Louisville, where we introduce you to the people, places and things that make up Kentucky's largest city.

This week, meet Gill Holland.

Now by trade.

He's a filmmaker, but you may know him as a developer.

20 years ago, he had the vision to turn the East Market business district into the trendy, walkable Nulu neighborhood it is today.

But he hasn't stopped there for the past decade.

He's focused on using that same formula for the revitalization of the Portland neighborhood, which now has more than $100 million in investments, including a recent plan to transform historic warehouses into a $35 million housing and commercial development.

But for the first time now, he's looking outside of Louisville to redevelop other what he calls historic hollers.

Here's my conversation with Gill Holland.

Well, you probably know Gill Holland as the mastermind and developer of Louisville's Nulu neighborhood, and now his sights are set on Portland and beyond.

And I want to talk about all of that.

But I want to start with your background, because you're by trade a filmmaker, not a developer.

How did how did this trajectory happen for you?

>> I mean, it's funny because in like New York City, nobody knows I do any real estate development or community building.

I'm only a filmmaker.

Yeah.

But yeah, that's I was I was briefly a lawyer in Paris, France, and one of the clients was a film producer, and I was like, people make movies.

I never met anybody who made movies.

I love movies I want to I want to make movies and tell stories.

So I do feel like it's very helpful in real estate, because movies are intellectual property and you're the the producer, and you find a director and a cast and a crew and a line item budget, and you try to find your audience, right?

And real estate, you have real property and you're the developer, and you find a architect, and you still have a crew and you have a line item budget.

And then you try to find your market and your audience and try not to lose money.

>> Similarities.

>> Real estate's actually a much better business than than film independent film.

But they're both super fun and they both involve storytelling.

>> Yeah.

And that's but you know, there are developers who will just pop up buildings anywhere, but your development is very specific.

I want to start with the Nulu neighborhood, because let's talk about what it was like when you first moved here.

And what did you see in it that nobody else did?

>> Well, I was married, you know, Augusta Brown lured me to Louisville or I actually, when we were dating, I was like, Louisville is like the coolest city in America.

And she had always wanted to buy a building.

And she was an urban planner by, you know, she has a master's in urban planning.

I knew nothing about anything.

I was making scrappy indie films.

But, you know, I saw this this neighborhood on East Market Street when I needed an office, and it was cheap rent, and it was old buildings, and I was like.

And then it turns out Jane Jacobs, who's the mother of urban planning and urban design in America, said new ideas need old buildings.

And so I said, well, let me put my office there and then Augusta and I, you know, bought the what is now the green building, the greenest commercial structure in the state of Kentucky.

And, you know, I was like, wow, you know, everything's so cheap in Louisville because I was coming with New York City eyes, and I had a tiny apartment about as big as this platform that would have cost more than that entire building cost when we initially bought it.

And then I started thinking about, you know, the urban acupuncture of things and like, how do you have a positive ripple effect for this particular building and then spread, how does that spread?

And then so that's why we kind of overinvested made the greenest commercial building showing leadership for the community.

And, you know, in oh six, when you're doing a great green building in the state of Kentucky, a coal state that's almost an, you know, an act of revolution, because I'm like, but, you know, I'm an independent film producer.

I want to be an independent energy provider to my building.

And how much does a building cost to operate?

You know, when you buy a car, it says, like, how many miles per gallon but a building?

I'm like this, I got to be able to afford this and like, oh, how can I make it?

Oh, let's do solar, let's do a green roof, let's do geothermal.

Yeah.

So kind of one thing led to another.

>> Yeah.

So the green building was kind of the first thing that everybody was like, whoa, what's happening here in the East Louisville market district?

That's what it was called.

>> Well, I mean, it didn't really have a brand.

It was kind of on the edge of butchertown.

Some people were calling it like Lower Phoenix Hill, some people were calling it East Downtown.

So I did feel like it needed a brand.

So we started calling it East Market Street Slash Nulu, which people, you know, knew Louisville.

But we can talk about its true origins if you want.

Yeah.

But anyway, I was like, you know, any brand, we just need some brand because this is a dedicated feels like a distinct neighborhood.

And we, you know, there was 30,000 cars a day driving down East Market Street, but most people never stopped.

Right.

Unless it was Easter and you were buying candy at moose, or you were volunteering at wayside, or you were maybe antique shopping at Joe Lace.

Yeah.

Otherwise.

And so the green building, one of the first things Gus and I did was like, we will offer, you know, we started an art gallery, we would have concerts, events, and then we would offer nonprofits like, you can have a party here, a fundraiser, and we won't charge you anything because we just needed people to stop.

Because if you stop traffic.

And which is why I'm so happy the streets are now two way, and they're doing all this media and improvements and making it more pedestrian friendly.

If you get people to stop, they will then spend money.

It helps economic development, it helps community development.

So that, you know, we use some tactical initiatives to kind of get people to start realizing like, oh, this is actually kind of a cool neighborhood.

These buildings are really cool.

They've been here 150 years.

Let's see if we'll keep them here for another 150.

>> Right.

Well, it seems looking back now, it seems so obvious.

>> It's funny.

>> Right?

Right.

But at the time.

>> You're crazy until you're not.

>> People thought you were nuts.

Seriously?

Like going into and investing in this neighborhood.

And it's got to be cool for you to see what it has become now.

>> Well, it's fun because there was a great neighborhood association before I got there, and there were people.

Rick Murphy, Bill Marzian, you know, who had been saving their buildings, fixing up their buildings.

>> And knew they were important.

>> And knew they were important.

Mike.

Mike Maloney so, you know, it kind of just helped tap into something that already existed.

Yeah.

And then as I was doing the history of the neighborhood, because I don't feel like you can be a positive, beneficial impact to a neighborhood unless you really know its history.

It was the historic Market Street.

So I'm like, okay, how do we bring back small, locally owned businesses, mom and pop shops?

Keep out the, you know, family dollars, keep out the chains.

Obviously with a hotel, sometimes you need a chain because there's just not that many boutique hotel operators.

And we already have 21 C, which is a great boutique hotel in Louisville, but it's still mom and pop shops and, you know, local, locally owned businesses keep more money in the local economy, hire more locals, and then the branding.

And then we started Nulu Fest, what, 13, 14 years ago.

And, you know, now we have 30,000 people who come to Nulu U.S.

And now there's lots of festivals.

Yes.

>> So and you mentioned the origins of Nulu.

So tell us about the name.

>> Okay.

Well, the.

>> Website says New Louisville, but I was living in New York City, in the village, and when I started coming to Louisville and hanging out on East Market Street, I was like, this feels just like Greenwich Village.

And I was like, and my friends would come visit and they'd be like, Louisville's so cool.

Like, it's so artsy and it's cheap.

And I was like, yeah, it's like the East Village.

And so and I kept saying, like, if I just could get a bridge between New York and Louisville like a Nulu bridge, it's a really Nulu came from New York, Louisville, because I felt like that area felt like the Greenwich Village.

>> Okay, so you heard it here, the extra.

But everybody does think it's the new Louisville Nulu.

But it's very cool to to see what that has become.

And I think that has given us a lot of people can see the vision that you're seeing now for the other side of downtown, which is your investment now in the Portland neighborhood.

What are the similarities you saw in Portland to the East Market area, and when did you think that's got to be next?

>> Yeah.

So, you know, I feel like when I first moved here in oh five lots, there was this whole thing like, don't go west to ninth Street, which is the most ridiculous thing anybody could say in a city west of ninth Street is as big as Owensboro.

It's like the fifth, fifth biggest city in Kentucky.

So of course I go and I'm like, I'm driving around Russell and Portland and I'm like, these are beautiful, historic neighborhoods, you know?

What are people thinking in this town?

So I started investing in the Portland neighborhood, meeting the people at Portland.

Now, the great local Portland Neighborhood Association, asking folks like, what do we need?

We need more housing.

1 in 4 buildings was vacant and abandoned, so that's 1400 out of whatever, 5000 properties in the Portland neighborhood.

So, you know, the flood of 1930s, you know.

And when I first moved here, people were still talking about the flood of 1937.

And I'm like, really?

That was 80 plus years ago, but it just wiped out mainly West Louisville because West Louisville's lower.

And so people with money started leaving.

So if you look at PRP prospects, say Matthews, those areas all blew up, you know, blossomed in the 50s with people mainly from Portland and Russell who had money, who could leave.

Yeah.

So if you look at the history and then I started doing deep dive on history of Portland.

And it's fascinating.

>> Yeah.

The beginnings of Louisville.

>> I mean, it's the sister city, Lewis and Clark, Abraham Lincoln, Henry Clay owned Portland, lost it in a poker match.

You know, like you can't make this stuff up.

And so all these old buildings, I'm like, okay, new ideas need old buildings.

Like, okay, how do we get some creative entrepreneurs, some non-profits to come because it's cheap rent.

And then, you know, a lot of people were like, why don't you just focus on the warehouse district at the beginning?

And I was like, yeah, but I'm going to put my office at 25th Street for the last ten years because I want to change the conversation from ninth Street, because if they think Gill is at 25th, they're going to start thinking, well, 15th has got to be fine then because Gill's over at 25th.

>> Right?

>> Right.

That's like Deep West.

>> Yeah.

>> So anyway, so it's more like one property per block.

And then using this concept of urban acupuncture to, you know, take away the negative ripple effect of a, of a drug den in a vacant shotgun house and turning that into an affordable house for a nice family.

Hopefully they have a dog and they can be out walking their dogs and, you know, and then bringing in non-profits who are already providing services in the area.

But why aren't they located?

So it's like situational living, situational officing like Larry Curtis, who's the head of Portland now, is a methodist preacher.

And, you know, he was like, yeah, why am I not living where I'm, you know, preaching, right?

>> Right.

>> So he called it intentional living.

So I stole his idea, you know.

>> And it is a ripple effect.

And we were talking earlier, too, about how, you know, having the vision is one thing.

A lot of people could walk down there and say, this could be cool one day.

Same thing with Nulu.

But then getting from point A to B, that takes a lot of hard work, a lot of relationship building and a lot of convincing people, right?

How do you do it?

>> No, I mean, you got to work with the neighborhood.

You got to see what's needed.

You got to see how you can build on the existing history.

You find the building.

You know, I try to target the buildings that have some cultural, historic significance for the for the locals.

And then you got to tell the story because you got to get money from somewhere to help do this.

And, you know, the banks are still reluctant to lend in West Louisville because of the appraisal gap.

And that's a whole nother concept.

But so storytelling becomes very important, branding becomes very important.

And Portland has a great brand.

It's just there's been decades of kind of bad, you know, we haven't had enough positive stories from West Louisville for for decades.

>> Yeah.

>> And so.

>> We're trying to help, you know, also help people in the area like let's write a good press release and get it to the courier, get it to, you know, get it to DRB.

>> Yeah.

And that's where that filmmaking storytelling part.

>> Storytelling.

>> Yeah, a lot of it is that so the the latest announcement or groundbreaking is for the Liminal project.

Tell us what that is and how that is really going to be kind of an anchor of this neighborhood.

>> Yeah.

So it's so exciting.

So there's kind of there's kind of two neighborhoods in Portland.

And in the old days they called Upper Portland, Lower Portland.

And also they called it Shippingport.

And, you know, there's been some various iterations over the years.

So there's this warehouse district.

And, you know, most cities in America that have historic warehouse districts have already revitalized them.

And people know what they're going to find in a historic warehouse district, loft apartments, you know, some funky spaces, some artists, some creative entrepreneurs, a coffee shop, maybe a local microbrewery, whatever local, you know, maybe a farm to table restaurant and attainable housing.

So housing that's affordable for the average Joe, you know, workforce housing and Louisville, you know, we're just behind the times.

And so we had not.

>> Had that.

>> Had not revitalized our warehouse district.

So but the problem with or the challenge for me was like I was doing like these tiny shotgun houses that were micro investments because I was trying to do one a block to have the positive ripple effect.

And I was like, man, this is just a huge this is like making a huge Hollywood studio film.

And I've never made a marvel film.

I do low budget indie films, so I need like some big guns to come in and help.

And I always knew that that would be kind of phase two or phase three because of, you know, it's a 30 plus million dollar project to build 137 apartments.

So four years ago, I got a call from these kind of newish developers and downtown developers and Kathy Farrington and Peter Grogan.

And so I gave them, you know, my 1240 fifth tour.

Like, I literally for 12 years, all I do is drive people around the Portland neighborhood, like I used to walk people around Nulu, and I used to walk down East Market Street and I'd be like, there's a restaurant going to be there.

There'll be a restaurant, you know, there'll be a restaurant in the funeral home.

>> Yes, yes.

>> I'll be the hotel in this lot.

And people were like, wow, you know, like, I don't know when that's all happening, but Portland, same kind of thing.

So we did.

We did the big loop, the driving loop.

We went into some old historic buildings and they were like, yeah, I think, I think we know how to make this happen.

I was like, well, let me help in any way.

And so Greg Rockman, my partner for a decade plus in Portland, we had just basically finished Painter's Row, which is across the street from liminal.

And so once that got finalized and it filled up immediately because it's a beautiful two bedroom apartment for like 1100 bucks.

>> Yeah.

>> You know, that same apartment.

>> Close to downtown, right?

>> You know, between 14th and 15th, right next to Main Street?

>> Yeah.

>> So then it was like, okay, liminal should be next.

And, you know, working with a lot of various financing entities in the state and the city.

Cappy and Peter are amazing developers, and I was lucky to be able to be part of that.

>> Yeah.

>> But it is funny because four years ago, just driving them around and, you know, I don't know, you know, I've so many tours never led to anything.

And that tour led to something big.

>> Yeah.

>> Well and that's interesting too, that I think a lot of people don't realize, you know, they see these developments now popping up.

And but you've been working on this for more than a decade now in.

>> The Portland.

>> Chunk of my life.

>> Yeah.

So there's a lot of behind the scenes that that goes into this.

>> Well, and Greg and I learned so much over the years, too, from, you know, whether it be from, you know, developers before, you know, we did the painter's row with the Whalens who have lots of great, you know, historic tax credit, historic preservation.

You know, I learned a lot in Nulu.

I learned a lot from Augusta, who had an urban planning, you know, so it all you're always learning, right.

And then, you know, now hopefully we can help some other folks.

>> Too.

>> In building on what you've figured out along the way.

How do you see the Portland neighborhood being different from the Nulu neighborhood?

>> Yeah.

Well, so Nulu is so in some ways they're similar in Nulu is the gateway between downtown and like Frankfort Avenue and the Highlands.

So 30,000 cars.

Portland's the gateway between southern Indiana and downtown, about 9000 cars.

But still it's a gateway area.

Nulu, however, is very contained, you know, I mean, I always say Nulu is a state of mind.

It's not I mean, there is a technical boundary now because we did an overlay district, but it's really kind of a state of mind.

But along East Market Street, Main Street, four blocks, Jefferson Street, whereas Portland is 1400 acres, it is the biggest neighborhood.

So I kind of had to focus like, okay, I'm going to go between 13th and 26th, mainly north of main and Bank.

So I still had to have a very focused.

So it was kind of two hubs and then renovating some shotguns.

>> Yeah.

>> In between 15th and 25th.

>> And a lot more residential.

>> And way more residential, right.

And way more single, you know, single family homes, you know, Nulu is more mixed use.

People would live on the third floor and their shop would be on the ground floor.

But I do feel like there's an opportunity for some of the two storey Victorians in Portland to have offices.

And then the folks who run the office can live upstairs.

So I do think there's some similarities, but it's a much different, you know, it's residential, it's it's branded, you know, it has its own brand.

I mean, I always joke like, you don't have to call it new Po.

>> Yeah, right.

>> Like everybody's like, don't call it new.

I'm like, no.

>> Portland has an amazing brand.

>> It's already Portland.

>> Yeah.

>> So but just getting more getting the history out there.

You know, Jim Higdon wrote an amazing history of Portland neighborhood and and just kind of changing people's perceptions.

>> Of what.

>> Things can be.

>> Right.

And now you've got your sights set even further outside of Louisville.

And Portland's still in the works, and you still got your hands in there.

But now now you're looking at Harlan.

So tell us why and, and and what took you there and what's happening.

>> Yeah.

Well, so part of the Portland thing was like breaking down the ninth Street divide.

And because I was like, that's so crazy.

And then I feel like in the last eight years in America, we have this urban rural divide, which is kind of tearing the country apart in some ways, you know, not to get political, but.

>> Like, yeah.

>> There's a big problem.

And, you know, rural, we need each other, these two areas.

And then I started thinking about Kentucky.

And, you know, if you go to Tennessee or North Carolina or West Virginia, they all have like go to Appalachian getaway towns, Pigeon Forge, Gatlinburg, Asheville, you know, The Greenbrier or whatever.

And I started thinking, Kentucky doesn't really have a Appalachian go to town.

Like, why do people, you know, people in Louisville don't talk about going to the mountains?

When I grew up in Davidson, North Carolina, you know, we would talk about going to Asheville all.

>> The time, right?

>> So then I started thinking about, okay, well, let's let's do something in Appalachia.

Also, we got to we got to diversify these coal towns economies.

We got to find jobs for out-of-core coal miners.

They're amazing hard workers, super talented.

You know, folks, there's great history.

And I have a personal connection because my dad was born in Harlan.

My granddad was a doctor for the coal company.

My great great granddad died in Harlan, but I had actually never been there until about five years ago.

And I when I went, I was like, oh my gosh, there's three state parks.

There's the longest, tallest zip line in Kentucky.

There's the highest mountain in Kentucky.

And then, you know, you start listening to all the songs.

You'll never leave Harlan alive.

>> Right?

>> And then the movies Harlan County, USA, when the Oscars start.

>> It has a brand.

>> It has a brand.

It's got the.

It's like the most famous county in America.

>> Right?

>> And then you start thinking about, like, the coal for all the coal that built New York City came from Harlan because, you know, the metallurgical that's used to then make steel comes from Appalachia.

And, you know, when we went into World War One and two, they were like, we need more of the metallurgical, the coal to make the tanks.

And, you know, so Harlan County played a major part in, like, winning the World war.

So, so much history, so much nature, so much culture, so many nice people.

So then I was like, okay, let's we're going all in on Harlan.

>> It's one thing revitalizing a neighborhood in Louisville where there's already a lot of money.

There's already a lot of people.

There's a lot of investment to be had.

Do you feel like Harlan seems to me, would be a much bigger lift?

>> So Harlan was a very wealthy town because of all the coal.

>> Money.

>> The the challenge.

And I saw this in Portland is the historically the definition of success was getting out of Portland or getting out of Harlan.

So how do we change that to the definition of success is come back to Portland, come back to Harlan, invest in Harlan.

Like this is worth investing.

There's amazing stories, amazing history.

It's a beautiful place.

>> Yeah.

>> So changing that narrative and then finding all those people whose.

Because, like, everywhere around the country, people are like, oh, yeah, my grandparents used to live in Harlan.

I mean, I hear that all the time.

Yeah.

So how do we get those people to then think, you know, historically and then think into the future and like, okay.

Yes.

You know, and if we think about how Harlan literally built this country, let's invest in.

>> Harlan tapping into that.

Yeah.

And as success for something in eastern Kentucky has ripple effects across the whole state.

>> Yeah.

>> And we think Harlan can be replicable, just like I thought like the what we were doing in Nulu with the green building, with the streetscape improvements, with the pedestrian friendly, the Bioswales, all that like that is replicable throughout the whole state.

And we'll see the positive ripple effects.

And other people will be like, oh, we should do that in our community.

>> Yeah.

>> And I feel like people are going to see what we're doing in Harlan.

They're like, oh yeah.

So Jeff and Skye, you know, they opened Moonbow Cafe, which is also now a bookstore.

So lots of people aren't going to Starbucks now.

They go to, you know, the locally owned coffee shop, just like in Nulu.

>> Right.

>> And then we open the Harlan County Beer Company, which is really just a restaurant, but, you know, so they don't have to go to McDonald's anymore, right?

You know, in the past they would go to McDonald's to get free Wi-Fi, like, okay, you can get Wi-Fi in other places now.

>> Right, right.

>> So it's it's how this community's building, you know, and it's a long term.

It's a long you know, we need patient investors.

>> Yeah, yeah.

>> What would your best advice be to people who would do have a vision for their own community to, to build on the history of it or change it?

What?

I mean, patience, I guess.

>> Well, I think, you know, telling the story.

>> Yeah.

>> Knowing the history, finding the buildings that are key and also like the ones that you can afford, you know, there's, you know, like we still haven't done the second, third floor of the Harlan County Beer Company building because we don't have the money for.

>> That yet.

Yeah.

>> But eventually we want to do, you know, eight apartments because there's a huge need for housing, right?

Throughout America.

There's a huge need for housing.

>> Yeah.

>> So but, you know, take it by steps.

How can you do things like incrementally and with the biggest positive ripple effect for the most people.

>> Yeah.

>> What what's next.

My gosh.

>> That's that's it.

Yes I mean you know.

>> We bought we bought 500 acres right outside of Harlan.

>> Oh yes.

So that's.

>> Like a kind of eco tourist destination with little, you know, in Norway they call them Huta.

But little cabins, again, because we need more lodging opportunities, because we need more tourism.

And tourists now are staying, you know, 50, 60 miles away.

It's like one Comfort Inn on the bypass and that's.

>> It, right?

>> And like five Airbnbs or whatever.

So that's a big project that just started just hired the architect.

And, you know, we're going to try to make him architecturally very interesting so that people not maybe what you think.

You know, I was joking.

It would be like Harlan County chic.

>> You know.

>> Rustic chic and like, no.

>> No, no.

Yeah.

>> It's but it's going to be like something that people are not expecting from Kentucky, Appalachia.

You know, we're also we're fighting or working with a hundred years of kind of Hollywood negative stereotypes, right, of Kentucky period.

And also Appalachia.

>> Yeah.

And and it it is becoming a little bit of a movie destination.

Right.

>> And well, Kentucky's a huge destination.

You know, Governor Steve Beshear, Governor Andy Beshear, like, have done amazing work with the tax incentives.

We have so many movies shooting here and that is blue collar and white collar jobs.

And that is also telling, hopefully lots of Kentucky stories that are going to get out into and change the narrative for the whole state throughout the world.

>> It will be interesting to watch what happens next.

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I hope we'll see you here next time.

Until then, make it a great week!