Look Inside a Historic Downtown Petoskey Loft with Panoramic Views

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Young, bright and skilled, neurosurgeon Dr. Justin Thomas could have landed anywhere after completing his residency. But Thomas, who’d summered with his family on the Leelanau Peninsula, had long had his eye on a year-round life Up North. “I tailored my last few years of residency to be able to manage what I had expected would be some of the neurosurgical conditions up here in Northern Michigan,” he says.

When Thomas met physical therapist Jenna McTevia, now his fiancée, the stars aligned. Having spent summers in Harbor Springs since childhood, McTevia was equally onboard with heading north to create a life—so Thomas accepted a position at McLaren Northern Michigan hospital.

In the spring of 2021, the couple found a downtown Petoskey condo for sale on Zillow. But by the time they could get away for a couple of days to see it, the property had been pulled from the market. As luck would have it, Justin had friends in the area who knew the owner, Petoskey businessman Dave Meikle, and put the couple in touch with him.

Meikle had pulled the building from the market to create a timeout to find the right buyers to live over the two trendy restaurant bars—Tap30 Pourhouse and Pour Kitchen and Bar—that he’d created on the ground floor of the circa 1900 building. Meikle had also outfitted the building’s second floor with office space and the third floor with two condos, units he envisioned to have a SoHo loft feel. Above them, on the fourth floor, he created a spectacular rooftop deck.

After ascertaining that the couple would be a perfect fit for the building, Meikle agreed to give them a private tour of the 2,000-square-foot, three-bedroom, two-bath condo that they’d seen on Zillow. As Thomas recalls, it took the couple about three minutes to decide the unit was exactly where they wanted to launch their new life. “The interior had a lot of existing architectural elements, and we saw a timeless space that absolutely captivated us,” he says.

Indeed, the condo had an urban loft vibe—exposed century-old brick walls and modern HVAC, high ceilings, original maple floors and handsome nine-foot interior doors—but it had so much more, too, not the least of which is a panoramic view of downtown Petoskey and Little Traverse Bay from the great room window. The couple could easily envision the space as the perfect backdrop for their taste in art and clean-lined furnishings.

Enter Thomas’ mom, interior designer Molly Thomas, who walked in and said, “This is the type of place where you could pull off white walls and a lot of black,” Thomas recalls. “She told us to paint all the trim, every door and even the kitchen island black, then add a lot of brown accents.”

The finished product is striking—a loft aesthetic with a Northern twist. The couple has gone on to decorate it carefully with Peter Lik photos, prints and artwork from their travels in Africa, where Justin did missionary neurosurgeon work, as well as nautical maps and a plethora of plants, courtesy of the local boutique Flora Bae Home.

Most importantly, their home is part and parcel with downtown Petoskey’s vibrant urban/ small-town lifestyle—one that the couple finds exhilarating. They can be on the bay in minutes, watch everything from sunsets to holiday parades from their rooftop deck and enjoy downtown Petoskey’s bars and eateries on foot—beginning with Tap30 and Pour Kitchen right downstairs. “We are so fortunate to wake up every day with the feel of being in a city but living and working in one of the most beautiful small towns in North America,” Thomas says.

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