There’s a nondescript warehouse at 2100 Washington Ave., with peach painted stucco on its Washington Avenue facade and exposed cinderblocks running down 21st Street. The site has predictably been used for industrial purposes for many years, with the current warehouse built over two phases in the 1980s, replacing another warehouse that stood here previously. Since the Reagan administration, the property was used for the distribution of roofing and siding material, by Ivan Supply Company.

Times are changing on Washington Avenue, though, as we’ve detailed for years. Washington Avenue west of Broad was once the perfect place for contractors to pick up building supplies, but as Graduate Hospital and Point Breeze have gentrified, Washington Avenue has taken a decided turn away from industrial uses. Lincoln Square at Broad & Washington and Graduate Pointe at 25th & Washington are both complete, adding hundreds of apartments to the corridor and new stores as well. A new mixed-use building is currently under construction at 2201 Washington Ave., and 2401 Washington Ave. is also progressing. And let’s not forget about approved plans at 2101 and evolving plans at 16th & Washington.

With all these new projects ongoing and upcoming on Washington Avenue, we can understand why Ivan Supply Co. would leave this location and consolidate their operations at two others. With the departure of this longtime business, the window is open for a new enterprise to establish roots on the Washington Avenue corridor. And that’s just what’s happening, as Philadelphia Animal Specialty & Emergency is planning to open a 65K sqft facility at this location. There’s a banner on the building, indicating as much.

PASE has some overlapping ownership with Washington Avenue Animal Hospital, which is locates on the 1900 block of Washington. That business is essentially like a primary care doc for dogs and cats, and also runs an urgent care center. PASE, on the other hand, will act more like a hospital, offering 24/7 emergency care and also employing specialists in the surgery, cardiology, internal medicine, dermatology, and ophthalmology fields in their 65K sqft facility. They recently shared some renderings of what they’re planning to do with their new space, and this only adds to the excitement that we feel for the transformation of the building. Rauhaus Freedenfeld & Associates did the design work, utilizing their expertise in designing veterinary clinics to dramatically improve this corner.

According to PASE, the new facility will open in the summer of 2022. By that point, we expect the building currently under construction at 2201 Washington will be finished, adding plenty of new neighbors that might appreciate having one of the largest veterinary facilities on the east coast across the street. And let’s not forget all the new neighbors in what will eventually be 61 new homes on the 2100 block of Kimball and the 2200 block of League, many of whom will also surely own pets.

Also by then we’ll hopefully see work underway at 2101 Washington Ave., which will eventually bring even more people to this corner. Figure on that trend continuing in the coming years, as more and more properties turn over on Washington Avenue, inspiring more businesses to open to serve an ever-growing local population. Unfortunately, we expect that the limiting factor for this corridor will continue to be that all of the larger projects will take place on the northern side, due to the challenges of getting a variance on the south side of the street. While we’d love to see height and density on both sides of Washington, PASE is a nice consolation prize, and one of the best outcomes we could hope for at the moment.