Historical old buildings might be pretty on main street, but they need occupants and care. One company hopes to bring both of those to Main Street Spearfish.
Keating Resources, a multi-state real estate developer, has purchased the plot of land located at 714 North Main, and have no intent of bulldozing the building.
Instead, president Alec Keating said the century-old building will be the local home base for the company.
“Three and a half years ago we started investing in the Black Hills – primarily Lawrence County," Keating said. "This year we decided that we wanted to plant our flag and have our Black Hills HQ on Main Street in Spearfish. So, we purchased the former Sears building three months ago, and right now we are fixing it up – it was in very poor condition.”
In addition to hosting Keating’s offices, the revamped space will also be home to Spearfish-based children’s play center Jitter Joint Play Café.
Keating said redeveloping historic buildings is the MO of the company.
"We did that with the old Shopko building in Custer, converting it to climate-control self-storage, the old Players Building in Spearfish, converting that to climate-control self-storage and industrial space," Keating said. "We buy vacant buildings, fix them, and bring them back to life.”
The Keatings say they want to contribute a distinct architecture style to their buildings in the area.
“It’ll be reSAWN Timber, which is my favorite exterior cladding company, its often featured in Architectural Digest," Keating said. "You see that material a lot in Jackson Hole, Park City, Aspen – very prominent mountain towns – so it’ll be great to bring it to the Black Hills. I haven’t seen anything like it here yet.”
The business expects the new space to be finished by next summer.