It's been over a year since we checked in on 1221 Mount Vernon St., a former power station turned auto body place with dreams of a residential conversion. We first brought this building to your attention a year prior when it was sitting on the market for a steep $1.8M. Ultimately, the property sold for just shy of $1.4M, and now it's well on its way to being converted into forty apartment units.
Once this project is finished, it will add dozens of additional residents to a neighborhood that's seen its share of redevelopment over the last few years. Additionally, the project will include twenty parking spots and ten bike parking spots. Unlike most of the development in this part of town, the project will leave an architectural impression that goes beyond heartburn. And it's not just a matter of a good looking building coming back to life; it's also the design elements. As we told you previously, the apartments will be laid out across four buildings, with access coming via a walkway in the middle of the building that will be open to the sky. This means that the units will get plenty of light and air, which you might not necessarily expect.
To be clear, this project doesn't include the adjacent building, which serves as a substation for Septa. So while the auto body shop gets a makeover, the building next door is left with some bad faux windows to make us forget what it's actually doing. Maybe someday, this one will get converted too. And it wouldn't be the worst thing in the world.