Germantown Avenue was a major route for farm-to-city trade in northwestern Philadelphia’s early decades. To accommodate these merchant and farmer travelers, an inn was built on a bend in the avenue in the village of Chestnut Hill in 1772. In 1894, it was replaced by a hotel building in grand Victorian style, with a mansard roof and onion-dome turrets at the corners. As the automobile era dawned, the inn’s fortunes declined and it fell into ill repute. Then, in the late 1950’s, the business district of Chestnut Hill underwent “colonialization” – storefronts were given a neo-colonial style refurbishment to help brand the village as a charming place to shop. As a result, the hotel lost its turrets and gained some façade embellishments of arguably colonial style. In the early 1980’s, it underwent further renovation as the property’s old stables and carriage house became shops and a farmer’s market.
A new owner purchased the complex in 2010, and asked for our help in a building makeover. The goal was to create a modern boutique hotel without discarding Chestnut Hill-style charm. We provided a feasibility study and developed design concepts for the hotel exterior and interior public spaces. The antique building presented complicated building code issues—in addition to hotel rooms on three upper floors, there were two restaurants in the building. We did extensive research on permitted uses, egress requirements, and fire codes. Part of our mandate was to enhance the building’s curb appeal, to make the front entrance and the alley to the farmer’s market and parking area more inviting to pedestrians.
A primary feature of our plan was to redo the tall colonnade on the front of the hotel. A colonialization feature, it was the wrong scale for the building, with two-story tall columns topped by a flat roof. To replace it, we designed a more intimate porch area on the first floor with outdoor dining that wraps around to the side, where the passage to the farmer’s market begins. Above the porch is a now second covered colonnade area with iron balcony railings. We chose historic paint colors for the main and adjacent hotel buildings to unify the whole, and proposed new treatments for the lobby, meeting room, and staircase. The side passage between the rear parking/market area and the hotel had been a blah catch-all space with trash containers and an uninviting side entrance. We moved the trash area out of sight and gave the side entrance presence and style in line with the rest of the renovation. We also designed and specified new windows for the entire hotel building. Now the hotel is busy with guests and indoor/outdoor dining in the heart of Chestnut Hill.