There’s nothing more disappointing than moving into a brand-new apartment and realizing you can hear everything happening around you. Footsteps echo from above, voices carry through the walls and the music next door becomes part of your daily soundtrack. What should feel like home ends up feeling more like a shared hallway.
That’s not the case at Bakery Loft Apartments in Richmond, Virginia, where precast concrete gave residents the quiet and solid feel of a true city landmark.
“In so many new multifamily buildings, you can hear the structure shift and settle,” said Beau Woodrum, architect with SWA Architects-VA Inc., in Richmond.
At 12 stories, residents can feel how sturdy the structure is without the creaks and sway that come with lighter-frame systems. Precast concrete construction helped SWA, the project owner and developer for these buildings, create a modern apartment community that’s solid, quiet and built to last.
“Being in a precast building is like being in a turn-of-the-century building in Chicago or New York,” Woodrum said. “There’s a solidity and mass that completely separates you from the noise of your neighbors.”
A Recipe for Renewal
Bakery Loft Apartments now stands where Weiman’s Bakery once filled the air with the smell of fresh bread. The Richmond landmark operated for decades in the city’s Shockoe Bottom district before closing in the early 2000s. Developer Louis Salomonsky, principal at SWA, revived the site in 2022 with plans for a 12-story, mixed-use tower that would bring new energy to the neighborhood while keeping a connection to its past.
Preserving that industrial legacy became an integral part of SWA’s vision for the redevelopment project. The design keeps the bakery’s character alive through brick facades, large window openings and other nods to the original structure. The result ties Richmond’s manufacturing heritage to a modern lifestyle, giving the former bakery site a fresh purpose as a place to live, work and gather.
Tindall Corporation joined the project early to help SWA bring the new structure to life while staying true to the site’s history. The original building had been demolished years earlier, but its distinctive façade (e.g., arched windows, brick detailing and an iconic “Bakery” sign) remained a defining part of the neighborhood’s memory.
“Our role was to help recreate the look and feel of that original architecture,” said Chris Andrews, P.E., sales manager at Tindall. “We worked closely with the design team to match those signature details and ensure that the new structure carried that same character forward.”
Using precast concrete panels allowed the team to reproduce the bakery’s familiar textures and patterns, while also adhering to modern performance and construction standards.