In a perfect world, a building permit leads immediately to the construction of a cool new infill project, but that’s not always how it goes. Sometimes a property needs to change hands once or twice before an owner is capable (and willing) to get shovels in the ground. It seems like this might be the case for a project in East Kensington where a new owner has secured a fresh building permit after a previous owner pulled a permit a couple years back.

2455 Frankford Ave. is the property in question, and the permit shows plans from Ambit Architecture for a three story building with four units and ground floor retail space. Though the commercial space is quite appropriate for Frankford Avenue, we wonder whether the developers would be including it if it weren’t required by the property’s zoning. Due to the size of the property, the commercial space will only clock in at 545 sqft, which is a rather small space for any kind of business. We don’t know if the “Jordan Sushi” sign in the rendering is a placeholder or an indication of what’s to come, but a sushi place could certainly work in a spot like this. Along with the 2 other new mixed-use buildings on this side of the street and the La Marceline building across the avenue, this little stretch should soon have some new commercial energy.

The building is being called Noir Frankford, perhaps due to its dark color scheme. We like the large windows and the industrial-adjacent look of the building, but are especially fond of the slight downward angle that the facade takes on the first floor, moving toward the residential entrance. It’s a very subtle architectural flourish, but it makes the whole building far more interesting.

Noir Frankford will be an obvious upgrade for a block that’s heading in the right direction and still has room for improvements. Not only are there some rough looking buildings left on this block, but there’s a vacant lot at the corner of Cumberland Street. So figure we’ll be back for more on this block sometime in the future, even though we don’t see any additional permits in the queue.

We expect any of the projects on Frankford Ave. will be of the multi-family variety, but zoning off the corridor tilts heavily toward single family homes, so even small mixed-use buildings like this one would require multiple variances with the zoning board. And this does not feel terribly likely, which will only limit density in the area, impacting the viability of businesses on the corridor. But instead of letting our thoughts get too dark, shadowy, or mysterious, we’ll instead focus on how nice it is to see a paused project make some progress.