Skyline massing

Renderings 690 Schuylkill Avenue (top) and 3401 Civic Center Boulevard (bottom). Credit - top: CANNOdesign. Bottom: ZGF/Ballinger.

Philadelphia YIMBY Presents Massing Renderings of Two New CHOP Towers

A month ago, the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia unveiled two new towers that are part of a $3.4 billion plan that will add considerable bulk to the University City skyline in West Philadelphia. On the University City side, the University-City-Tower at the presumed address 3401 Civic Center Boulevard will rise across the street from the CHOP Buerger Center for Advanced Pediatric Care at 3500 Civic Center Boulevard. On the Southwest Center City side, 690 Schuylkill Avenue will stand to the northeast of the CHOP Robert’s Center for Advanced Research as the tower, right next to the iconic South Street Bridge.

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Philadelphia skyline 1985 south elevation. Image and models by Thomas Koloski

Philadelphia YIMBY Presents Massings of the 1985 Skyline

In the mid-1980s, the Philadelphia skyline rose as an even, roughly 500-foot plateau, particularly when viewed from the north and south. Though the skyline spanned a great expanse length-wise, it remained at a low profile, in great part thanks to the “Gentlemen’s Agreement” to not build above the 548-foot-tall pinnacle of the City Hall, which sat just beneath the 37-foot-tall statue of William Penn, the state’s founder. Philly YIMBY presents exclusive massing renderings of the city skyline just as it appeared in 1985, just before One Commerce Square and One Liberty Place both broke ground, starting their challenge to the skyline in the summer.

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Rendering of the tower via Tantillo Architecture.

YIMBY Presents Exclusive Concept Massings for 2300-24 Market Street in Center City West

Today Philadelphia YIMBY presents exclusive new massings for the recently revealed residential building at 2300-24 Market Street in Center City West. Designed by Tantillo Architecture and developed by Lubert-Adler, the project, which was revealed over a week ago, will add extra floors to a number of existing structures, further boosting the skyline in an area where a number of projects were revealed over the course of the past year. In total, the building will stand 202 feet tall, or 187 feet tall to the roof, and count 14 stories, including those in the existing buildings. According to the Civic Design Review filing, the structure wills pan 213,268 square feet and will house 222 residential units.

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Liberty Place unfinished design with the Philadelphia skyline, south elevation. Models and image by Thomas Koloski

Imagining the Philadelphia Skyline with the 1985 Iteration of Liberty Place

On April 5, 1984, Willard G. Rouse of Rouse and Associates announced the proposal of Liberty Place, a complex in Center City that would rise hundreds of feet above the informal height limit set by the 548-foot Philadelphia City Hall. By the next year, Helmut Jahn of Murphy/Jahn Architects finalized the design on One Liberty Place at 1650 Market Street as the design we see today, though Two Liberty Place, The Shops at Liberty Place, and the hotel all differed from their current versions. Today Philly YIMBY takes a closer look at this early iteration of the complex design.

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