The DC Historic Preservation Review Board will review plans for a new condominium building at 801-811 N Street NW at its meeting next Thursday March 26. The five-story with basement building is located on the corner of 8th and N Streets NW, in the Shaw Historic District.
“We will submit conceptual renderings at the hearing,” says project designer Michael Vallen, of the Washington, D.C.-headquartered Vallen Design Studio. “It’s part of the process. We hope to begin construction by late summer of 2015.”
The developer is Tito Construction, also based in D.C.
The building would replace a parking lot owned by an auto dealer. The condo concept has already received approval from ANC 6E.
Vallen said the concrete-frame building would be L-shaped. It will have 24 condominiums, of which one would be designated affordable. They will be split 23 two-bedroom units, some with two bathrooms; and one one-bedroom unit. The name of the building has not yet been determined, nor has the selling price for the condos. According to Zillow, reasonably new two-bedroom condos in the neighborhood tend to go for $450,000 and up.
There will be 18 underground parking slots, the required number. The building will be all residential, no retail.
Vallen said that as part of the Shaw Historic District, the challenge was to design a building that blended with the neighborhood. There are low-density rowhouses to the north on 8th Street, and higher-density multi-family and commercial buildings to the west toward 9th Street. The Washington, D.C. Convention Center is across N Street.
“A number of developers were trying to acquire the lot, to put up big projects, but the neighborhood homeowners weren’t interested,” said Vallen.
For the developer, “it was a unique opportunity to acquire a lot this size, and on a unique block with a number of historic houses,” said Vallen. “It’s a great opportunity to build a residential project in a really nice neighborhood.”