source: The Post & Courier Columbia
WEST COLUMBIA — Investors plan to redevelop three West Columbia blocks into a creative and entrepreneurial complex.
JAMS + STARK development company announced Colite City, a “makers” community to be located between Jarvis Klapman and Meeting Street, near Wentworth Printing, the West Columbia library and the retail area known as Triangle City, as part of Columbia’s annual Growth Summit entrepreneurial conference.
The first 150,000-square-foot phase will have event space, as well as designer and studio spaces, a technology hub and a tap room and food hall, said Director of Development Wade Caughman. The project is inspired by similar developments in other cities, like Camp North End in Charlotte and Industry City in the New York City borough of Brooklyn.
“You’ve got the blacksmith, the taco truck, and the technology company all in one on one location,” Caughman said.
It might not make sense to the average person, Caughman said, but he said this style of development has proven beneficial to companies in the past.
“People will be collaborating together,” Caughman said. “That’s what makes us different — all these smart people, all these creators, all these innovators, all these entrepreneurs in one location.”
photo credit South Carolina Department of Archives & History