The longtime River North home of Rock Bottom Brewery has hit the market less than a month after the brewery closed.
The Texas-based owners of the property at 1 West Grand Avenue have hired CBRE’s Keely Polczynski to sell the 20,000-square-foot building at State Street and Grand Avenue, CoStar News reported.
Craftworks Holdings owned the property before filing for bankruptcy in 2020, when Houston-based SPB Hospitality bought its assets for $93 million.
SPB Hospitality decided to sell the property after the brewery vacated its space, Polczynski told the outlet. After turning down several unsolicited offers from developers wanting to buy the site, the sellers said they expect to get bids in the “low- to mid-teens” of millions of dollars.
Built almost a century ago, the Rock Bottom Brewery building has an “orange” status, meaning it’s not a Chicago landmark but there is a required 90-day hold on any demolition permits for the property while the zoning department considers the request.
If a buyer was able to get demolition permits, they could also pay certain zoning and density bonuses to build either a 330-foot-tall residential building or a 390-foot-tall nonresidential building.
In addition to name recognition, the property’s location in the popular River North neighborhood could also help the building sell quickly. It’s also located near a CTA Red Line train station and the Magnificent Mile shopping district.
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— Victoria Pruitt