Globe Iron Concert Venue Coming to Flats West Bank

The Globe Iron will be the Flats West Bank’s next music venue. Credit: LDA Architects

The Flats West Bank, the more industrial and less developed side of the Cuyahoga River, has long been ripe for development. Nautica Entertainment is set to kick some of that in motion as plans for its new music venue, the Globe Iron, were approved by the Cleveland Planning Commission late last week.

Named after the foundry that once operated in one of the buildings at the intersection of Elm and Main streets, the medium-sized venue will be built on three parcels owned by Nautica, which lays claim to about half the land on the West Bank.

Globe Iron will, according to renderings presented at the meeting, include a large stage, general admission area, three bars, two BIP areas and an upstairs mezzanine area with a VIP-only lookout. AEG Presents, the concert promoter for both the Agora and Jacobs Pavilion, will runs shows at the new venue.

In the CPC meeting June 7, Justin Miller, VP of operations for AEG’s Great Lakes division, sold the Globe Iron to the Commission as a concert hall ripe with industrial chic and Midwestern appeal, with both its anachronistic gear facade and its string-lit courtyard. (Where, we’re told, weddings would fit nicely.)

Miller did not mention what exact genre of shows the Globe might host, but emphasized the Globe’s design—and usage—would have a general appeal to most Cleveland concertgoers.

“I think people are going to enjoy both the uniqueness and the cool space, and the intimacy that’s going to come from the acts,” CPC President Lillian Kuri told Miller in the meeting. “And it’s still going to have that Cleveland—I mean, it’s not all the way cleaned up and Disneyland. Which I’m so glad you didn’t do.”

“Yeah, we want the character,” Miller said.

The Globe Iron’s approval marks a continual-but-steady climb for the Flats neighborhood in general. Earlier this year, Bobby George’s plans for a chic River Garden concept, and attached restaurant, in the Flats East Bank was approved for build out.

Designs approved last Friday show a wedding-friendly courtyard, in the minds of the designers, to exist in the shadow of the Main Avenue Bridge. Credit: LDA Architects

And last summer, the East Bank announced plans to seek permission from the state to become Cleveland’s second (!) designated outdoor refreshment area, commonly known as a DORA. (Where outdoor booze is legal.)

Scene reached out to AEG Presents, along with Nautica Entertainment and Flats Forward for comment, yet did not receive calls back by Thursday evening.

James Carol, a talent buyer for AEG, declined to comment when asked how the Globe Iron would fit alongside other music venues in Cleveland’s repertoire.

Three of the four buildings that will make up Globe Iron were bought by Nautica Entertainment in 2017 for a combined $2.9 million.

According to the now approved designs, produced by Jesse Sweigart of LDA Architects located in the Offices of the Agora, at least two of the buildings off Elm and Center streets will be demolished to make way for 74 parking spaces. (“We need almost 300 spots,” Miller said in the meeting.)

Downtown Cleveland has had parking minimums eliminated for about two decades; recent legislation incentivizing development catering to alternative forms of transportation not on four wheels was passed by City Council last August.

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