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Everything on New Buildings, Contruction, Destruction, Planning, Real Estate, Gossip, Development, and more! 

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Monumental Construction

In a town full of monuments we often take for granted the major effort that went into building these massive structures. Many modern advances in construction were not available when some of the most impressive, and grand in scale memorials were built.

The Lincoln Memorial’s architect Henry Bacon and sculptor Daniel Chester French employed hundreds of men and huge systems of pulleys to construct the building with its distinctive architectural acents modeled on a Greek Doric temple.

When you realize the effort it took to build some of these structures it really makes you appreciate their scale.

The Willard

Built in 1903 The Willard InterContinental Hotel right along Pennsylvania Ave has hosted everything from  Inaugural Balls to Heads of State. But more importantly, the Mint Julep is thought to have been invented at the hotel’s Bar.

It was one of the most prestigious hotels in Washington during the first part of the 20th century, however it fell on hard times after World War II and was eventually shuttered. In danger of demolition, the hotel was extensively renovated and enlarged by Hardy Holzman Pfeiffer Associates from 1979-1986 adding the InterContinental to its name.

With views of the White House, Washington Monument, and Capital it is situated at the cross roads of our Nations Capital. Which is probably why plans for Woodrow Wilson’s League of Nations took shape when he held meetings in the hotel’s lobby in 1916. We guess they had to meet in the lobby because even back then they couldn’t afford the high conference meeting room rates. Calvin Coolidge lived at the hotel for a month in 1923 while Warren G. Harding’s widow vacated the White House.

Green Architecture: Green Roof

In the first of a series of posts highlighting how green architecture is being incorporated into Washington Area buildings we take a look at the “Green Roof”

Last year the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) replaced the conventional roof on its downtown Washington, DC headquarters with a green roof. Even more interesting is that in addition to the roof, they installed equipment to monitor the benefits of the roof and after a year of monitoring, the results are in!

The new green roof was found to have retained thousands of gallons of stormwater, reduced building energy costs by hundreds of dollars a month, and lowered outdoor air temperatures. These striking results extend the benefits to the entire area and shows other area companies that installing green architectural elements is not only environmentally friendly, but cost friendly as well.

More details on the ASLA report, how to get a tour of the project, and one more picture after the jump…

Dupont Lights

 

The Dupont Circle underpass construction is nearing completion. The underpass, which moves traffic under the circle instead of through it, helps create a town gathering place of Dupont without being bisected by traffic. Beautifully pictured here at night pre-construction, the way the street lights are exposed makes it look like a group of low lying stars have descended on the circle. Very Nice. 

[Photo: Andresincollege]

The Bright Lights of Bethesda

It’s great to see the preservation of existing architecture when new developments come along and the Bethesda Theater conversion to condos is a good example of the preservation of previous architecture.

It really does add something to down town Bethesda to have the blue neon sign as part of the street scape. The development did maintain a performance space in the original building but so far the space hasn’t gotten much use.

This great picture at right shows great contrast and how sometimes, a little neon can be a good thing!

NE Capital Markets New Plans

The Capital City Market in North East is in for some major changes after over 80 years as one of the areas only whole sale markets.

In its place on the 24 acres site will be a new billion dollar redevelopment of the area called New Town.

It is interesting and a little sad to see the displacement of these historic sites, however the facilities have never been able to keep up with the new standards in market storage and shipping that is vital to keeping a modern market up and running. Interestingly enough, 80 years ago the market moved to it’s current location to make way for development from what bacame the down town area of the golden triangle.

Though a plan already was approved by the city council, one important element of responsible growth that would be nice to see in the plans would be developing space for some of the current vendors in remain in the area. It’s thoughtful and responsible conditions like that that help areas retain the people that helped create it, and is something we wish was part of more of the developments in the area!

Rosslyn with a View

Unlike some other developments going on in Rosslyn, the Water View has spectacular views and an excellent location at the base of the Key Bridge.

The new development will house the Hotel Palomar on the first 15 floors and residences the rest of the way up to the 31st floor observation deck.

From the looks of it, the build out is nearing completion. It will be nice when they finally finish and can repave the onramp to 66, currently it is a beat up mess that is no friend to the poor cars that have to pass by.

One more photo of the view from Georgetown after the jump

The Whitehouse it Ain’t – 2501 Penn Ave

Located at 2501 Pennsylvania Avenue, The buildings slogan is “Now you can live on Pennsylvania Avenue, without having to Campaign to get there.”

It’s a nice enough location, and a preservation of an existing facade, which is always something we can get behind. However, the building lists one of our pet peeves as an amenity… Walking distance to the Kennedy Center!!! Even if you wanted too, no one walks to the Kennedy center except Watergate Residence. The mangled pedestrian nightmare of highways in front of the Kennedy Center makes it all but inaccessible.

Georgetown – First New RowHouses in 10 Years

Though development in Georgetown is common, an entire new development of row houses is not, which is just what we have with the new Wormley Row.

Just off the main drag of M street, Wormley Row is incorporating one old building with almost an entire block of new ground up structures to build 13 (extremely large, even for the area) row homes.

More on the scene construction photos, and what’s behind the strange name after the jump…