Nate Stencil, the CEO of South Dakota-based Stencil Homes, really likes Rochester. I mean, he really, really likes Rochester. In the past two years, he has built and opened two apartment complexes Nue52 with 83 units, and Kascade Place with 96 units. Another Stencil complex, a 192-unit project called The Pines, is nearing completion.

Worcester Investments, a family-owned company based in Riverside, will seek a property tax abatement for its planned $43 million conversion of the nine-story Executive Plaza Office Building — aka "the Flashcube Building."

Even the names given the period and style of American architecture — modern, mid-century modern, international — seem to contradict the concept that such buildings could be “historic.” Many were built to replace, and in reaction to, the brick and stone structures that dominate historic registers.