This Week's Find: A Storehouse-Turned-Home on the Hill

• May 9th 2013

by Shilpi Paul

A few years ago, UrbanTurf wrote about a bank on Capitol Hill that was turned into a doctor’s single-family home. Now, we get wind of a former storefront that will take on a new life as two residences later today.

Originally one-story commercial buildings with large show windows, the properties at 1321-1323 Constitution Avenue NE (map) have undergone several transformations during the last century.

Constructed in 1910, the building was first owned by Domenico Del Vecchio, a hardware store magnate in DC. Among other properties, Del Vecchio owned several storefronts along Constitution Avenue.

Over the next few decades, the building slowly morphed from commercial into residential. First, a section of the windows on the facade was replaced with brick. Next, a second story addition went up. At some point in the middle of the century, the show windows were filled in completely with brick; a couple double-hung windows were installed instead for a more residential feel.

For the past 14 years, the house has been the primary residence of Olivier Gadras and his family. Gadras sold the home to Ditto Residential last year, and the developer, who is responsible for the revamp of The Roundhouse in Brookland, launched a complete renovation.

Now, there are two identical four-bedroom, 3.5-bath homes at the addresses, both with centrally-located skylights, large rear windows, wide plank French white oak flooring, private roof decks and landscaped rear gardens. Each will be listed later today by Coldwell Banker’s Greg Mascio for $1.3 million. More photos below.

This article originally published at https://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/capitol_hill_store-to-home_conversion/7044.