Fortress

I have been at Fortress for two months, great space love the warm brick and community spaces. The issue with Fortress is with parking … there have been numerous car break ins with little acknowledgement from management and the police. If you live here and have a car, it will get broken into.

The building is great, and the view of the city from the rooftop and certain units is one of the best I've seen. Gym, common areas, appliances, and finishes are nice. I've genuinely been happy calling this place home for the last 1.5 years. Walls between units don't transfer noise in my experience (8th floor), but you can hear people walking down the hallway pretty clearly. The a/c unit on the roof is loud, so I had a great view of the city but never really wanted my windows open because of the noise starting and stopping. I found the lack of overhead lighting in my unit odd (kitchen lights only), but lamps are an easy fix. Unfortunately, there have been car break-ins and missing packages, but those aren't unique to this building. They seem to happen regardless of street parking or lot parking.

I used to love this apartment, I have met some amazing neighbors and the building is beautiful, but now it has become so unsafe that no amount of exposed brick can make up for it. In the past 2 days, there have been 9+ car break ins. There is smashed glass all over the parking lots from shattered windows. When a car got stolen, Fortress said the cameras “were not working” that night. So disappointing.

I am sad to say that this property is letting me down. I was so excited to live in such a beautiful historical building. However, since moving in, there have been more car break ins than I can count. It has become a daily issue. I worry every morning when I go outside to leave for work if it'll be my day AGAIN to have a broken window. There needs to be change FAST or tenants will be desperately trying to break leases, if they aren't already. Maybe brighter lights in the parking lot with a security guard consistently patrolling the lots. Something is better than cameras that are deemed useless when you cannot see license plates or identifying features of these criminals.

Stuck in a building with a company that doesn’t care about their residents along with car break-ins, missing packages, backed up trash and paper thin walls. Biggest mistake of my life.

I’ve lived here for about 6 months now and have really liked it. The property managers are very quick to respond and friendly. This is the most dog friendly building and my goldendoodle loves to play in the puppy park. There have been some finishing touches that needed to be completed since the building opened (they needed to add a support beam to my ceiling). The buildings community spaces are kept very clean. They gym space is amazing! I do wish there was covered parking.

The fortress is a beautiful apartment with your basic amenities. My car was broken into during my first month after moving here, but since then roving security guards were hired and there’s been no more break ins. The only thing this apartment lacks is the community feel to it. There’s a few nice people here but most are cold to you and typically mind their own business. I assume this is caused by the lack of opportunities to meet residents here, which is directly attributed to management failing at setting up appropriate events in a timely manner. The focus seems to be wine and cheese at 4:30pm on a Thursday or catered breakfast at 10:30am, with notices posted in the elevator less than a week before the event. The management seems to not realize we live in Milwaukee and have professional sports teams, so why not a bus ride to a brewery tour or a packers/bucks game in the common area to bring residents together? The fortress has been open for a full year and there’s been maybe four “community events”. In previous apartments that I enjoyed living at, residents paid a $15 monthly fee for community events held every month and they were well worth the $15 spent. Hopefully the fortress takes a similar route moving forward.

Living here has been a very positive experience. The management and maintenance crews are very nice and actually get to know you. We get so many compliments on the cool look of the exposed brick and how big the kitchen is. My favorite part, however, is the amenities. We grill out in the court yard, hang out on the rooftop and were able to cancel our gym memberships because everything you'd need is here. And since I’ve been here they have upped their security with it being closer to a tougher neighborhood. Would recommend!

I've lived at the Fortress now for almost 10 months and I must say I'm a very pleased tenant! The aesthetic of the building is really what got me at first, but now I can say the best features of the Fortress are how dog friendly the building is, how close proximity it is to downtown and it has a great mix of tenants. Everyone is very friendly and the property managers are great as well. Any request/question I may have, they get back to me right away which is so important. The dog park and other amenities are awesome too. I highly recommend the Fortress to anyone that is looking for an industrial apartment-feel being close to downtown!

This building is beautiful but it has a long way to go to be safe for the residents. They have no security on property or anyone to monitor the cameras. Frequently the building has trespassers that enter the building and sleep in the stairwells and hallways - the kitchens are super small and the building is very expensive for what you get - no closet space in most of the units, no lights in closets nor the bedrooms, they are having a bad issue with the mail system there and tenants aren't able to get their mail delivered. Dogs are often off leash - they accept all breads so this is an issue if the owner is unable to control their dog. Trash receptacle is not in a convenient location.