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December 6, 2023

From prosperity to hardship and back again: Hartford celebrates start of 155-unit apartment redevelopment of Fuller Brush complex

Michael Puffer David Schick, senior strategist with real estate development and investment firm Shelbourne Global Solutions, talks to community leaders Tuesday at the former Fuller Brush factory in Hartford’s North End.
A rendering of the completed Fuller Brush apartment redevelopment. This photo gallery includes a mix of renderings and present-day photos of Fuller Brush complex.
By Michael Puffer

Community leaders, politicians and developers with New York-based real estate firm Shelbourne Global Solutions came together Tuesday morning to celebrate the pending launch of a 155-unit apartment redevelopment of the former Fuller Brush complex in Hartford’s North End.

The century-old industrial complex’s role in the community has fluctuated with its history and economic fortunes.

Community leaders and politicians on Tuesday took turns at a podium in a vast wing of the building that has already been stripped down ahead of reconstruction. Only support beams have been left standing. 

Lights and exposed wires hung from the ceiling. 

Shelbourne representatives said the first phases of redevelopment — creation of apartments and amenity spaces — will begin within days and take about 18 months to complete.

The addition of commercial and industrial space will follow as tenants are identified.

Steven Harris, a 76-year-old retired fire captain, recalled walking past Fuller Brush in his youth, knowing it was a source of employment, hope and pride. 

Later, the building hosted a state welfare office and was a sore spot in the neighborhood, a place where people had to prove poverty in order to qualify for badly needed support.

Janice Flemming-Butler, CEO of lobbying group Strategic Outreach Solutions, tearfully recalled sitting for hours in 90-degree heat in the building’s hallways as a child, waiting to see if her family would qualify for food stamps. 

Michael Puffer
Janice Flemming-Butler, head of lobbying firm Strategic Outreach Solutions, is a key proponent of the redevelopment of the former Fuller Brush factory.

She learned not to let welfare staff know her father was still at home for fear of losing access to food. 

For her, it was a place where shame began.

Flemming-Butler recalled in more recent years complaining to her friend Alan Lazowski, a real estate investor and head of LAZ Parking, about the seeming inability to spread the accelerating redevelopment of downtown Hartford to the North End. 

Lazowski spoke to his business associates at Shelbourne, leading to the real estate investment and development firm’s review of possibly redeveloping the century-old industrial complex at 3580 Main St.

“So, when I came back to this building with (Shelbourne Chief Strategist David Schick), I had so many mixed emotions, but I started visioning anew,”

Flemming-Butler recalled. “I started to see that young professionals could come back home, and they could come to this building and have the aesthetics of downtown, but in their community.”

Shelbourne recently finalized financing for the $42.1 million residential phase of the Fuller Brush redevelopment, which includes $22 million in private loans; $8.5 million in city and state loans; $6 million in developer equity; $4.5 million in state historic credits; and a $1.1 million federal grant, according to

Michael Freimuth, executive director of the Capital Region Development Authority.

Only five of the apartments are to be set aside at “affordable” rents. 

Flemming-Butler and others noted the neighborhood already has a significant amount of subsidized housing and that it’s important to add market-rate units, and associated commercial development, as a draw for young professionals and others seeking out amenities comparable to new apartment developments in downtown Hartford.

The entire Main Street complex is 326,000 square feet on 12.5 acres. Shelbourne plans to transform 174,560 square feet comprising the main building into housing, a project it has dubbed “Bristle & Main.” 

A separate 7,180-square-foot building will be transformed into amenity space during the first phase of development.

“I look at this as an ecosystem, not just for people living at Bristle & Main, but for the entire community,” Shelbourne Chief Operating Officer Michael Seidenfeld told the Hartford Business Journal. 
 

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