It wasn't so long ago that 17th Street between Carpenter and Washington was pretty much the worst block in the Graduate Hospital neighborhood. For years, a small collection of burned out husks of homes dominated the streetscape. After L&I was kind enough to demolish the blight, the block was left with a single occupied home and a couple dozen vacant lots.

Thankfully, the Carpenter Square project has gone a long way toward bringing the block back to life. Thus far, the developers have built eleven high-end homes, some of which are still available for sale. Now, they're working on the second phase of the project at the corner of 17th & Carpenter, which will include six condo units, a commercial space, and a courtyard. Like CPR, this project has breathed new life into this block. But a huge vacant lot remains on the west side of the street.

Some Carpenter Square homes and steel for the coming condo building

Giant vacant lot across the street

Back in January, we shared the news that this parcel was available for sale through an RFP process with the Redevelopment Authority. We also detailed a couple of possibilities for the parcel, including single family homes, quadplexes (the parcel is zoned multi-family), or a large apartment building. Needless to say, the new neighbors on the block and anyone else living nearby will be very interested to find out who won the bid and what they'll be building.

According to Paul Chrystie of the PRA, the winning bid came from a developer called S17 Street LLC. The Philly Land Works site references Thomas Love as representing the winning bidders. Unfortunately, Google comes up empty on both the entity and Mr. Love. The developers, who are calling their planned development 17th & Carpenter West, were the high bidders on the parcel, offering $1.353M and demonstrating full financing. They're planning sixteen bi-level units for the site, which we imagine will either come in the form of eight duplexes or one large building. No parking will be included in the project.

Architecturally, we don't know what to expect. Carpenter Square has set the upper boundary for architectural quality in the neighborhood, and we're all familiar by now with the floor for architectural quality (G-Ho special). Hopefully, 17th & Carpenter West will approach the former in their aesthetic choices, and the neighborhood will have another big project it can be proud of.