Artisan

Preservationist Glenn Hinchey is restoring a brick building at 401 Hawley Ave. in Syracuse's Hawley-Green neighborhood that operated as a grocery store from roughly 1850 until 1983, when it was abandoned amid the area's economic decline. Hinchey, who has spent 40 years on restoration projects including Syracuse's Hamilton White House and the Landmark Theatre lobby, bought the derelict building 11 years ago after doing structural repair work there. He has since worked steadily to rebuild rotted floors and joists while researching the building's 1850s-era storefront appearance.

Over the decades the store passed through several owners, including German immigrant William Helmstetter, who ran it for 25 years, and Vahram Agababian, an Armenian Genocide survivor who operated it as Babian's Market until repeated robberies and vandalism forced its closure in 1983. While replacing a sidewalk this past Labor Day, Hinchey and volunteers uncovered a 1850s-era community well containing antique marbles, a pocketknife, a key and clay tobacco pipes. Hinchey plans to finish exterior work this year and hopes the space becomes a coffee shop, bakery or ice cream parlor rather than a bar.