The rise of remote work and the continued housing shortage have led to a surge in the number of apartments being carved out of former office space—70,700 in 2025 compared to 23,100 in 2022, according to RentCafe. Developers are increasingly turning to structures with former lives—as offices or industrial or commercial buildings—to create multifamily housing that gives residents dwelling spaces that feel rooted in place and connected to the broader narrative of their communities.
The following 10 projects occupy buildings whose previous roles include an automated car park, Knoxville’s first Black-owned motel, a textile mill, a bank’s computer server space, a post office sorting facility, the old headquarters of the Chicago Tribune, and the largest office-to-residential conversion in the United States to date.
1. Blue at Lavender Bay
Milsons Point, New South Wales, Australia
A 20-story 1970s commercial office tower occupied a prime spot on Lavender Bay, making it an excellent candidate for residential conversion. However, the side-positioned elevator and services core left deep floor plates. The Sydney office of PTW Architects shifted the core to the building’s center, allowing the new units to take advantage of natural light and cross-ventilation. During construction of the new core, a temporary transfer truss system supported the existing structural frame, which eliminated the need for temporary external steel framing and shortened construction time.
The design team also replaced the exterior’s dark precast concrete panels with glazed elements. New balconies, curved fritted-glass winter gardens, and bay windows cantilever from the existing structure to enhance bay views. Strategically placed vertical louvres provide sun protection. The 125 apartments range from one to three bedrooms and include penthouses overlooking Lavender Bay. PTW Architects completed Blue at Lavender Bay for client Aqualand in 2021.
2. Book Tower
Detroit, Michigan
In the 1920s, noted architect Louis Kamper designed the 38-story Book Tower with an unusual amount of intricate Italian Renaissance detail, complete with caryatids and a three-story barrel-vaulted atrium topped by a glass skylight. Once the city’s tallest, the tower anchored the Washington Boulevard commercial corridor, but as downtown declined, the tower did, too. Its magnificent atrium was infilled to house additional offices. By 2009, the building lay empty.
In 2015, local real estate firm Bedrock Detroit purchased the tower and the adjacent Book Building. The New York City office of ODA, with the local office of Kraemer Design Group as preservation consultant, replaced 2,483 windows with historically accurate ones, restored the cornice and caryatids, re-created the atrium, and restored the skylight. Opened in 2023, the Book Tower and the Book Building now contain 229 residential units, 117 apartment hotel suites, event space, offices, shops, restaurants, a rooftop bar, a ballroom, and a fitness center shared by residents and guests.
3. Chronicle Mill
Belmont, North Carolina
Belmont’s first textile mill, dating back to 1901, shut down in 2010 and remained vacant for years, its redevelopment potential challenged by a creek at the property’s western edge, a large transmission line crossing the site diagonally, and the structure itself: a deteriorated amalgam of concrete, steel, wood decking, and timber columns and beams from different eras. Local real estate firm Centra Properties purchased the site in 2013 and partnered with Armada Hoffler of Virginia Beach, Virginia, and North State Development of Cornelius, North Carolina, to convert the mill to residential use.
BB+M Architecture of Charlotte, North Carolina, selectively demolished newer portions of the mill to create more livable floor plates and preserved portions of the brick façade as mementos. Hand-woven art panels, a rope ceiling in the clubhouse, and salvaged objects further keep history alive here. A new fourth floor and an added five-story building raised the number of apartments to 238. Completed in 2022, Chronicle Mill also includes retail and dining spaces, as well as outdoor gathering areas.
4. De Voortuinen
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
In converting a former bank headquarters for residential use, Amsterdam-based architecture firm Elephant repurposed the 14-story structure’s central concrete circulation core to contain bathrooms, storage, and technical systems. The designers also surrounded the building with deep, continuous balconies and placed four elevators and four staircases on the exterior. Residents share each elevator with only one other neighbor. Hallways offer park views and lead directly to apartments and their private terraces.
Each terrace links to all living spaces within each unit, allowing for flexible configurations that residents helped design and can still modify. The building’s 120 trees grow in planters positioned beneath its balconies and supported on four slender steel posts, so the soil is at the same level as the balconies’ floor. Completed in 2021, De Voortuinen has 94 condominiums, two penthouses, and ground-floor shops.
5. Dogan-Gaither Flats
Knoxville, Tennessee
Built in the early 1950s, the Dogan-Gaither Motor Court was Knoxville’s first Black-owned motel. Urban renewal later displaced the lodge and other Black-owned businesses. The motel reopened at 211 Jessamine Street, continuing its role as an important waystation in the segregated American South. In 1967, however, the motel closed and was eventually abandoned until 2020, when the Fourth Purpose Foundation, dedicated to helping people recently released from incarceration, purchased the building to rework it as housing for parolees.
Local firm Sanders Pace Architecture restored the zigzag roof and the breezeways flanking the lobby, replaced surface parking with landscaping, brought natural light into living areas, added an interior courtyard, and repaired the riparian buffer alongside the adjacent creek. Completed in 2022, the building now contains 16 dual-occupancy one-bedroom units. Its location downtown puts services and jobs within easy reach. The operator, Men of Valor, offers residents counseling, employment assistance, and skills training.
6. Former Brest Post Office
Brest, France
Brest’s original post office, built in the late 1920s, was destroyed during World War II. Architect Pierre-Jack Laloy rebuilt it in 1950, creating a U-shaped structure that stood for seven decades. When the French postal service moved sorting operations to the city’s outskirts, the postal service’s real estate subsidiary sold the facility to the Acapace Group of Paris to revamp it as housing for seniors.
Paris’ Chatillon Architects added a contemporary wing to create an interior garden. The four-story addition’s glass brick and concrete exterior harmonizes with existing stone, concrete, and granite. Set on six structural columns, the contemporary section provides unobstructed sightlines from entrance through reception to the interior garden. Wooden loggias and balconies soften the concrete façade. Completed in 2024, the building holds 93 apartments that range from studios to two-bedroom units. The postal service retains offices in a portion of the first floor.
7. Midland Lofts
Kansas City, Missouri
Constructed in 1927 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977, the Midland Office Building once housed the headquarters of AMC Theatres and the National Collegiate Athletic Association. The 12-story art deco edifice sat empty for years before the Cordish Companies of Baltimore, Maryland, tapped local firm Helix Architecture + Design to rework it as workforce housing. Helix fit 135 apartments into the 88,500 square foot (8,220 sq m) structure. All units are earmarked for renters earning up to 80 percent of the area’s median family income.
The design team preserved the historic façade and installed energy-efficient windows. Inside, Helix tucked amenities into existing, oddly shaped architectural nooks. Acoustic isolation shields the apartments from sound in the adjacent Midland Theatre, a popular concert venue connected to the building. Located in the downtown Power and Light District, close to shops and public transit lines, Midland Lofts was completed in 2024.
8. Newark Urby
Newark, New Jersey
One of the first automated car parks in North America appeared in Newark in the 1920s, and it became such an icon that a moving company featured it in its logo. The 18-story art deco structure fell out of use in the 1980s and remained vacant until the local office of developer Urby teamed up with LMXD of New York City to transform it into housing. Opened in 2023, Urby Newark contains 221 market-rate apartments and communal spaces that include a ground-level garden and a roof deck.
Concrete of Amsterdam, the Netherlands, preserved the core and massing but replaced the windowless façade with one made of corrugated aluminum and golden aluminum panels. Wide new windows bring daylight into the units. An adjacent
low-rise volume, which combines new construction and another historic structure, is clad in brick and contains the main entrance, shops, a gym, and a co-working facility.
9. SoMA
New York, New York
Built in 1969, the massive office building at 25 Water Street had a fortress-like quality, with slit-like windows reflecting its original role as a server space for Manufacturers Hanover Trust. When local developers GFP Real Estate, Metro Loft, and Rockwood Capital teamed up to recast the structure for residential use, local architecture and interior design firm CetraRuddy punched new windows and repainted the brick, saving costs over replacing the façade. Inserting two light wells made the large floor plates habitable. To make up for loss of square footage, a 10-story addition tops the building.
Believed to be the largest office-to-residential conversion in the country to date, SoMA was also the first conversion to draw on the state’s 467-m housing tax incentive: A quarter of the units are rent-restricted. Many apartments offer views of New York Harbor and the Brooklyn waterfront, and all residents have access to coworking spaces, a landscaped roof terrace, athletics facilities, and two pools.
10. Tribune Tower Residences
Chicago, Illinois
Tucked behind the iconic Chicago Tribune sign of the Tribune Tower Residences is a swimming pool, something the neo-Gothic Revival office building’s original architects probably never imagined. Designed in the 1920s by Raymond Hood and John Howells, the 34-story edifice on the Magnificent Mile went dark in 2018, once the newspaper moved elsewhere. The local offices of CIM Group and Golub & Company brought in the local branches of architecture firm SCB and preservation consultant Vinci-Hamp Architects to convert the 1920s structure and its associated buildings into 162 residential units. The design team restored the lobby and sign and carved an 80-foot courtyard in the podium’s heart, which right-sized floors for residential use and added green space.
The courtyard’s limestone-clad walls echo the tower’s historic facade. Four stories added to the podium are distinctly contemporary, with extensive glazing. The design team replaced all historic windows and converted single-hung operations to ADA-compliant ones that maintain the original appearance. Comprehensive upgrades to insulation and mechanical systems cut energy consumption in half.
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