TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WTXL) - A little restoration can go a long way and South Monroe Street is an up-and-coming area for businesses to transform authentic buildings.
Instead of bulldozing and starting from scratch, business owners are seeing the beauty and character in decades-old buildings.
"We have these great, historic buildings. There's not too many of them left in Tallahassee and if we don't take care of them and give them a second purpose, they're going to go away soon," said Amanda Morrison, Managing Partner with Happy Motoring.
And that's exactly why more stores are popping up on South Monroe Street, AKA the SoMo neighborhood.
Happy Motoring, a bar and food truck hub, transformed a gas station that had been vacant for 15 years.
And more businesses are hoping to open their doors in this emerging Southside area. One of them, Catalina Cafe.
"It's an incredible experience to take such an historic building like that and to revitalize it in order to share some of the experiences we have to all folks in Tallahassee," said Maurice Moulton, Co-owner of Catalina Cafe.
Catalina Cafe is renovating a building that's been there since the 1940's.
And Proof Brewery Company is following the trend also adapting an 80-year-old building.
The building has been on the Southside of Tallahassee since the 1940s. It was originally used as a Coca-Cola bottling plant and soon this authentic building will be full of new life.
Both Proof and Catalina Cafe are busy working to transform these irreplaceable buildings. They hope to be open to the community by early 2019.
