Wisznia’s 65-Year History of Imaginative Design and Development
By Marty Bell
10 min read
Glancing across Loyola Avenue in downtown New Orleans, from the City Hall and Tulane/LSU Medical Center side of the street, the Saratoga appears to be a bland 1950s brick office building, out of an era when sameness and modesty trumped originality and flash. Approach the building, however, and you find yourself face to face with two identical looking bearded men lying on the floor dressed in bunny suits and in the process of maiming or perhaps comforting a stuffed bunny, or maybe both. These identical mannequins lay in a glass cylinder that once held a revolving door. They are actually both self portraits of Louisiana artist, Alex Podesta, his caring side and his mean side, and a warning that the Saratoga of today is anything but bland. It’s actually a rollicking building, full of art and architectural quirks. Sixty four works by 41 local and emerging contemporary artists hang throughout the building accompanied by quotes and comments from the artist themselves and the resident curator, Terrence Sanders. And just as the boys in bunny suits characterize the artist who made them, the re-named Saratoga – The Apartment Museum – reflects the spirit of its architect and developer, Marcel Wisznia.
One Man, Multiple Hats
Wisznia, the son of an architect, combines pragmatism, a love for historic buildings, business savvy, love of art and somewhat out-there creativity in the firm that bears his family name and serves as a designer, developer and investor in housing ventures. A graduate of Tulane, Wisznia spent much of his early career doing single family residences, office interiors, retail stores and public projects in New Orleans. His development projects were in other places, mostly in Texas and New Mexico, where his father had thrived. But, like so many things, Hurricane Katrina changed that and pulled his focus to the town he calls home.
The Saratoga was a 15-story office building on the edge of downtown New Orleans, about four blocks from the French Quarter, constructed in 1956, but by 2004 it was vacant and wore a big “For Sale” sign on its front wall. The recently completed new Loyola Streetcar line, was not yet even a dream of the planning commission and transit authority.
Wisznia and his Adaptive Reuse team, led by Bill MacRostie of MacRostie Historic Advisors, applied for the building to be individually listed in the historic register, arguing that though it was not quite yet 50 years old, it was time to consider the architecture of this period historic. “This was meaningful to me since this was the period of my father’s early work,” Wisznia says. But the approach and the proposal were rejected. Louisiana SHPO, though, did say that once the building turned 50,
it would qualify, if two constraints could be overcome. The first was that it sat two blocks outside of the downtown historic district, and the second was that the period of significance in the nearby district needed to be updated, as it was then set at 1940.
MacRostie and his colleagues ultimately succeeded in expanding the boundaries to include the building and update the period of significance to 1956. Then Katrina hit and among the devastated buildings was the Tulane/LSU Medical Center, a vital part of the city’s healthcare system. This posed another dilemma. The lender rescinded its loan approvals. As millions of public dollars were pumped into restoring the hospitals, Wisznia was finally able to convince the lender that hospital staff, especially younger, newer staff, as well as medical students would need someplace nearby to live.
Believing that you choose a location for housing to fill a need and then focusing on a design approach and amenity package to attract the targeted tenants, Wisznia and his team set out to create a unique environment for the young hospital residents.
In addition to the art, which residents’ friends would surely be eager to come see, the Saratoga includes a multi-media theater with cushy seating, a resident lounge complete with kitchen and raised bar tables for two, and a large patio looking out on the city and set up very much like a bar with couches and love seats, tables for two and a large outdoor cooking kitchen.
Realizing that for this clientele, the units had to be reasonably priced and therefore could not contain a lot of space, Wisznia incorporated sliding glass panels that move to instantly alter the units between an open loft space and a one-bedroom apartment. When the Park Service committee evaluating the building for historic preservation qualification insisted the developer install a 2 foot by 2 foot ceiling grid and acoustical panels harkening back to its days as an office building, Wisznia agreed to keep the grid – but not install the tiles – resulting in a more contemporary look of industrial steel open to the concrete structural structure above. Wisznia ultimately received approval to fund the 155 units with $14 million of federal and state tax credit allocations with Chevron as an investor and Prudential as the $21 million lender. Out of the working capital reserves, $150,000 was spent to acquire the building’s art. “And I wouldn’t be surprised if at some point, the art collection is worth more than the building,” Wisznia says.
Family Passion for Architecture
The family of Walter Wisznia spent World War II on the run. They fled from Vienna to Paris and then Argentina, before ending up in New York City when Walter was accepted to Columbia University to study architecture. His father would not pay the tuition. He wanted his son to pursue medicine or law, but architecture was not a “real profession,” in his eyes. So Walter paid his way through college by designing window displays at Bloomingdale’s. Upon graduation, Walter, needed to earn a living, but New York required a three year apprenticeship before being allowed to take the licensing exam and practice on one’s own. And he knew he wanted to be in private practice. So he packed his bags and moved to Texas where there were no apprenticeship requirements. He settled in Corpus Christi, and a year later married Sonja Postrong, a woman he met while in college. Soon after, they started a family. Marcel Wisznia was the second of their three children.
“My dad was passionate about his work,” Marcel says. “Architecture was who we were as a family.”
Walter Wisznia emphasized using both sides of the brain. “He was not afraid to show his clients that he could use both his creative skills and his business abilities.” Marcel says. “The architect as real estate developer is greater than the sum of the parts.” This wisdom had a profound impact on the son who today hands out a business card printed on two sides – one side for architect and one side for developer.
Upon graduating from Tulane in 1973, Marcel did not want to go back to Corpus Christi and be the boss’ son. So, like his father, he hung out a shingle. “I had a beard and long hair and worked late into the night and then went out to clubs until 3,” Marcel says. “I worked a full day, but did not want to work conventional hours.”
In his first year at work, Marcel renovated a home for a college friend whose parents had died, leaving him a handsome inheritance. This project earned Marcel a Golden Girder Award, given out by the Vieux Carre Courier, which brought him instant recognition. In spite of this Marcel’s practice had its ups and downs. “There’s a thin line between being self-employed and unemployed,” Marcel says. “And you don’t always know which side you’re on.”
After ten years of practicing on his own, Marcel reached out to his dad to merge their practices. Walter agreed and they continued to work together for the next 20 years; as two profit centers of the same company, mostly on commercial buildings and new construction projects, until Walter’s death at 80 in 2004. Now sitting in his office before a large fan-shaped window and cardboard models of his current buildings, Marcel, with flowing neck length gray hair, rimless glasses and eyes that seem to smile, says, “I realized if I was going to continue to live and practice in New Orleans post Katrina, I really had to start investing in it. And, the best way I could contribute to the City’s recovery was through the development of multi-family housing. And what better place to focus than downtown, which sits on some of our higher ground.” The City’s significant inventory of historic structures, many of them under or unused seemed to be the perfect place to start.
Past, Current Projects
Marcel’s first Wisznia project in New Orleans, what he refers to as his “test kitchen” was the conversion of a Western Union Telegraph Building into the Union Lofts, a $10 million, 33-unit market-rate conversion from a commercial use to housing. The project used both Federal and State historic tax credits and a $5.5 million, 40-year, non-recourse, low interest rate assumable FHA loan. Construction began in 2005 and was interrupted by Katrina. It took six months after the storm to resume power in the neighborhood. But following the disaster, Wisznia realized that not only were homes destroyed, but there were many people left without their belongings also.
A motion picture tax credit was implemented by the State to attract new business, which meant production personnel would be coming to New Orleans for limited time periods. Oil companies sent emergency crews to live in the city. And so when construction resumed, Wisznia decided to furnish all of the apartments, not just with furniture but with pots and pans and sheets and towels and utilize them as corporate rentals.
This was followed by the renovation of the Maritime Building, the oldest high rise in New Orleans constructed in 1893, which Wisznia now has as its company headquarters. To finance this project, Wisznia learned about new markets tax credits for the first time. He discovered that to qualify 20 percent of the income had to come from commercial; i.e. non-residential sources. But Wisznia felt the downtown residential need was too good to pass up and the building was historically important to New Orleans downtown revival. Out of this was born a mixed-use project that combined ground floor commercial, second floor offices and 105 apartments on floors 3-11. Wisznia created two new business ventures to fill the vacant commercial and office spaces. The first is a ground floor café called Merchant, which features Illy coffee and carries the tagline ”coffee – crepes – grapes” and a shared workspace on the second floor called BETA. BETA incorporates a large communal kitchen and living room area where tenants mix and mingle, as if they are still in the college library; 20 workstations, 8 private offices and a large conference room. The entire operation is run by an iPhone app.
Next on the docket, and now being financed, is a renovation of the Stevens Garage, originally built in 1951 and now planned as a market-rate housing project with a twist. The existing garage’s car ramps are being removed and replaced by two automobile elevators, where residents will be able to drive right up to their front door whichever floor they are on.
All the baristas at Merchant and the concierge staff at the Saratoga wear round badges that simply say, “Wisznia” in white. It’s a name that comes with a lot of pride. “My dad started this practice in 1947 which set the path that we’re still on,” Marcel Wisznia says, “Although we are proud of our past, I believe our best work is still ahead of us.”
