Your weekly chance to take a stab at real estate appraisal.
Well your guesses are in and counted, and the actual list price on the beautiful 4,200 sq-ft french style mansion in Foxhall is a paltry $2,750,000.00 for the six bedroom home.
The first phase of the massive redevelopment of St Elizabeths in Anacostia is slated to start in the new year and we now have an idea of what it’s going to look like. Architecture firm HOK’s design (pictured) has been selected, and it already has the approval of the National Capital Planning Commission. What do you think?
[Renderings: HOK Concept for NCPC]
Columbia Heights - The Ellwood Thompson grocery rumors continue to persist for the DCUSA space. [New Columbia Heights]
Penn Quarter - We always knew those electronic billboards were burning a little too bright to be safe! [PQLiving]
Mt. Vernon Triangle - Huge banner for new office building goes up with a ridiculous slogan of “Here Comes the Neighborhood.” [The Triangle]
Southwest - The glass curtain walls (pictured) of the new Arena Stage have started to be installed! [SWDC Blog]
Everyone has an opinion on architecture, what’s yours?
By Spencer Lepler
In light of the news that Monument Realty will be resuming the sale of condos at Potomac Place Tower on 4th street SW between G and I streets, I took a walk through the surrounding neighborhood of Capitol Park and was pleasantly surprised to find a tranquil garden community nestled within the increasingly busy Southwest Waterfront neighborhood.
This development of well maintained modern townhouses featuring lovely brickwork and handsome human scale proportions, designed by Architect Chloethiel Woodard Smith and Landscape Architect Dan Kiley and managed by two different community organizations, is unique amongst the massive urban renewal projects of the 1960s. While projects like Tiber Island created livable communities of Tower blocks with supplemental infill low rise buildings, this community is a sea of three story pedestrian friendly townhouses with super block towers on the perimeter. In addition, these townhouse condos are clustered around a series of well planted courtyards and open quadrangles that are only accessible by pedestrians and bicyclists. This combination of dense urban development along with a very pedestrian centric design makes this community feel much more like an organic neighborhood, like Capitol Hill or Georgetown, than any of the other modernist developments in southwest.
If not for the lack of commercial development, Capitol Park creates one of the most pedestrian friendly spaces in all of DC. While I was standing in one of the sheltered courtyards I was reminded of the urban pocket parks of Paris. In most of DC, the public green spaces are aligned with major avenues and transportation routes. In Paris there are also major parks along major axes, but there are countless pocket parks and courtyards that are nestled within the winding medieval streets. There, the minor parks are created by the medieval urban fabric resisting the overlaid Baroque city plan, while in DC Capitol Park is unique in that it creates minor green spaces by overlaying a modernist interpretation of a medieval neighborhood plan on a Baroque city. These parks provide a much different respite than at the Mall or any of the Squares or Circles…
Right next to the White House sits the Renwick Gallery, a branch of the Smithsonian Art Museum. The buildings origins go back to 1859, but due to the out break of the civil war wasn’t completely finished until 1874. The Second Empire-style building was designed by its namesake James Renwick and was used as a temporary military warehouse during the war before it was used as it was intended as an art museum.
After the war, the building served as the home to the Corcoran Gallery of Art, but that didn’t last long as the gallery quickly outgrew the space and relocated to a new building nearby in 1897. Now the Renwick is part of the Smithsonian and focuses on American craft and decorative arts from the 19th century to the 21st century. Though it doesn’t fit in at all with the architectural style of any surrounding buildings, we think it’s a perfect fit.
[Photo: BrandBlair]
The WBJ does a nice round up of the status of many of the condo projects downtown and apparently almost every new condo project is at least half sold out. Bogdan Builders’ CityScape on Belmont is 93 % sold. Jair Lynch Development Partners’ Solea (pictured) and DC Hampton’s Citta 50 are over 60 percent sold.
Other area projects including PN Hoffman’s Flats at Union Row and Robertson Development’s The Beauregard are both also close to being completely sold out. Given that there aren’t many new condo projects on the horizon it begs the question, are we getting close to a condo vacuum?
Check out this proposed project by the folks at Shinberg Levinas Architects for a cantilever residential building along MacArthur Blvd in the Palisades. The multi-unit building is still considered “On The Boards” though we don’t think this will break ground any time soon, at least not as condos… but apparently when it does there are going to be some incredible views. What do you think of the design?
[Rendering: Shineberg Levinas]
Big news for community development advocates today. The District just announced that it has chosen to fund the refurbishment or construction of 10 affordable housing project which represent over 600 area homes and totals $33.7 million. Some big ones that made the list include The Jazz and the Cook School (pictured) on P St.
The complete list of all ten projects after the jump…
Your weekly chance to take a stab at real estate appraisal. Submit your guesses in the comments and closest guess gets the PriceChecker crown for the week. This weeks PriceChecker is a beautiful french style mansion in Foxhall.
This 6 bedroom classic looking French style home stands a full four stories and comes in at hefty 4,212 sq-ft. We can tell you that though the house was originally built in 1970 the inside has been redone, though not that recently. Interestingly the public record says it is only a five bedroom house. We love the statues out front!
So take your best guesses and we will crown a winner next Monday afternoon, and should you need some more information to help you, follow the jump for the realtor spin and a pic of a great looking entryway and a horrendous painting in the living room…
Though it may not look like it from the outside, part of the renovation of this row house in Foggy Bottom by Sigal Construction was a complete green makeover. Most of the time people think of modern glass buildings as the face of sustainable development, but really it’s about how builders can use what they have and make it sustainable.
Interestingly, it’s with older buildings that you are really able to show the improvements in things like energy use and environmental impact because you have a baseline, unlike when you develop a building from the ground up. This is clearly the direction the movement is headed where you don’t have to scream “this is a green building” and it can just be a building that is green. What do you think about how the public perceives what a green building looks like?
[Photo: DCMetrocentric]
While the new development 1200 East West in Silver Spring doesn’t exactly have the most interesting or original name, we do like the colorful art that’s going to be out front (lower left of the rendering). The multicolored sculpture will stand almost three stories tall and be at the corner of East West Highway and Blair Mill Rd. The building is slated to be ready for occupation in Spring 2010.
A photo of the building under construction after the jump…
Check out this rendering of the future Living Classroom building that’s slated to be built as part of the Yards development in Near Southeast. It gives a better angle than the ones we saw a while back on how the building will be situated with the surrounding current buildings.
As you can see in the background to the left, there are some of the current buildings, as well as how the Living Classroom will interact with the park and waterfront. We can not say enough about how excited we are to see this built.
[Rendering: STUDIOS]
Vandals apparently preferred to make a statement rather than just take the signs and trash them, but really… are apartment and condo signs really that objectionable? How do you feel about the preponderance of signs in your neighborhood, are they ever too aggressive and a nuisance? Clearly they were to this person.
[Photo: Pak Gwei]
Some more good housing news out of the NAR today. Apparently sales of existing homes rose in July for the fourth consecutive month, adding to the rising consensus that a recovery is close at hand. Sales of previously owned single-family homes were up 7.2 % compared with June and 5 % from July 2008. Hooray!
[Photo: KendraLR]
It’s time once again to take a look into the DCMetrocentric Mailbag! We received this inquiry about the work going on along Columbia Rd in Adams Morgan.
Reader Lacy writes in…
“Do you happen to know what is happening to the Safeway on Columbia Road? It likes like they are remodeling into one of those “nice” Safeways and taking over the building next door too. There is another vacant building next door too, but it looks like construction stops at the first vacant structure.“
Yes it’s true, the Adams Morgan Safeway is getting a makeover. Anyone have any new name ideas like they have in other parts of town? As for the work right next door, it’s going to be a 24 hour CVS which will certainly get a lot of use from the weekend warriors who frequent that part of town.
Do you have a question, comment, or query? We love to hear from you!
[Photo: CarlosQC]
