IMAGE / GOOGLE MAPS
The Grant Building at 31 Centre St. in downtown Bath before redevelopment began.
October 27, 2022
Posterity project: Photographing historic Bath revamp and the people behind it
Courtesy / Joshua Langlais
Redevelopment of the historic Grant Building is the subject of a photo documentary project.
By Staff
When developer Sean Ireland began the restoration of a 1936 art deco style building in downtown Bath last year, he looked to the community for input on its future.
Now Ireland has teamed with Bath photographer Joshua Langlais to document the redevelopment for posterity.
The four-story, 25,000-square-foot Grant Building at 31 Centre St. was the fourth building Ireland acquired over a three-year period.
“Having done several of these kinds of real estate projects, I wanted to find a way to highlight and draw attention to the ‘boots on the ground people’ – the ones getting their hands dirty and showing up day after day for months at a time battling the often harsh and unpredictable conditions and elements of a construction project,” Ireland said in a news release.
Ireland, of Windward Development, is a founder of Union + Co., a coworking, art and innovation space at 48 Front St., as well as Bath Brewing Co. He's also developer of the Harvey Block/Morris Povich Building and the Medanick Building, both of which have been named Maine Preservation Honor Award winners.
W.T. Grant Co. built the art deco store, an anchor of downtown and one of several department stores in the city at the time.
Bath Iron Works had offices at 31 Centre St. in the 1970s through the '90s.
It was occupied by a retail salvage store for a while in the 2000s.
Redevelopment of the mixed-use project began in September 2021 and is about 50% complete.
The idea to photograph the redevelopment was generated by Ireland’s desire to highlight people performing the labor involved in the deconstruction and construction. The goal is to document progress and the faces of the project with both architectural and portrait photography as well as audio interviews with each portrait subject.
Langlais completed a similar community-based portrait and interview format in Bend, Ore.
In Bath, said Langlais, “The guys didn’t know what to think at first.”
Langlais said he took time getting to know everyone, explain the idea to them and make sure they felt included in the process.
“It’s been a challenging assignment - often not great light, lots of noise and distractions, and, of course, not wanting to get in the way,” he said.
The photography and audio exhibit will be at 31 Centre St. for the next six months. Union + Co. will host a final exhibit once the Grant Building is completed and opened, which is expected to be next summer.
Click here to view an online version of the gallery.
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