Old Armenian Town homes close to housing residents again

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- The finish line is close in the decades-long effort to keep and restore historic homes in Armenian Town in Downtown Fresno.

Woodframe windows go into place at three homes in Old Armenian Town. One of the last steps in a long process to get the buildings occupied once again.

The windows in all of the homes are each custom-made to fit historical specifications.

"We came to find out that really the full wood windows that you woud've seen back in circa early 1900s were really important to the overall aesthetic of the building so we took out the windows and replaced them with brand new full wood windows," said Scott Anderson, Penstar Group.

The homes didn't always sit at their current location, they were built a block away on Santa Clara and N Streets in the early 1900s.

Around 2000, they were set to be torn down to make way for the Court of Appeals Building and proposed commercial development, but historic groups fought to save them.

Five homes were moved to Santa Clara and M Street in 2014, but continued to sit empty. Two of them burned down in 2020.

Over the years, there were hopes the homes could be used as offices, or shops, and serve as historic exhibits of Fresno's Armenian community's past.

The road to rehabilitation has been long. Maintaining the exterior to match historical requirements and meet modern standards proved to be difficult and costly.

"The original relocation was about half a million dollars, the subsquent fire that occured here was another half million dollars, since then we've invested $1.3 million in the reconstruction and the latest bill was $140 thousand that came from my office to bring back the original wood windows that are custom built," said Miguel Arias, Fresno City Council.

The project was funded by the city.

Developers took painstaking details to make sure the restorations were accurate.

"If you look at some of what we call the fishscales on the side of the building you'll see numbers on them that's our craftsmen and our contractor taking painstaking skill in numbering each one of them so we knew exactly where each one of them would go when we replaced them," said Anderson.

While the outside of the homes have to meet historical standards, the interior has modern design and amenities.

Outside of the homes themselves, the original street lights have been restored, and a park area was placed where the two homes burned down.

There a plaque will be installed to commemorate the history.

Once work is completed, the homes will be rented out as affordable housing with April 15th as the date planned for residents to move in.

Applications are being worked through right now.