Renderings Reveal 188-Unit Mixed-Use Building Proposed at 1527 Callowhill Street in Franklintown

A recent submission to Philadelphia’s Civic Design Review committee outlines a proposal for an eight-story, 188-unit mixed-use development planned at 1527 Callowhill Street in Franklintown, Lower North Philadelphia. The new building will replace an existing parking lot situated at the northeast corner of Callowhill Street and North 16th Street. Developed by Omega Home Builders and designed by Designblendz Architecture, the project will span 208,000 square feet, ground-floor retail, parking for 24 cars and 63 bicycles, and a green roof.

The new building, also known under its full address of 1527-47 Callowhill Street, is slated to rise upon a 40,767-square-foot lot that sits just to the west of the former Inquirer Building, a sprawling structure with an iconic high-rise clock tower centerpiece, which has served as the city’s police headquarters since 2022.

1527 Callowhill Street. Building location aerial. Credit: Designblendz Architecture via the Civic Design Review by the Philadelphia City Planning Commission and the Department of Planning and Development.

1527 Callowhill Street. Building rendering. Credit: Designblendz Architecture via the Civic Design Review by the Philadelphia City Planning Commission and the Department of Planning and Development.

1527 Callowhill Street. Building rendering. Credit: Designblendz Architecture via the Civic Design Review by the Philadelphia City Planning Commission and the Department of Planning and Development.

1527 Callowhill Street. Building rendering. Credit: Designblendz Architecture via the Civic Design Review by the Philadelphia City Planning Commission and the Department of Planning and Development.

The development sits two long blocks west of North Broad Street and one long block north of the Vine Street Expressway, just to the north of Center City proper. This somewhat transitional area is centrally located yet is somewhat difficult to define due to its peripheral adjacency to several prominent neighborhoods, and may thus be alternately described as being situated in Franklintown, the Art Museum area, Logan Square, or even Fairmount.

But regardless of the name the district goes by, the transit-proximate neighborhood (the Race-Vine subway station on the Broad Street line, one stop north of the city’s focal point at City Hall, is situated within a six-minute walk to the southeast of the proposal site) has seen ample new high-density development in recent years and is well-primed for an even brighter future ahead.

1527 Callowhill Street. Building elevation rendering – commercial entry. Credit: Designblendz Architecture via the Civic Design Review by the Philadelphia City Planning Commission and the Department of Planning and Development.

1527 Callowhill Street. Courtyard rendering. Credit: Designblendz Architecture via the Civic Design Review by the Philadelphia City Planning Commission and the Department of Planning and Development.

1527 Callowhill Street. Nighttime building rendering. Credit: Designblendz Architecture via the Civic Design Review by the Philadelphia City Planning Commission and the Department of Planning and Development.

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