Meet you at the stack: architecture students generating ideas for former Sault brewery site.

• Author: Taylor, Darren
• Position: SAULT STE. MARIE

There's no firm timeline to redevelop the Brewery Block at 503 Bay Street, and no finalized idea as to what it will be transformed into, but the property's owners are calling on fresh, young minds to contribute their ideas.

At the request of Riversedge Developments, 65 third-year students from Sudbury's Laurentian University McEwen School of Architecture toured the former Northern Breweries site in September.

Riversedge purchased the property last year and has torn down most of the dilapidated buildings that made up the former brewery, which had fallen into disrepair and been the target of arson.

Martti Lemieux, Riversedge Developments' design director, said the students were brought on board to generate ideas about what future purpose it could serve. Laurentian's architecture students also provided input into Mill Market, the farmers market on the former St. Marys Paper mill site.

"There's no bias with them, no baggage; they are just here to reinvent and think.... It's critical you start with a pool of good ideas," Lemieux said.

"What I'd like to see is a place for our young people. We don't know exactly what yet, but we're losing our young people ... they need a shared social space."

Ideally, it would be a space for the "young, creative class, light manufacturing, and creative entrepreneurship," Lemieux said, which could include a bicycle shop, a cafe, a bookstore and other components.

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