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We took a close look at South Kensington last week in a three-part series that included stories on the future of industrial American Street and what’s next for the Soko Lofts site, as well as an overview of the issues facing the neighborhood. To give you a more concrete sense of what’s happened there lately, here’s a roundup of all (or nearly all) of the new (or newish) projects in the area bounded by Girard on the south, Berks on the north, Sixth on the west and Front on the east. We tried to include everything, but this wasn’t a scientific survey, so there may be some omissions. The cutoff time-wise was three years, give or take. We’ll start at Front Street and work our way west. For a map of recent projects that have been presented to the South Kensington Community Partners zoning board, click HERE.
The 114-unit Oxford Mills project at at Front and Oxford | Photo: Peter Woodall
Howard and Cecil B. Moore Streets | Photo: Peter Woodall
Thompson and Howard Street | Photo: Peter Woodall
Master Street between Howard and Mascher | Photo: Peter Woodall
Master and Mascher Streets | Photo: Peter Woodall
Thompson and Howard Streets | Photo: Peter Woodall
Hancock and Turner Streets | Photo: Peter Woodall
Hancock and Montgomery | Photo: Peter Woodall
Tilghman and Montgomery Streets | Photo: Peter Woodall
2nd Street just north of Cecil B. Moore | Photo: Peter Woodall
2nd and Oxford Streets, northeast corner | Photo: Peter Woodall
Second and Oxford Streets, southwest corner | Photo: Peter Woodall
2nd and Turner Streets | Photo: Peter Woodall
Old School, 2nd Street between Master and Jefferson | Photo: Peter Woodall
Master Street between Germantown and Cadwallader | Photo: Peter Woodall
3rd Street and Germantown Avenue | Photo: Peter Woodall
Thompson and Orianna Streets | Photo: Peter Woodall
Orianna Street between Girard and Thompson | Photo: Peter Woodall
4th Street between Girard and Thompson | Photo: Peter Woodall
4th Street between Girard and Thompson | Photo: Peter Woodall
Former Third Ward space, now Impact Hub Philly | Photo: Peter Woodall
St. Benjamin nanobrewery under construction , 5th and Cecil B. Moore | Photo: Peter Woodall
6th and Cecil B. Moore | Photo: Peter Woodall
Hey! You missed a HUGE apartment development in south kensington that is slated to break ground this summer. The ENTIRE block surrounded by thompson, stiles, american, and germantown called Liberty Square.
Hi Nathan, I was only looking at what’s been built rather than what’s on drawing board. We did have some info on the Liberty Square project in our overview on development in the neighborhood published last week: http://hiddencityphila.org/2014/02/on-american-street-a-growing-manufacturer-holds-on/
Philadelphia has a power line problem.
Do we ever! I didn’t realize what you were referring to until I went back and looked at the photos–I had unconsciously edited them out.
It’s horrendous and is getting worse – Peco hates to put the power underground.We ‘re in an area that has some underground and they are threatening to put it all above ground.
it’s all well and good until the undergrounded lines fault, then a 2-hour outage becomes a 2-day outage while they locate the fault and rip up the street…
great pictures…good combination of old and new…i didnt even notice all the wires either until i looked again..wow
Do you know what is going in the building pictured at Master Street between Germantown and Cadwallader?
Hi Jon,
I understand they have several tenants lined up, including a coffee roaster and a bakery that would be doing production work there, but may also have a small cafe. A web company is slated to rent a good part of the second floor.
It would be nice to see electrical lines put underground… interestingly they are doing it all over Puerto Rico, not as much problem with reconnections after storms and hurricanes. The Pix at Second and Oxford Sts, southwest corner shows some shoddy mixing of the cement used for the bricks…BRICK BLIGHT – make that contractor responsible ..stop Brick blight in South Kensington!!!
Man, those garage front homes are bad.
Much worse than the wires so many seem to love to complain about.
Hi Peter, Great articles on Kensington South. Just so you know, Brickstone is the owner of the Wanamaker Building, et. al. Blackstone is the developer of Liberty Square. They are separate, unrelated companies with similar names.
does that roofdeck on the hancock and montgomery property cover the entire surface of the roof, with no setback? yikes.
the orianna homes… heinous.
check out the 1300 block of N. 6th st = 3 new buildings
Thanks–saw those the other day and realized I’d missed them…