view in the painting is from the corner of Federal and Market looking east across Central Square. Central Square used to be called Public Square. I read recently in The Metro Monthly that The Realty Building was being renovated  for High-priced, luxury apartments. I think it would be cool to live downtown, high in a luxury apartment. I'd be rich, and have nothing better to do but don a mask and cape, and patrol the alleys and roof-tops... Here's a bit about the renovations courtesy of  bx magazine. Downtown The Chase Bank building was purchased by Cleveland developer Lou Frangos with the hope of renovating the 135,298-sf building to lease to businesses, leaving the 25,064-sf anchor space to JPMorgan Chase Bank. He also started the $8.3 million Realty Tower Apartment renovations at Federal and Market Streets. Plans call for 25 upscale apartments on 13 floors to replace the old Realty Trust Building by summer of 2009. Frangos also plans to transform the vacant 13-story Wick Building originally constructed in 1906 on West Commerce Street into housing

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