A little less than a year ago, we first told you that Pearl Apartments would be bringing the old granary building at 20th & Callowhill back to life, and would also be building a new eight story mixed-use building next door. About ten months after groundbreaking, the project is definitely progressing. What what formerly a vacant lot is now a building, and interior renovations of the granary are also ongoing.

From the north, on 19th St.

From the corner of 20th and Callowhill

When finished, The Granary will have 227 apartment units, underground parking, and tenant amenities like concierge service, a shared roof deck, a club room, and a fitness center. Here are a few renderings, to give some idea about what the future will bring:

Looking

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Right before school got started last semester, we told you about the nearly completed project at 1844 N 18th St., a few blocks away from Temple. Not only does the building have some of the more satisfying architectural elements among the new structures in the neighborhood, but it also includes underground parking for nineteen cars.

The building

At the time, we told you that the developer mentioned the possibility that he might add another story on top of the building, with another five units. Whelp, according to the L&I Map, it appears that’s exactly what’s going to happen. Approvals were given earlier this month, and we’d guess that construction will get underway once the spring semester ends in a few months.

Ain’t it cool to see a brand new building already getting a little taller just a year after it got built?

You may recall, we told you over a year ago about developer Steve Rodriguez’s plan to build a four story, mixed-use building on the triangular lot at 24th & Grays Ferry. The building, by Campbell Thomas and LABhaus, had been delayed for quite some time because of appeals by a cabal of near neighbors, who forced a number of minor changes to the design of the building before they would acquiesce and drop their legal challenge. But today we bring good news at last: The ZBA approved a final version of this project yesterday, and construction should begin in the near future.

The lot

The new building will contain twenty-two residential units, twenty-four parking spaces in the basement (plus mechanical parking lifts), and about 10,000 sqft of flexible commercial space. Jackie Balin from Fameco is the broker for…

Last summer, we attended a Toll Bros. presentation, highlighting their plans for the long vacant Stamper Square/New Market site, in Society Hill. While that session was for information only, and no vote was taken at the time, we got the sense that the community generally supported this project, in contrast to the reactions of near neighbors to the last proposal for this site, a fifteen-story boutique hotel plus condos.

View from above

New site plan

Last week, Toll Bros. came to the community again, this time with more concrete plans for 410 S. Front St., along with some sparkly renderings. Toll intends to build a four story condo building, with a huge green roof and a large roof deck. Some private courtyards and one public courtyard are also included in the proposal.…

Last week, we told you about Lombard Estates, Noah Ostroff’s 11-home development planned for 1803-29 Lombard St., which is currently functioning as a parking lot. At the time, we were under the impression that the neighbors on nearby Addison St. were generally supportive of this project.

Parking lot

At this week’s CCRA zoning meeting, we quickly realized that this was indeed not the case. The developer’s extremely friendly attorney presented the plan to the CCRA zoning board, describing eleven new homes of varying widths. Four of the homes will be 16′ wide, five homes will be 21′ wide (with 4,100 sqft of living space), one home will be 31′ wide, and the final home will be 40′ wide (!), have three car parking (!), and 7,200 sqft of living space (!!!).

The developer handed out packets with floor plans…