227 Highland Park townhomes JV

A factory site that sat empty for about 17 years is turning into 227 for-sale townhomes in Highland Park, after Chicago developer Habitat brought in M/I Homes as its building partner for a project called The Bowery of Highland Park. The land is the former Solo Cup property at 1700 Old Deerfield Road, and the joint venture says construction should start in the second half of 2026. (habitat.com) Highland Park’s City Council cleared the plan in February 2026 with a unanimous vote, ending years of false starts for a 28-acre site that had cycled through other redevelopment ideas. Local coverage called it the largest housing project the city has seen in generations. (therecordnorthshore.org) The project is not apartments. Habitat says all 227 homes are townhomes for sale, which means the bet here is that buyers on the North Shore still want lower-maintenance homes without leaving the suburbs for a single-family house. (habitat.com) The site plan reads more like a small subdivision than a single building. Habitat says it includes more than nine acres of open space, a resident clubhouse, an outdoor pool, a dog park, a public tot lot, walking trails, and traffic and infrastructure work around the property. (habitat.com) This land has been a local headache for years because Solo Cup left around 2008, and the property stayed vacant while proposals came and went. Crain’s reported in late 2025 that the factory had been closed for 17 years by the time the townhome plan reached a city vote. (chicagobusiness.com) The final version is smaller and more negotiated than earlier ideas. Local reports say the 227 homes will be spread across 48 building groups, with first-floor garages, private internal roads, and design changes made after neighborhood pushback on traffic, safety, and spacing near nearby businesses. (therecordnorthshore.org) Highland Park also used its inclusionary housing rules here, so this is not 227 market-rate homes with nothing set aside. Coverage of the approved plan says 34 townhomes are reserved to satisfy the city’s affordable-housing requirement. (hoodline.com) M/I Homes changes the story from “approved on paper” to “likely to get built,” because it is a national homebuilder with an active Chicago-area business rather than a land planner waiting for a buyer. Habitat said the two firms expect to close on the parcel in spring 2026 before starting work later in the year. (connectcre.com) What this adds to the region is a new batch of ownership housing in a suburb where developable land is scarce, not another downtown tower. In plain terms, some households that might have rented in Chicago or bought an older North Shore home will now have a brand-new townhome option on a former industrial site instead. (therealdeal.com)