A Portsmouth-based development group wants to turn a half block of Olde Towne into a home for nightlife that rivals downtown Norfolk.
A group of partners that includes Portsmouth School Board member Tamara Shewmake plans to spend $15 million to redevelop the former Tidewater Community College visual arts building and an adjacent Dollar General into luxury apartments, a restaurant and a duckpin bowling alley.
Whitteney Guyton, CEO of developer 5 Elite Group, wants to attract millennials and other young people in Hampton Roads across the bridge-tunnels and from nearby neighborhoods like Western Branch and Northern Suffolk to Olde Towne Portsmouth.
“We don’t really have a downtown area for nightlife to go to,” she said.
The large classrooms on the first floor of the larger 33,000-square-foot building at 340 High St. will be converted into both an upscale steakhouse with a Louisiana bent and a spa with massages, manicures, pedicures and facials. On the second and third floors, the developers plan to build 12 luxury apartments, including an 1,875-square-foot, three-bedroom penthouse. Finally, the roof would be turned into a lounge and deck for residents.
Guyton said she and 5 Elite Group Chief Operating Officer Joshua Shewmake were meeting with the Portsmouth Redevelopment and Housing Authority about an unrelated matter when a staff member mentioned the former TCC and Dollar General buildings were up for sale. The pair first thought about bringing a gym into the smaller space, but decided to tour the larger building even though Guyton admitted she had no idea how to initially redevelop the property.
“We walked down here together, and Josh was like, ‘We could put a restaurant down here, make upstairs all apartments or condos or something,'” Whitteney Guyton said. “I was like ‘Ahh, Josh, you did it.'”
The developers are a mix of friends, classmates and significant others. Guyton, who is also an owner of 1865 Brewing in Hampton, is married to Darmeshia Guyton, vice president of property development and design. Darmeshia is helping plan the design of the buildings. Whitteney Guyton also went to Norfolk State University with Tamara Shewmake. Finally, Joshua Shewmake coaches a church baseball league with Anthony Hayes, the group’s chief financial officer.
In a separate project, the development group opened a sports facility for basketball, baseball and other activities called Shew Velocity Sportsplex at 900 Broad St.
TCC had announced plans to move its visual arts program from Portsmouth to Norfolk in May.
Hayes said it meant a lot to be able to put together a redevelopment project of this scale as a group of Black entrepreneurs.
“The fact that we’re going to do it is going to make it even better, because other people can come up behind us and then have the ambition to try to do what we’re doing,” he added.
Darmeshia Guyton said the group hopes to begin construction at the start of 2022. She expects the redevelopment process to take around two years.
Trevor Metcalfe, 757-222-5345, trevor.metcalfe@pilotonline.com
