The ongoing redevelopment of the historic Julia C. Lathrop Homes is reaching a key milestone this week, officially cutting the ribbon on 414 units of mixed-income housing and a publicly accessible landscaped park along the north branch of the Chicago River.

Completed as public housing in 1938, Lathrop dates back to the New Deal’s Public Works Administration and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Because it was built during the Great Depression, a number of notable architects worked on Lathrop such as Robert De Golyer and landscape architect Jens Jensen.

“At the time, it was surrounded by industry, and the river was a toxic waste dump,” explains Sarah Wick of Related Midwest, which partnered with Bickerdike Redevelopment Corporation, Heartland Housing, and the Chicago Housing Authority on the Lathrop project. “So the design faced inward.”

To open the 34-acre site up and embrace the now cleaner and greener Chicago River, the team hired landscape architecture firm Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates—the same group behind Maggie Daley Park, the 606 trail, and Streeterville’s newly completed Bennett Park.

Here, Van Valkenburgh created a new half-mile-long pathway that curves outward away from the shore as it passes under Diversey. The layout brings cyclists and pedestrians beyond the riverbank and provides great vistas of the water and the Chicago skyline in the distance.

The boulder-lined pathway snakes north to Lathrop’s existing two-acre “great lawn,” which bridges Clybourn Avenue and the riverfront, as well as other public amenities. There’s a new kayak launch, a children’s playground, and a circular dog run with wooden benches lining its perimeter.

The opening of the riverfront park coincides with the completion of Lathrop’s first phase, which brings a mix of 414 market-rate, affordable, and public housing units to the border of Bucktown, Roscoe Village, and the western edge of Lincoln Park. Residents began moving into the refurbished units last fall, and all of Lathrop’s CHA residents have been moved into either new or restored buildings.

Overseen by design firm HED, phase one focuses encompasses the rehabilitation of historic four-story brick buildings on the site’s northern half—each with slightly different architectural details and layouts. Phase one also includes the adaptive reuse of Lathrop’s old administration building into a Hexe coffee shop and the construction of a new six-story residential structure designed by bKL Architecture.

The latter, wrapped in a masonry facade designed to match the look of its historic neighbors, offers full ADA-compliant accessibility. Additional new construction is slated for later phases at the site’s south end, near Lathrop’s decommissioned power plant and a senior housing building that was added in the 1960s.

When complete, Lathrop’s redevelopment will offer a total of 1,116 residences: 494 market-rate units, 222 affordable units, and 400 apartments reserved for CHA households. All units include the same level of finishes, including well-appointed modern kitchens and handsome metal-framed windows that mirror the originals.

Later phases will also extend Lathrop’s improved riverfront path and landscaping south of Diversey Avenue—and, perhaps one day, beyond. “As the city continues to focus on riverfront improvements, we hope to eventually connect our riverwalk to other sites and projects like Lincoln Yards and the 312 RiverRun,” says Wick. “It’s very exciting.”