Menards to enter KC area with store at Missouri 152 and Green Hills Road

Could home improvement store chain Menards finally be entering the metro?

It has been looking at area sites for several years and even purchased land. But in late 2012, the company postponed plans for stores here and in some other cities, citing economic conditions.

But Menards now plans to build a 160,000-square-foot store at Missouri 152 and Green Hills Road, according to the Platte County Economic Development Council. It also will have 10 pad sites around the store for other tenants. Grading work is already being done.

Jay C. Leipzig, director of community and economic development of City of Belton, said Menards plans to apply for a land disturbance permit sometime this summer.

“We have an approved final site plan and plat. We are waiting on final civil drawings and the construction documents,” Leipzig said.

Jeff Abbott, spokesman for Menards in Eau Claire, Wis., issued this statement: “In the Kansas City area, we own a south side property on the south corner of the Interstate 49 and 163rd Street interchange in Belton and a north side site at the northeast corner of the Highway 152 and Green Hills Road interchange. We hope to build a new store on both sites some day in the future. Because we are still in the process of finalizing our plans, no official timeline has been established just yet for construction of these two stores.”

Abbott said the company now has pad sites for sale at both locations.

More “Brookside East” shops

After more than two decades in interior design, Russ Baltis earned a nickname for one area of particular passion.

Now that nickname, Lampateur, is the name of his new shop in the east Brookside area.

“I was fascinated with what lighting can do in a space, for a space,” he said. “I don’t know why but I love to take old chandeliers and lamps apart and make them work again. It is just fun to see what a little TLC and a new shade can do.”

Baltis began stocking the space at 6209 Oak St. in February, drawing in customers before he officially opened the doors this spring. He designed the shop to look as if it would fit in with the longtime antique shops along Magazine Street in New Orleans.

Along with vintage lamps and chandeliers, Baltis said he has a “little bit of everything.”

The home furnishings are not just functional, they’ll have you wondering about their story. There’s a voluptuous distressed leather couch from Lille, France, now a light green but with traces of its original bright green in the creases and tufts. An oil painting of a stern dark-haired woman in profile. A pencil drawing entitled “Befuddled Soul.”

Lampateur also has a leather ottoman with a top that can be flipped over to make a table. And a bright green vinyl chair — circa 1951 — from the old Jones Store.

Over the years, Baltis has collected lamp shade frames and fabric so he’ll have them at hand so he can match them with the perfect lamp comes through. He also is offering lamp and chandelier repair services, working out of an area in the back corner of the store, and he does faux finishings.

Lampateur joins other new businesses that are dubbing the area at 63rd and Oak streets the “East Brookside.” They include Brookside Betty’s, a “retro-inspired” dress and accessories shop, which opened a year ago at 6215 Oak, and Itsy Bitsy Bums, which specializes in cloth diapers and baby carriers, as well as distinct gift items and supplies for new mothers and children ages five and under. Itsy Bitsy Bums was founded as a home-based Brookside business, then it had a couple of other Brookside storefronts before opening at 6213 Oak in February 2014.

Heirloom Bakery & Hearth recently opened at 401 E. 63rd St. The local owners extensively remodeled a former gas station. The space now offers such items as breads and pastries for breakfast, as well as BLTs, roasted chicken and salads for lunch, and coffee drinks.

This story was originally published May 19, 2015 at 9:39 AM with the headline "Menards to enter KC area with store at Missouri 152 and Green Hills Road."