What looks like a building was actually a bet on a neighborhood, a city, and the kind of firm Schmidt Associates wanted to become.

Before Massachusetts Avenue was a destination, it was a diamond in the rough. Boarded storefronts, a shuttered Sears, and blocks that most people drove past without a second glance. One person saw the potential others missed.

In late 1985, founder Wayne Schmidt purchased a fire-damaged rooming house on a neglected stretch of Massachusetts Avenue and chose to make it the professional home of Schmidt Associates. That single decision says more about how this firm thinks and works than almost anything else in its 50-year history. It is the reason the firm’s front door opens onto one of Indianapolis’s most celebrated corridors today. And it is the reason owners who work with Schmidt Associates get something most firms cannot offer: a partner that has been betting on communities long before anyone else believed in them.

THE BUILDING WITH THREE NAMES

The Wil-Fra-Mar Building had good bones and a good story. Constructed in 1910 as a 6,000-square-foot rooming house, it took its name from the developer’s three children: William, Francis, and Marie. For decades it served the neighborhood quietly. Then a fire in the 1960s tore open a large section of the roof, exposing what remained to the elements. By the time Schmidt came across it, the building had fallen into serious disrepair.

The Federal Historic Tax Credit had created new tools for exactly this kind of opportunity. And Wayne Schmidt, who had long loved old, dilapidated buildings, was ready to use them.

“He had the vision to say, I think this area is going to develop and I want to be a part of it.”

— WES HARRISON, STRUCTURAL ENGINEER + COLLABORATOR

 

Harrison shared this and more in the 50th anniversary episode of “Foundations + Futures: By the Decade.”

Schmidt purchased the Wil-Fra-Mar on the last day of 1985, just in time to qualify for the restoration tax credits. Historic woodwork, windows, handrails, brass doorknobs, pocket doors, and mirrored fireplaces were salvaged and restored wherever possible, giving the first floor a warm, homelike entry that still greets visitors today.

“Over the years, a lot of blood, sweat, and tears have helped make the Wil-Fra-Mar the successful office space it is today.

— WAYNE S. SCHMIDT, FOUNDER

 

GROWING INTO THE BLOCK

In 1987, Schmidt Associates, then a 17-person firm, moved in. What followed was four decades of steady growth, and a building that grew right along with it.

• 17 staff members move into the restored Wil-Fra-Mar in 1987.
• With 25 staff, the firm expands into the building next door, a structure that had previously served as a Sears surplus store, a coffee shop, and a yogurt shop, adding conference rooms and a signature solar canopy.
• With 65 staff, design begins on the Phi-Dan-Ste building, named after Wayne’s three children: Philip, Daniel and Stephanie. The four-story structure rises on a 19-foot-wide strip on Massachusetts Avenue, filling a vacant lot and connecting to the Wil-Fra-Mar on every floor.
• With 120+ team members today in Indianapolis, the connected complex still reflects the open-concept spirit Wayne envisioned from the start.

Practicing what we preach

Every choice made in designing and expanding this complex was a deliberate act of values. Preserving historic character over convenience. Salvaging original details rather than replacing them. Designing new construction that honored the scale and texture of an existing block rather than overpowering it. Wayne Schmidt called the result unique “a place to remember” and he was right. But what made it memorable was not the architecture alone. It was the discipline behind it.

That discipline is what Owners experience when they work with Schmidt Associates. It shows up in the questions asked before a single drawing is made. In the attention paid to how a building will feel to the people inside it, not just how it will look from the outside. In the commitment to finishing on time and on budget because the firm understands that an Owner’s trust is not a given. It has to be earned, project by project.

Historic preservation remains a core part of the firm’s identity and practice today, and not because it is fashionable. Because Schmidt Associates has always believed that what already exists in a community deserves respect, and that the best design finds ways to build on it rather than erase it.

A legacy that changed the avenue

One restored building does not transform a neighborhood on its own. But anchor institutions matter because they signal to others that a place is worth believing in. Schmidt Associates’ presence on Mass Ave sent that signal. Others responded. Buildings changed hands, new tenants arrived and the corridor began to find its footing. Before long, the opportunity was impossible to miss.

Today, the main entrance to Schmidt Associates opens directly onto Massachusetts Avenue. The Vermont Street door, once the primary entry, is now secondary. That small shift tells a larger story: the avenue Wayne Schmidt bet on in 1985 has fully arrived. And the firm that believed in it first is still here, still growing, and still doing the same work for owners across the Midwest that Wayne started doing on this street four decades ago.

Visionary decisions rarely look inevitable at the time. Choosing to invest in a fire-damaged building on a neglected street took real courage and real belief in what a community could become. That belief still runs through every project Schmidt Associates takes on. It shows up in schools built to serve communities for generations, in healthcare facilities designed to anticipate how care will change, and in civic spaces that give neighborhoods a reason to gather.

This firm has called Mass Ave home for nearly 40 years. The street that once needed a believer now draws them by the thousands. That is the legacy carried into the next 50 years.

Explore more from this series

• One Historic Building That Helped Spark Mass Ave’s Comeback
• Restoring a Symbol: How the Soldiers and Sailors Monument Endures for Generations
• Designing for Generations: Our 40-year Journey with Indiana University
• Explore our 50-year Legacy