Rehabilitation of former Larkin Center into affordable housing wins preservation award
An affordable housing project on the site of the former Larkin Center in Elgin has been recognized with a statewide preservation award.
Full Circle Communities’ 1212 Larkin project — a 48-unit community for low-income residents and those with disabilities — won an Award for Rehabilitation in the 2024 Landmarks Illinois Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Preservation Awards.
Full Circle Communities is a nonprofit affordable housing developer based in Chicago. It specializes in preservation and development to provide housing with supportive services.
“That site has always been for community use and about doing good in Elgin,” said Lindsey Haines, executive vice president of real estate development for FCC. “We wanted to honor that and keep it going and breathe new life into the site in a slightly different way.”
The project was honored in 2023 with an Elgin Mayor's Award for Preservation.
The Larkin Center, which closed in 2013, provided care and counseling for people, mostly youths, with behavioral and emotional problems.
The 3.4-acre site was vacant until the project began in 2019. The main brick building, constructed in 1912, was added to the National Registry of Historic Places and given a historic rehab, creating 11 apartments, offices and resident amenities like fitness and community rooms.
The group home and most other buildings on the property were not historic. They were demolished to make way for four-flats and townhouses designed to be historically sensitive and fit the scale of the neighborhood.
It was completed in 2021, and residents started moving in early 2022. The community features studio through three-bedroom apartments and townhouses. FCC works with the Association for Individual Development to provide on-site support services.
“We’re really pleased with how it turned out,” she said. “It’s a great mix of old and new and creates a kind of brand new little pocket neighborhood in Elgin.”
Since 2000, Full Circle Communities has completed over 20 projects in the Midwest with over 1,600 units, including communities in Carol Stream, Lake Zurich, and McHenry. It is seeking zoning approval for a project in Arlington Heights that could break ground next year.
“We hope that folks look at this project and see that historic buildings and sites can be an opportunity to do something new and creative,” Haines said.