Arturo Howell
For more than 100 years, the building at 57 N St. NW in the District has been home to a wide variety of tenants, including horses, cars, hot dog carts, art studios and antiques. When we looked at the building, it had been vacant for a few years and had empty lots behind it, says John Sunter with Four Points in Washington, the developer of Chapman Stables. We took clues from Blagden Alley in Shaw and realized that Hanover Place is wide enough to become an active pedestrian area, Sunter said. The neighborhood and architectural elements of Chapman Stables drew the attention of Jerry Lin, a buyer at the new condo.
Id been looking off-and-on for a while since Ive outgrown my studio in Foggy Bottom, and my boyfriend will be moving here from New York soon, Lin said. I was looking at older buildings because I liked the idea of renovating a place, but when I saw Chapman Stables, I could see that it had lots of historic character.
hapman Stables is a horseshoe-shaped building that surrounds a central courtyard, which will have trees and a trough-like fountain at one end. The green of the courtyard will be visible from numerous parts of the building and will be the first thing people see when they step through the front door and look through a two-story glass wall on the other side of the lobby, Sunter said. A rooftop pavilion with a kitchen, dining and seating areas will have views of the top of the Capitol building and the Washington Monument, as well as the city skyline through walls of glass. The condos in the historic building include elements of the steel beams and pipes that Sunter said are like art pieces in the midst of the units, as well as original brick walls. A handful of loft units, constructed on top of the original stable building but invisible from N Street, include an open main level for living and dining and an upper-level master bedroom with a cathedral ceiling and access to a private terrace overlooking the courtyard. This unit in the historic building includes an exposed brick wall and a large rusted steel beam adjacent to the kitchen.
The condo includes a large walk-in closet with a stacked washer and dryer and porcelain hexagon-patterned flooring in the bathroom, which has a glass-enclosed shower, a floating vanity and a wall-mounted toilet for a modern look. Whats nearby: Sunter calls Truxton Circle the hole in the doughnut of development in surrounding areas, including City Center to the south, Shaw to the west, Bloomingdale to the north and NoMa to the east.
