Two long-time Wellesley Hills businesses have cleared out of the historic H.H. Richardson train station building, with one moving to Winchester and the other seeking a new Wellesley location.
A Z Fine Arts gallery, which set up shop at the unique Wellesley spot at 339 Washington St., 10-plus years ago, has announced its relocation to Winchester. “After over ten years we have taken a new location and hope all our loyal customers will follow and we look forward to meeting new people in Winchester as well,” the business has posted on its Facebook page.
Separately, Jaylin Cleaners, which operated in Wellesley for 20 years, according to a note posted on its former space alongside A Z Fine Arts, has left not of its own accord. After 20 years serving your dry cleaning needs we regret to inform you that we have lost our lease. Our landlord has decided to go in a different direction.”
The change has some from Wellesley expressing angst on social media about what might become of the space in light of other tear downs in town of old buildings.
Jaylin’s Marc Rosenthal writes in the note that the cleaning business is looking for another location in Wellesley, but in the meantime can serve customers at its Needham location (317 Chestnut St.) or at its plant in Newton at 1160 Beacon St.
I do hope they keep this Well known Richardson Building And return it back to how it was! It’s a very important piece of Architectural history!! And should be preserved! I hope the owner realizes the importance of it! I’ll be interested to see! I would love to own this building! Ship it to me, if you don’t want it!!
In passing by, it appears that at least the shell of the building is being preserved (I could not determine whether some of the historic wood work inside is being gutted), so that is at least a little bit of a relief.
Provided that this goes okay (and the most historic aspects of the building are preserved), this should be (as the Wellesley Inn should have been) a cautionary tale for the Town. As essentially the only (comparable) town in the area without a demolition delay ordinance, a unquestionably historic building like this could have been leveled in a day with essentially no one knowing about it until it was too late. That is an absurd state of affairs, and we, as a Town, must move to correct this so as to at least have a chance at preserving the many historic buildings in Town that help give Wellesley a “feel” that so many residents and visitors find so appealing. Otherwise, we will remain a target for developers eager to make a quick buck (since they know they can demolish existing structures almost immediately) before the music stops in this latest disco and leaves us with more cookie-cutter residential detritus.
Does anyone know if the landlord is still looking for new tenants to occupy the space?
Perhaps this will provide an opportunity to restore the facade of this architectural gem.