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Category: Commercial Real Estate

  • 260-apartment project is proposed for long-vacant site on Ridge Avenue in East Falls

    260-apartment project is proposed for long-vacant site on Ridge Avenue in East Falls

    A 260-apartment development, largely composed of one-bedroom units, is the latest residential project slated for 4401 Ridge Ave. in East Falls.

    The almost two-acre site has been long vacant and is now covered in trees. It is owned by the Philadelphia Housing Authority, which operated a dozen rental homes there until the late 1990s. The property is under an agreement of sale, according to the agency.

    Plans for the project were posted on the Philadelphia Planning Commission’s website Tuesday, showing a six-story building from Stokes Architecture & Design.

    The zoning paperwork in city records is signed by Eric Marshall, who is the principal with MGMT Residential. The company, based in Northwest Philadelphia, owns and manages hundreds of units in neighborhoods including Roxborough and Manayunk.

    MGMT itself is not the developer and will not own the property, according to the project’s zoning lawyer, Richard DeMarco, although the company will manage it once construction is completed.

    The development team declined to comment in advance of a neighborhood meeting Wednesday night.

    The plans show that the apartment building proposed for 4401 Ridge Ave. will offer 217 parking spaces. It will also host at least 8,000 square feet of commercial space, according to the East Falls Community Council, which has been negotiating with the developers.

    The neighborhood group’s zoning chair, Hilary Langer, reports progress at the discussions.

    He says that many neighbor concerns center on traffic, parking, and the preponderance of smaller units — a concern he does not personally share.

    “The … fact is that one-bedroom apartments are in demand and their vacancy rate is [almost] 10%, which is really the same as annual natural turnover,” Langer said in an email.

    Langer said that by his calculations, 115 two-bedroom apartments have been built in his neighborhood since 2021, and a quarter of them are still vacant. But 399 one-bedroom or studios have been constructed in that time frame, and only 12.5% of them are empty.

    An aerial rendering of the 260-unit apartment building proposed for 4401 Ridge Ave.

    The project needs approvals from the city’s Zoning Board of Adjustment to move forward, with a hearing set for March 25. It will appear before the advisory-only Civic Design Review committee on March 3.

    The last proposal for the site came in 2021 from Baltimore-based Atapco Properties. That project included 189 parking spaces for 185 apartments.

    That former proposal’s frontage was pushed back from Ridge Avenue, which the East Falls Community Council feared would make an already pedestrian unfriendly environment even worse.

    The newer development has the apartment building fronting on the sidewalk.

    “You’re not going to get walkability if you just put in plazas and parking lots,” Langer said. “This building, at the very least, it provides the chance of walkability.”

  • A six-story Hyatt Studios hotel is planned for the Broad Street Diner site

    A six-story Hyatt Studios hotel is planned for the Broad Street Diner site

    The Broad Street Diner’s days may finally be coming to an end.

    Although demolition permits were issued for the building at 1135-43 S. Broad St. in 2022, it has remained in business.

    But on Tuesday, plans for a six-story Hyatt Studios hotel were posted on the Philadelphia Planning Commission’s website, indicating that the project is moving forward.

    It will be subject to the advisory only Civic Design Review process on March 3.

    The proposal includes 105 hotel rooms and 42 underground parking spaces. Hyatt Studios is a recently launched extended-stay brand of the larger hotel chain.

    The plans are credited to Philadelphia-based architect Plato Studio, led by Plato A. Marinakos Jr. The document submitted to the planning commission was rife with errors, including mislabeled street names and neighboring developments.

    The architect’s plan highlights the project’s proximity to SEPTA’s Broad Street subway line.

    “The hotel will benefit from direct subway line access connecting guests to major sightseeing destinations, entertainment venues on South Broad Street near [Pattison] Avenue and Center City,” the plans say.

    The Hyatt Studios hotel will require approvals to move forward from the Zoning Board of Adjustment.

    A sign outside the Broad Street Diner in South Philadelphia in 2022.

    Maria Petrogiannis, head of development for MR Realty Associates, which owns the property, was not immediately available for an interview.

    Her father, Michael Petrogiannis, is a longtime owner of beloved eateries in the region, including the Mayfair, Melrose, and Country Club diners.

    The Broad Street Diner’s demolition permits were issued at the same time as the Melrose Diner at 1501 Snyder Ave. on the West Passyunk Avenue corridor. But the Melrose was demolished in 2023, after 67 years in business at that location.

    Today, its site sits vacant, hemmed in by a chain-link fence, and is a frequent subject of nuisance complaints from neighbors.

    A planned apartment building for that site, which MR Realty said would include a new version of the Melrose Diner, has not materialized.

    In a 2025 interview, Maria Petrogiannis said the hope was that the apartment building and replacement diner on West Passyunk would be completed by the time the hotel project came to fruition, giving workers a site to move to when the South Broad Street eatery was razed.

    Editor’s note: A previous version of this story incorrectly identified Pattison Avenue.

  • Sheetz wants to move into Delaware County, home of Wawa

    Sheetz wants to move into Delaware County, home of Wawa

    Sheetz could soon stake a claim in Delaware County, extending its reach into the Philadelphia region.

    The Altoona-based convenience store chain, which opened its first store in the Philly suburbs last week, has submitted a sketch plan application to build a 6,000-square-foot location in Chadds Ford.

    It would be Sheetz’s first outpost in Wawa’s home county.

    A Sheetz and Wawa now sit across the street from each other in Limerick Township, Montgomery County.

    If approved, the store would be constructed about five miles down the road from Wawa’s corporate headquarters, and across the county from the site of Wawa’s first store, in Folsom.

    The Sheetz would be in the Village at Painters’ Crossing shopping center near the intersection of U.S. Routes 1 and 202, according to the application. Sheetz would take over a parcel in the northeast corner of the complex that is currently occupied by a vacant former bank and a closed Carrabba’s Italian restaurant.

    Along with Sheetz’s usual offerings of made-to-order food, grab-and-go snacks, and drinks, the outpost would include indoor and outdoor seating, two mobile-order pickup windows, and six gas pumps, according to the application. It would not include a drive-through.

    Customers crowd into the indoor dining area at the new Sheetz in Limerick Township that opened last week.

    Nick Ruffner, Sheetz public affairs manager, declined to provide additional information about the proposal, saying in a statement that “it is still very early in the process.”

    Zoning changes and other approvals would be required before anything is built, Chadds Ford Township solicitor Michael Maddren said. As of Tuesday, Sheetz had only submitted the sketch plan, which was discussed at a planning commission meeting earlier this month, Maddren said.

    At the meeting, township officials did not express strong opinions about the sketch, Maddren said: “We need a little more detail.”

    Craig Scott (left) of Wayne and Dave Swartz (right) of Collegeville had breakfast at last week’s grand opening of the first Sheetz in the Philadelphia suburbs.

    If the Chadds Ford project moves forward, Sheetz could establish a foothold in three of Philly’s four collar counties: Along with its new Limerick, Montgomery County location, Sheetz also has expressed interest in building a store in Chester County.

    In the fall, company officials submitted a sketch plan to Caln Township officials, proposing a location at the site of a shuttered Rite Aid on the 3800 block of Lincoln Highway in Downingtown, according to the township website.

    After years of Sheetz opening stores in Western and central Pennsylvania, and Wawa expanding closer to Philly, Sheetz and Wawa’s footprints have increasingly overlapped in recent years.

    A Wawa opened outside Harrisburg in 2024, marking the chain’s first central Pennsylvania location. It is down the street from a Sheetz.

    Wawa made the first move: In 2024, it opened its first central Pennsylvania location within eyesight of a Sheetz. Since then, Wawa has opened 10 stores in the region, with plans to add 40 more there in the next five years.

    Both chains also have expanded beyond Pennsylvania.

    Sheetz now has more than 800 stores in seven states. Wawa has nearly 1,200 stores in 13 states.

  • Redevelopment is coming to a former factory in East Kensington after years of delay

    Redevelopment is coming to a former factory in East Kensington after years of delay

    The long vacant industrial building at 1807 Huntingdon St. in East Kensington is moving toward redevelopment after seven years of setbacks.

    Philadelphia-based Smith & Roller has been eyeing the faded brick structure since 2019 but struggled with funding following the COVID-19 pandemic and the loss of a lender after Silicon Valley Bank’s collapse in 2023.

    But last week New Jersey-based Ellavoz Impact Capital announced that it was acquiring the building in partnership with Smith & Roller, allowing the developers to move forward with their plans near SEPTA’s Huntingdon stop on the Market-Frankford line.

    Developers Tayyib Smith and Jacob Roller see the project as a catalyst for change around the elevated train station, which is haunted by the opioid crisis.

    “I’ve always imagined connecting nodes of vitality and then seeing how it almost has a regenerative spring of people looking at a neighborhood differently,” Smith said.

    “I can imagine that block having a different feel, a different type of lighting, a different type of walkability, more socio-economic diversity, more eyes on the corridor,” he added.

    The developers plan to break ground on the project in about six months.

    Smith & Roller’s neighboring development, 1801 Huntingdon, will transform a historic bank building into a banquet hall and commissary kitchen for Black-owned caterer Strother Enterprises, which has been expanding elsewhere in the city recently. That development will need approval by the city’s Zoning Board of Adjustment and is on a longer timeline.

    Over the years, the project at 1807 Huntingdon has added more housing and cut back on space for businesses.

    The current version of the project includes 109 residential units and 8,600 square feet of commercial space. According to Ellavoz Impact Capital’s news release, the commercial space has been preleased, but the tenant list is not public yet.

    A rendering of the redeveloped factory building, as a mixed-use apartment building.

    An earlier version of the project, reviewed by the city’s Civic Design Review committee in 2022, would have contained 80 apartments and 38,000 square feet of light industrial space.

    That’s partly because the federal program Smith & Roller originally planned to use, New Market Tax Credits, requires that at least a fifth of a mixed-use project be devoted to commercial development.

    But the project at 1807 Huntingdon has been in process for so long that this part of Kensington no longer qualifies for the federal incentive, which is meant to spur investment in struggling areas.

    The project is still in a Keystone Opportunity Zone (KOZ), however, which will give state tax breaks to businesses at the 1807 and 1801 Huntingdon projects.

    That policy is also meant to incentivize development in lower-income areas, but there are many examples of its application to parts of Philadelphia like the Navy Yard and University City.

    “I don’t know many [KOZs] that are in neighborhoods like Kensington,” Smith said, “where there’s somebody trying to use it in the spirit and intent of how the legislation was written.”

    The project will include both the redeveloped factory with additional space above it and an adjacent parking lot, which will have multiple stories of housing on top.

    It will include a mix of studios, one-bedroom, and a few two-bedroom apartments, along with loft-style units that can be rented out as either short-term rentals or office space.

    Sixty percent of the units will be set aside for households earning 80% of area median income, or almost $67,000 for one person.

    “We don’t have a direct subsidy, like a Low Income Housing Tax Credit or anything like that,” Roller said. “In some cases, it’s not that different a number than a market rent in the neighborhood.”

    Jacob Roller (left) and Tayyib Smith last June outside the historic bank they plan to turn into a base for Black-owned businesses, which is next to the apartment project farther down Huntingdon Street.

    Roller said the project is inspired in unit mix and general location by the success of Shift Capital’s mixed-use project at 3400 J St., home to Càphê Roasters. Smith & Roller was a junior partner in that project.

    The Huntingdon Street project will be the firm’s largest project by unit count.

    “I am extremely impressed by the work of Smith & Roller,” Jeffrey Crum, president of Ellavoz Impact Capital, said in the news release. “They have proven themselves as professional and experienced urban redevelopers who have a unique vision for revitalizing neighborhoods in partnership with local communities.”

    The proposal has been presented to the East Kensington Neighbors Association several times over the years, and the community group is supportive of Smith & Roller’s proposal.

    The group also sees the development project as a means to bring new life to the block, where the current dilapidated state of the buildings often attracts opioid users from nearby open-air drug markets on Kensington Avenue.

    “The block has been challenged for a long time,” said John Theobald, president of the East Kensington Neighbors Association. “It’s really where a lot of the Kensington Avenue activity impacts the neighborhood, so hopefully more people living there and less vacancy will help.”

  • One of Philly’s last architecturally intact old movie theaters is officially recognized as historic

    One of Philly’s last architecturally intact old movie theaters is officially recognized as historic

    The Circle Theatre in Frankford, built in 1929 for what was once the largest movie theater chain in the country, is now officially recognized as historic.

    The Philadelphia Historical Commission voted Friday to add the former movie theater on the 4600 block of Frankford Avenue to the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places.

    According to the nomination, the Circle Theatre is “a significant surviving example of a neighborhood theater from a period when many were built” in the 1910s and ‘20s. The theater’s architects, Hoffman-Henon Co., “significantly shaped Philadelphia’s built environment through their commissions for theaters and Catholic institutions,” such as churches and schools.

    The decorative facade of the Circle Theatre includes architectural terracotta with ornamental details and columns that have been preserved. The structure was a movie theater from the time it opened in 1929 until 1953, according to the nomination. The building, which included some commercial space, was then converted exclusively for commercial use and now includes both occupied and vacant storefronts.

    “The Circle Theatre is absolutely a landmark, and there’s still people who remember coming up [Frankford Avenue] to go there,” Ellie Devyatkin, director of economic development and neighborhood planning at the Frankford CDC, said during Friday’s Historical Commission meeting.

    According to the nomination, “while Philadelphia once had over 400 movie theaters, the Circle is one of relatively few survivors with significant architectural integrity.” The theater was nominated for designation by Historical Commission staff.

    The Hoffman-Henon architectural firm designed the Circle Theatre for the major movie theater chain Stanley Co. of America. The firm designed theaters for the company in Philadelphia, Atlantic City, Baltimore, and smaller municipalities throughout the tri-state area. Hoffman-Henon designed four Stanley theaters on Market Street in Philadelphia that the historic nomination called “movie palaces” that were “characterized by a large seating capacity and opulent interiors.”

    The Circle Theatre and the Warner Theatre, also known as the Embassy Theatre, on the Atlantic City boardwalk “included the most flamboyant interiors in the firm’s catalog,” according to the nomination. Both opened in 1929 after Warner Bros. acquired the Stanley Co.

    Emily Cooperman, a member of the Historical Commission and chair of its historic designation committee, said the committee was “very enthusiastic about this nomination” and appreciated the creation of an inventory of historical theaters by commission staffer Ted Maust.

    The Frankford CDC supported historic designation for the building, which is across from the community development corporation’s office. Through a Philadelphia Department of Commerce program, the organization worked with the owner of a produce market in the building to improve its facade and is working now with the owner of a salon, Devyatkin said.

    The Circle Theatre building now includes both vacant and occupied storefronts.

    Historic designation protects buildings from demolition but also requires permission for certain exterior changes. Building materials that preserve historic character and adhere to city guidelines can be expensive.

    “Particularly in neighborhoods where rents and property values are low, these designations can be difficult … when they do not come with financial assistance,” Devyatkin said. “There are other parts of the city where you can justifiably command a higher rent or a higher sales price for doing the right type of restoration or preservation work. But without subsidy, that’s really difficult … in many neighborhoods in Philly.”

    Oscar Beisert, a preservationist with the Keeping Society of Philadelphia, said he agreed and would like the city to show some “leniency, especially in areas where the economic viability is a lot lower.”

    He thanked staff at the Historical Commission for nominating the Circle Theatre for inclusion on the city’s historic register.

    “Frankford has a lot of great buildings,” Beisert said, “and it’s great to see one of them designated.”

  • Meet the Philly native and St. Joe’s Prep grad running Philly’s largest outdoor shopping center operator

    Meet the Philly native and St. Joe’s Prep grad running Philly’s largest outdoor shopping center operator

    Brian Finnegan, Brixmor Property Group’s new CEO, is a true Philadelphian.

    He was born in Southwest Philly, spent his formative years in Roxborough, and graduated from St. Joe’s Prep. He met his wife, Katie, at a Halloween party in his mother’s Packer Park backyard in 2009, while just down the road the Phillies played the Yankees in the World Series and Pearl Jam closed the Spectrum.

    Finnegan, now 45, can’t give up his Eagles season tickets, despite living outside New York and traveling the world as a real estate executive, When he can’t make games, he can usually count on his 73-year-old mother, Geraldine, to take the seats.

    Finnegan said he got his work ethic from his mom, who’s worked for the legal services company MCS Group for nearly 50 years, and his late father, Thomas, a 30-year employee and manager of city parks. He also points to his early jobs, which included a summer gig as “head grill guy” at Circle Pizza in Avalon.

    These experiences paid off: Last month, Finnegan was named Brixmor’s CEO, a role he’d previously held on an interim basis.

    Brian Finnegan, who was named CEO of Brixmor Property Group last month, said he’s especially proud of the company’s commitment to its more than 20 shopping centers in and around Philadelphia, where he grew up.

    Finnegan lives in Rye, N.Y., with Katie and their three young daughters, Magnolia, Daisy, and Poppy.

    In a recent interview, Finnegan talked about Brixmor’s dedication to its more than 20 Philly-area shopping centers, including Roosevelt Mall, Pilgrim Gardens, and the Village at Newtown.

    The company has invested about $180 million in its Philly portfolio over the past nine years, Finnegan said, and calls itself the largest operator of open-air shopping centers in the region.

    The following interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

    How would you say Brixmor is doing overall?

    The company is in the best position it’s ever been. We’re signing rents at the highest level that we ever have. We have occupancy levels that are close to the highest we’ve had.

    Consumers today are demanding much more of the suburbs in terms of the types of services that they’re looking for, the types of restaurant options that they’re looking for. And that’s allowed us to really improve the merchandising mix at our shopping centers with better food and beverage options and better service options in terms of health and wellness.

    Why do you think Brixmor shopping centers are thriving while many brick-and-mortar stores falter?

    Grocers, especially [tenants like Sprouts, Whole Foods, and McCaffrey’s], have really invested in their stores, and they’re drawing a lot of traffic.

    Sprouts is among the retailers located at Roosevelt Mall in Northeast Philadelphia, one of Brixmor Property Group’s complexes in the region.

    As it relates to fitness and wellness, and higher quality food and beverage options, I think consumers today care more about what they’re putting in their bodies and how they look than they ever have.

    Across the income spectrum, consumers are looking for value. And as department stores have closed, off-price operators [such as Burlington and Five Below] have taken a significant amount of share.

    You have to create an environment at specific shopping centers where if one tenant draws traffic, another tenant can complement them.

    It really matters who your neighbor is, so if you’re able to put a strong merchandising mix together, which we’ve been able to do at our centers in Philadelphia, you’re really going to see traffic.

    The Ross Dress for Less at Roosevelt Mall is one of several off-price retailers that have found success in Brixmor Property Group centers, according to CEO Brian Finnegan.
    What would you like to accomplish as CEO?

    We’d love to find some new opportunities to grow our footprint in Philadelphia.

    The deals that we’ve done in Philadelphia, many of them are [with retailers new to Brixmor’s national portfolio], like with Lululemon, like with Free People, like with Warby Parker, like with Pottery Barn and Williams-Sonoma.

    Closed Iron Hill Brewery in Newtown is officially becoming a P.J. Whelihan’s franchise

    We think about how our centers connect with the communities that we’re in. We’re part of those communities. We’re actually landlords to Philadelphia institutions like Chickie’s & Pete’s and P.J. Whelihan’s.

    The more that we can tie our assets with retailers that are relevant to those communities, the better.

    What makes you optimistic about shopping centers amid all the e-commerce competition?

    What [the pandemic] showed was that people like connectivity. They don’t like to just have things delivered to their door. They want to go out and experience things. They want to touch and feel things.

    Our traffic since the pandemic across the entire portfolio is up 7%.

    Barnes & Noble is shown at Barn Plaza shopping center in Doylestown, which is one of more than 20 complexes in the region owned by Brixmor Property Group.

    If you talk to a lot of these major retailers, what they’ll say is the store is the center of everything that they do. They’re utilizing that store to be able to connect with the consumer in store, at delivery, as part of pickup.

    I’m pretty bullish. There are a lot of retailers that continue to thrive despite the fact that consumers have options to be able to get something online if they wanted to.

  • Under new leadership, Women’s Community Revitalization Project is developing apartments on public land in Kensington

    Under new leadership, Women’s Community Revitalization Project is developing apartments on public land in Kensington

    The Women’s Community Revitalization Project is planning a 34-unit apartment building, flanked by two triplexes, on city-owned land in Kensington.

    All of the units will be available to those below 60% of area median income, or almost $72,000 for a family of four.

    The apartment building at Cumberland and Reese Streets is designed at an angle slashing across the lot, using only a portion of the city-owned land.

    “Having a solid wall of building directly across [from rowhouses], we just felt wasn’t really contextual to the neighborhood,” said Lorissa Luciani, who has been the executive director of Women’s Community Revitalization Project (WCRP) for the last nine months. “Then there’s height limitations so we couldn’t go any higher.”

    The project is funded through federal Low Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC), which the nonprofit group obtained in 2025. The land will be obtained for a nominal cost from the city.

    WCRP has been meeting with local community groups since 2024. Luciani said organizations such as Xiente, APM, and the 19th Ward RCO have been supportive of this project.

    The development, designed by Philadelphia-based CICADA Architecture & Planning, will cost over $26 million and is slated for completion 18 months after the group settles on the land. It will include 10 parking spaces.

    On Tuesday, the Philadelphia Land Bank’s board voted to approve the sale of the property to WCRP. The plan also has the backing of Councilmember Quetcy Lozada, which is essential because she will need to introduce legislation to move the property out of the Land Bank.

    “It’s an amazing project,” Lozada said. “We are in need of partners like the Women’s Community Revitalization Project who understand the need for not just affordable housing, but deeply affordable housing.”

    Without Lozada’s support, the project would be impossible. Final passage of the legislation could come as soon as later this month.

    The three buildings being developed by WCRP can be seen from above, highlighted in white, with the apartment project’s slanted angle readily seen from above.

    Luciani said WCRP would close on the project in the fall.

    This will be Luciani’s first ground-up development with the organization. She joined the nonprofit in 2025 after WCRP’s longstanding executive director and founder Nora Lichtash retired from her leadership role with the group after 35 years. She still works for the group as a consultant.

    WCRP was founded in 1986 to serve Fishtown, Kensington, and other neighborhoods in North Philadelphia east of Broad Street. Since then, it has developed projects in other corners of the city, such as Germantown and Point Breeze.

    “My predecessor has a substantial amount of experience and relationships with many of these organizations” in Kensington, Luciani said.

    “I’m trying to work to have my own relationships with them,” Luciani said. “They’re a really organized, sophisticated community that really understands their needs, and they’ll fight for it as hard as they need to.”

    Luciani previously worked in New Jersey local and state government and planning for decades and has a deep familiarity with subsidized housing policy.

    “I grew up in public housing in North Jersey,” Luciani said. “So it’s been a personal and professional lens that I utilize to try and continue the good work that helped my family in the hopes of helping others.”

  • Brandywine Realty Trust is opening a $60 million hotel in Radnor

    Brandywine Realty Trust is opening a $60 million hotel in Radnor

    Brandywine Realty Trust plans to open a 121-room Marriott Tribute Portfolio hotel this spring in Radnor.

    The company is the region’s largest office building owner, and the five-story project at 165 King of Prussia Rd. is meant to cater to their tenants in the suburbs.

    Dubbed The Brandywine, it cost $60 million to develop and will include an expansive roof deck and two restaurants with almost 260 seats between them.

    The 80,000-square-foot hotel will be in the midst of the company’s 2.1 million square feet of holdings in Radnor, its largest suburban cluster.

    “We were constantly hearing from our tenant base that as they were bringing people in from out of town, there was no real high-end, luxury hotel for them to spend time in,” said Jerry Sweeney, Brandywine’s CEO.

    Brandywine’s other large suburban office holdings are in King of Prussia and Conshohocken.

    “We saw a real window of opportunity to really upscale the hospitality experience available on the Main Line,” Sweeney said. “That’s very important to us because we have 3 million plus square feet of office space in the Pennsylvania suburbs, and over 2 million is concentrated within walking distance of this hotel.”

    Sweeney estimates that over a quarter of the hotel’s business will come from Brandywine’s tenants in their Radnor office buildings, which include Lincoln Financial Group, Arkema, and Penn Medicine among many others.

    In Brandywine’s second-quarter earnings call last year, Sweeney said he anticipates additional demand will be drawn from the seven colleges, including Villanova University, that are within a five-mile radius and from nearby healthcare facilities.

    The Brandywine is expected to be open in time for graduation this year, and the company anticipates a boost from sporting events and celebrations this summer, which include World Cup games, a PGA tournament, the MLB All-Star Game, and the 250th anniversary of the United States.

    The hotel’s ground floor will include the 114-seat Merrick’s Tavern, serving regional American dishes, a cocktail list anchored by bourbon and rye, local beer, and what is billed as a wine program. It’s intended for everyday dining and groups.

    The 145-seat Pomelo Rooftop Terrace will operate year-round, serving botanical-forward cocktails and a locally sourced menu.

    Merrick’s Tavern is named after Samuel Vaughan Merrick, the first president of the Pennsylvania Railroad and a founder of the Franklin Institute.

    “With this hotel we really used the historical evolution of the Main Line as a theme, which is tied to the history of the Pennsylvania Railroad,” Sweeney said. “Even some of the motif and interior space designs we have are very reminiscent of the great age of American railroads, where travel was upscale.”

    A rendering of Merrick’s Tavern within Brandywine Realty Trust’s new hotel, opening this spring in Radnor.

    The hotel is next to the Radnor stop on SEPTA’s Norristown High Speed Line and close to two Regional Rail stations.

    The building’s architect is the DLR Group, while interior design is by Restoration Hardware and Bergmeyer. The Brandywine will be operated by Aimbridge Hospitality.

    As part of the Marriott Bonvoy Tribute portfolio, the brand is a boutique hotel within the larger chain, which allows more flexibility for decor and furnishings.

    Brandywine Realty Trust has developed hotels before, notably the AKA University City in the FMC Tower, in partnership with Korman Communities.

    “For us, it was really brand building, expanding our tenant service program to our tenants and creating more connective tissue between us and our customers,” Sweeney said.

    “We saw a great window of economic opportunity to build a high-end hotel that was positioned along two interstates, two train lines that would appeal to a much broader base of customers beyond just the Brandywine universe,” he said.

    The Brandywine will be just the latest hotel added to the Main Line.

    New venues have been opening in recent years in municipalities like Newtown Square and Conshohocken.

    “It wasn’t all that long ago when you just had the [65-year-old] Radnor hotel, but wherever there’s a big business presence, you’re going to need hotel rooms,” said Ed Grose, CEO of the Greater Philadelphia Hotel Association. “These aren’t your typical limited-service hotels. They’re nice. They’re hotels that cater to businesses that are also growing in that area.”

  • Closed Iron Hill Brewery in Newtown is officially becoming a P.J. Whelihan’s franchise

    Closed Iron Hill Brewery in Newtown is officially becoming a P.J. Whelihan’s franchise

    The company behind P.J. Whelihan’s is officially moving into a shuttered Iron Hill Brewery.

    The Haddon Township-based PJW Restaurant Group has signed a lease for Iron Hill’s former location at the Village at Newtown, according to Brian Finnegan, the CEO of Brixmor Property Group, which owns the Bucks County shopping center.

    PJW marketing director Kristen Foord confirmed the lease signing, saying in an email that the company was “not in a position to share additional specifics” at this time.

    The move was approved by a federal judge last month as part of Iron Hill’s bankruptcy proceedings.

    Like more than a dozen other former Iron Hills throughout the region, the nearly 8,000-square-foot space in Newtown has sat empty since the Exton-based brewpub chain closed all locations and filed for liquidation bankruptcy last fall.

    Iron Hill opened in the affluent suburb in 2020. The restaurant moved in after Brixmor refurbished the more than 200,000-square-foot complex on South Eagle Road.

    As part of the revamp, the developer added new buildings, allowing it to bring in shops and restaurants like Iron Hill, Harvest Seasonal Grill, and Turning Point. The 30-acre complex is anchored by the high-end grocer McCaffrey’s Food Markets.

    In Newtown, “we’ve got Free People and Lululemon and Ulta that we added to the shopping center,” Finnegan said Wednesday in an interview. “We’ve got a lot of strong service tenants. We also have Capital Grill and Harvest, so some great food and beverage options.”

    And soon, he said, that list will also include P.J. Whelihan’s.

    PJW’s most well-known restaurant is P.J. Whelihan’s, which started in the Poconos in 1983 and has expanded to include 25 P.J. locations, the majority of which are in the Philly region.

    PJW also owns the Pour House in Exton, North Wales, and Westmont, Haddon Township; the ChopHouse in Gibbsboro; the ChopHouse Grille in Exton; Central Taco & Tequila in Westmont; and Treno, also in Westmont.

    While the Newtown restaurant will get new life soon, many other former Iron Hills still sit vacant.

    Some landlords are actively looking for tenants, with West Chester’s John Barry saying he hopes to have a lease signed by the end of this month.

    “We have a number of groups interested in the space and a few [letters of intent] have been submitted,” Barry said in an email last month.

    In other places, such as Voorhees, township officials and community members remain in the dark about whether another tenant will move in soon, and landlords can’t be reached.

    A few of the closed breweries may be revived under new owners, though details are slim.

    A federal judge last month approved the acquisition of Iron Hill’s trademark and intellectual property in conjunction with the transfer of restaurant leases in Center City, Huntingdon Valley, Hershey, Lancaster, and Wilmington.

    Representatives of the potential new owner, Rightlane LLC, have been unable to be reached. Contacted through the owner of Iron Hill’s building in Center City, Rightlane declined to comment to the Philadelphia Business Journal earlier this month.

  • Saks Fifth Avenue in Bala Cynwyd is closing

    Saks Fifth Avenue in Bala Cynwyd is closing

    Saks Fifth Avenue will be closing its Bala Cynwyd location.

    Saks Global, which owns Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus, announced the impending closure in a news release Tuesday, a month after the luxury clothing retailer filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

    After decades in business, the expansive store along City Avenue is expected to close in April, according to a Saks Global spokesperson, who said decisions were based on several factors, including store performance and “lease economics.”

    Fifty workers at the Bala Cynwyd Saks Fifth Avenue will lose their jobs effective April 11, according to a WARN Act filing with the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry. Another 155 workers at a Wilkes Barre fulfillment center will be laid off, according to a separate filing.

    As part of the company’s restructuring, it will shutter seven other Saks Fifth Avenue stores, including at the American Dream mall in North Jersey, as well as a Neiman Marcus in Boston.

    “Saks Global is refining its store footprint to focus on profitable locations with the highest growth potential,” company executives wrote on its website, adding that the nine closures represented “the first phase of this ongoing review.”

    The move will make the company “better positioned to deliver exceptional products, elevated experiences and highly personalized service across all channels,” CEO Geoffroy van Raemdonck said in a statement.

    Over the years, the Saks Fifth Avenue in Bala Cynwyd has become the brand’s only physical outpost in the region. It is referred to as “Saks Philadelphia” on the company’s website, despite being located across the city line in a freestanding building at Bala Plaza.

    City Avenue is shown in April 2024. The Saks Fifth Avenue along the busy thoroughfare is closing in April.

    The aging shopping center is in the process of being revamped into what developers are advertising as a “sanctuary for work, life and play,” with hundreds of new residential units.

    Nearby on City Avenue, a standalone Lord & Taylor, which closed in 2021 amid the department store’s bankruptcy, is being converted into an apartment building.

    City Avenue in Lower Merion set to triple its apartment count, transforming the office and retail hub

    Until recently, the longstanding Saks Fifth Avenue appeared primed to be part of the area’s future: In 2024, City Ave District, the nonprofit business development agency that straddles Lower Merion and Philadelphia, reported that business at the store was so strong that it had resisted offers to move to King of Prussia.

    Once the Bala Cynwyd Saks Fifth Avenue closes, the nearest location will be in New York.

    Saks Global also operates a Neiman Marcus at the King of Prussia Mall, which is not on the list of stores to close.

    The Neiman Marcus at the King of Prussia Mall, pictured in 2020, will remain open.

    Saks Off 5th discount outlets at the Franklin Mall in Northeast Philadelphia and at the Metroplex shopping center in Plymouth Meeting recently closed. The winding down of those stores was announced before the bankruptcy filing, as was reported by several news outlets, including the Philadelphia Business Journal.

    Elsewhere in the country, Saks Global is closing the majority of its standalone Fifth Avenue Club personal styling suites, the company said Tuesday.

    In New York, Bergdorf Goodman, which Saks also owns, will remain open.

    What Philly-area Saks customers should know

    Shoppers walk through Saks Fifth Avenue in New York in January.

    Shoppers at the Bala Cynwyd store will no longer be able to buy gift cards in person, according to Saks, and will have 15 days from the start of the closing sale to use existing gift cards.

    Items that were bought before the closing sale can be returned or exchanged as usual, the company said, but purchases made during it will be final. Merchandise bought during the closing sale will also be ineligible for return or exchange at stores that are remaining open.

    SaksFirst credit cards will still be accepted, according to the company, and customers with those credit cards will still earn points for purchases made in store. Shoppers will no longer be able to make in-person credit card payments or apply for credit cards at the Bala Cynwyd store.

    At other Saks locations, including the King of Prussia Neiman Marcus, the company says the customer experience will remain unchanged.