Old North Saint Louis

Old North St. Louis is a neighborhood with rough edges but charming at its heart. Walk through the neighborhood, and you’ll likely be strolling along aged brick sidewalks past 150-year-old homes while hearing live music spill out from an art gallery. But on another street, you may be stepping over potholes near crumbling, ivy-covered buildings. But overall Old North St. Louis is a community full of people who appreciate history and support their local businesses, says Andy Karandzieff, owner of Crown Candy Kitchen, a neighborhood establishment run by his family since 1913. “This is an area for people who want to live in old, historical buildings and want to restore these buildings. I’m cautiously optimistic about this neighborhood.”

As Karandzieff says, there are a few modern houses sprinkled throughout Old North St. Louis. But most of the neighborhood’s homes were built in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Many houses sport sloped, fish-scale mansard roofs, a calling card of the Second Empire architecture style that originated in France. While some homes are in dire need of restoration, the housing stock is picturesque enough that the Old North House Tour is an annual tradition in St. Louis. Although the community’s median sale price is roughly $90,000, rehabbed homes can command prices from the mid-$200,000s to the low $300,000s. The houses are made from bricks crafted in St. Louis and old-growth trees – materials that can’t be found in contemporary construction, says Flourish Properties LLC owner Lisa Mandel. “This is our history. This is stuff that will never be created again.”

Many neighborhood students spend their elementary years at Patrick Henry Downtown Academy, where they can plant, harvest and cook produce grown in the school garden – a feature that won Henry a National Green Ribbon School award in recognition of its sustainability efforts. Children progress to Yeatman-Liddell Preparatory Middle School, where students can get free books and free groceries through the school’s partnership with nonprofit The Little Bit Foundation. Older students attend Vashon High School, which earns a Niche grade of A-minus for its athletics. There are more than a dozen teams students can join, and both Vashon’s boys and girls basketball teams won state championships in 2023.

The neighborhood contains 200-year-old Jackson Place Park, the second oldest green space in St. Louis. Its circular baseball field is unusual but no less functional for residents. The fun continues across Market Street, where the park’s playground and basketball court are found. Those who want to exercise their minds can stop by Chess Pocket Park, a cluster of chess boards tucked into the shade of a tall building.

Chess Pocket Park sits along 14th Street, the neighborhood’s dense commercial district. It’s lined with clothing boutiques, as well as a pair of businesses that have served the neighborhood for more than 100 years: Marx Hardware & Paint Co. and Crown Candy Kitchen. Crown Candy Kitchen fries up 22 tons of bacon every year for BLT sandwiches, which are gobbled up by customers who sometimes drive 30 miles to the soda fountain for lunches and chocolate shakes. However, it’s the neighborhood patrons who have kept the 110-year-old eatery thriving in the years since the pandemic, Karandzieff says. One thing you can’t pick up in Old North St. Louis is a week’s worth of groceries, but GreenLeaf Market is less than a mile outside the neighborhood.

When you’re not shopping for new threads or handcrafted candies, you can check out the community’s artsy hangouts. Among the mural-covered walls of 14th Street is the Zuka Arts Guild, which opens its doors on Fridays for evenings of music, poetry and more. Or take bookbinding classes across the street at Central Print. Mandel says Old North St. Louis is full of artists, who are one part of the neighborhood’s dynamic makeup that also includes entrepreneurs, small business owners and multi-generational families. “That gives the neighborhood a certain kind of energy.”

Written By

Alex Soderstrom

Photography Contributed By

Aaron Bloodworth

Video By

Luke Basinger