Playing it forward First Lutheran Church offers free concert to promote donations to open a Seventh Street coffeehouse.

The storefront at Fifth Avenue and Seventh Street is a mess right now: exposed pipes, scaffolding, barrels of plaster and buckets of tools.

If hope and hard work pay off, by fall the space will be an artsy coffee shop.

Zion Development Corp. and Rockford Area Lutheran Ministries plan to open Katie's Cup in time for the busy holiday season.

Renovation in the 120-year-old building began last summer but is at a standstill while the dollars catch up with the dream.

"Volunteers started some of the demolition work, but we're not doing anything else until we get the money," said Brad Roos, executive director of Zion Development. "Restaurant development is very difficult. We're not a Starbucks. We're not franchised. We're not on Riverside."

The community can help the project by contributing to the freewill offering at "Playing It Forward," a concert featuring award-winning organist Aaron David Miller this Sunday at the historic First Lutheran Church.

The theme is borrowed from the 2000 film "Pay It Forward," in which a young boy starts a chain of good deeds. The idea was to connect the 150th anniversary of First Lutheran to the new coffee shop, said Mariel Heinke, director of Rockford Area Lutheran Ministries.

"We came up with the concept of giving a gift," Heinke said. "The concert was a gift, and the people who attended could then pay it forward by giving a gift to the community."

Rockford Area Lutheran Ministries, a coalition of 22 Evangelical Lutheran

Church in America congregations, has taken several roles in the development of Katie's Cup, including fund-raising, providing volunteers and programming.

Katie's Cup is named for the wife of Martin Luther, the 17th-century church reformer. Katharina von Bora Luther, called Katie by her husband, was known for her strong character, love of people and hospitality.

Renovation of the 1,400 square feet is expected to cost around $100,000 -- $74,000 for construction and $25,000 for inventory and equipment.

"That's a preliminary estimate, because we're still in the design stage," Roos said. "We want to do this without taking out any conventional loans."

Plans call for an atmosphere that is cozy, with sofas, overstuffed chairs and carpeting, but industrial, with brick walls and wood flooring.

The coffee shop is six blocks from First Lutheran and near at least four other Lutheran churches. It will be adjacent to Seventh Street's first franchised restaurant, Pickerman's Soup and Sandwiches, which opened in December 2001 at 528 Seventh St. in a building renovated by Zion.

Since 1982, the neighborhood development organization has invested more than $15 million in housing and economic projects, including turning the crime-ridden Grand Hotel into affordable housing called the Grand Apartments.

Ann McGuire, owner of Pickerman's, is optimistic about Zion's plans for a neighboring coffee shop.

"As long as it brings in people with spendable income, because that's what we really need," McGuire said.

Jonathon Lewis, a licensed personal banker who works across the street at AMCORE Bank plaza, agreed that Katie's Cup could have a positive impact.