Juneau Village Adding Amenity Building

Juneau Village Towers. Photo by October 2020 by Mariiana Tzotcheva

Milwaukee’s largest apartment complex is getting a major upgrade.

Juneau Village Towers, 1029 N. Jackson St., will receive a new, $4.8 million amenity building.

Residents of the 598 apartments in the three-building complex will find a courtyard replaced with a 9,725-square-foot building that includes a community room, private dining room, new fitness center, yoga room, package delivery locker system and a new building management office. A glassy western side of the building will open to the complex’s outdoor pool, which will see its perimeter surface and fencing replaced as part of the project.

Juneau Village was completed in 1966 as a luxury apartment complex with an adjacent retail center. The signature building stands 27 stories tall, and until recently was one of the taller apartment buildings in the city. A two-level, underground parking structure spans the length of the property, which runs from E. State St. to E. Juneau Ave.

Katz Properties is the current owner of the complex. It was most recently assessed for $58.8 million.

Envisioned as a seven-block complex as part of a federally-subsidized urban renewal scheme, Juneau Village drew high-profile tenants when it first opened. They included Milwaukee Bucks star Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, for whom an apartment doorway reportedly had to be expanded.

The complex’s development was led by A.L. Grootemaat & Sons, with three investors from Chicago. In 1995, it was acquired for $18.6 million by a partnership of John Crichton and Thomas A. Hauck of Shoreline Real Estate and Daniel Katz of Katz Properties. Following Haauck’s death, the partners divided their Juneau Village assets in 2010, which also included the low-rise Juneau Village Garden Apartments complex to the north and the Metro Market-anchored shopping center to the east.

Jeff Tredo is listed as the architect of the latest project through his firm Tredo Group. Tredo, after the initial permit request was filed in January 2022, joined MSI as director of design.

The original complex was designed by Chicago-based Solomon Cordwell Buenz. That firm did little work in Milwaukee in the intervening 40 years, but returned to design Kilbourn Tower in the early 2000s and more recently designed three luxury apartment towers, 7Seventy7, 333 N. Water St. and the planned 1550. It was part of the original investment group.

Initial demolition work for the Juneau Village project has started. Moore Construction Services is serving as the project general contractor.

In recent years, the two-tower Yankee Hill complex to the southeast received a similar amenity upgrade in the base of its south tower.

Katz did not respond to a request for comment by the time of publication.

Photos

Pre-Construction Photos