Lafayette College to auction off historic pieces from demolished homes

Want to own a piece of historic College Hill?Next week, Lafayette College will auction off a slate fireplace mantle, more than 80 doors and two cast iron bathtubs with claw feet salvaged from homes demolished along McCartney Street to make way for a new student housing complex.The auction will be held at 10 a.m. June 15 at 901 Bushkill Drive in Easton. Pictures of the items being auctioned are available online.They were removed from eight homes the college owned on McCartney Street before the houses were demolished. The demolition started in February and included a house on March Street.Many of homes on College Hill date back to the early 1900s.Residents who fiercely opposed the new residence hall have said it would change the historic character of the neighborhood.The new residence hall is part of Lafayette’s plan to expand the student population by 400 over the next 10 years.Increasing the student population would bring in more tuition dollars, allowing the college to offer financial aid to students who would have otherwise been unable to attend the school, officials have said.The 165-bed dorm will include retail space and patio seating on the street level. The college store will be relocated there as an expanded college and community bookstore, and a full-service diner will be added for students and the public.Lafayette College will lease the land to Radnor Property Group of Philadelphia and the Chicago-based Harrison Street Real Estate Capital, and they will finance, build, own and operate the building.Lafayette will control the design of the building and maintain its residence life functions, which includes signing rooms, directing the programming in the building and selecting and overseeing resident advisers. Students will lease their rooms directly from the developer.Radnor is a real estate development company that specializes in mixed-use commercial, student and multifamily housing. Radnor has established similar partnerships for buildings at Duquesne, Drexel, Bucknell and Franklin & Marshall.The benefit of the partnership is that Lafayette can preserve its resources and debt capacity for projects that do not generate revenue such as construction and renovation of academic buildings, college officials said.
Source: Morningcall