Pat Schuchard is no stranger to complicated rehabs. The artist, a retired Washington University professor, is behind some of St. Louis’ most impressive historic renovations—including Das Bevo, Majorette, and Tim’s Chrome Bar. But the tornado that ripped through Schuchard Projects’ Boo Cat Club on May 16 was his first.
And the damage the tornado did to Boo Cat Club was especially galling because the building was one of Schuchard’s favorites. The building, designed in 1907 by Louis C. Spiering—who did key work for the 1904 World’s Fair and later designed the Sheldon Concert Hall—sits in North City’s Academy neighborhood. It was originally home to the St. Louis Artists’ Guild.
Keep up with local business news and trends
Subscribe to the St. Louis Business newsletter to get the latest insights sent to your inbox every morning.
“It’s a really incredible building,” Schuchard enthuses. “And it looks like a little arts and crafts cottage from the outside, but it has a theater inside and a ballroom. It’s really an amazing place.” But “amazing” wasn’t the word when Schuchard and his wife, Carol, first acquired it. “The building was a wreck,” Schuchard says. “It had the most beautiful mold bloom you’ve ever seen in the basement.”
Schuchard Projects had painstakingly restored the building, opening it in 2014 as an event space. An estimated $1.5 million in damage from the tornado—including the destruction of the Spanish tile roof that the Schuchards had lovingly restored—upended all that. While the company carried extensive insurance, it had to cancel months of bookings and return deposits to all the people affected. Even now, the Schuchards are still arguing with their insurer over what they are due.
But next week, the company takes a big step forward: Beginning in December, Boo Cat Club is again booking tours for people who want to consider the space for an event. While the site remains a work in progress, Pat Schuchard is convinced it will be back online in time for the spring of 2026 and the heart of the event season.
“We are lucky because, you know, we do this,” he says of building rehabs. “We have really good people that we’re used to working with. So we’ve been able to use some of our regular guys and get some of this stuff done.”
Not all, though. The Schuchards haven’t been immune from the difficulties facing people seeking to restore historic roof tiles. Schuchard says they’re still waiting on a quote, six months after the tornado, from their preferred roofing company. “They’ve got a 100-person backlog,” Schuchard says. “A big part of it is that the tornado tore through the most significant historic area in the city.” Too many customers have been flooding the same few roofers capable of handling historic roofs.
But he feels confident that not only does the building look better than ever, but that they’ll be fully back in plenty of time for prospective clients, who tend to book a space roughly 8–12 months before an event. “We’re calling these ‘hard hat tours’ because we’re still under construction,” he says. Skipping the busiest part of the annual event calendar for the second year in a row didn’t feel like an option. He hopes a discount, along with the Schuchards’ good reputation, helps to ameliorate any anxiety about the company getting the project across the finish line.
Schuchard says the company plans to share photos of the site before the tornado and also its work on the other event spaces it owns in town. “We lead with our approach to aesthetics and art design,” he says. “Hopefully people know what it’s going to be, and we can show them what it was. And I think two and two might make four.”
