About The Shores Building in Cedar Rapids.
A historic catalog factory at 700 16th St NE — and the small businesses keeping it busy.
The Shores Building is a four-story brick and concrete factory built in 1911 for the Shores-Mueller Company. A century later, it's still working — just for a new kind of business owner.
A factory built for the catalog age.
In 1911, the Shores-Mueller Company broke ground on a four-story brick and concrete factory at the corner of 16th Street and 7th Avenue NE. From this building, they shipped flavoring extracts, veterinary remedies, and household goods to farms across rural America — all sold through their mail-order catalog.
An expansion in 1917 doubled the footprint. The heavy timber framing, sawtooth windows, and steel vault doors that defined catalog-era manufacturing still shape the spaces today.
A patient century.
As the catalog era faded, the building cycled through warehouse uses, partial vacancies, and a long waiting period. The bones held — original timber floors, exposed brick walls, and concrete columns refusing to give up.
You can read the building's history in its walls. Layers of limewash, coal smoke, and paint mark each decade the building has lived through.
A second life as a small-business home.
A full revitalization in 2021 transformed The Shores into an industrial-chic, mixed-use home for Cedar Rapids' next generation of businesses. Modern systems were woven in quietly. Original details were left intentionally exposed.
Today, the building is home to fourteen independent businesses — salons, counselors, therapists, a chiropractor, design showrooms, a strength gym, and more. None of them are chains. All of them are Iowa-owned.
What we believe.
Buildings like The Shores don't belong to one era. They hold the shape of every business that's passed through, and still leave room for the next.
Our job is simple: keep the building running, keep the rent fair, and keep the door open for the kind of independent businesses that make a city worth living in.
Building details
Come see it in person.
Walk the original timber floors, grab a coffee, and meet a few of our tenants.