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The Butterworth Mansion: From Best New Listing to 11 Units?

  • April 9, 2020

by Nena Perry-Brown

Rendering of proposed conversion, from T Street, east. Click to enlarge.

A former Best New Listing — and 19th-century example of missing middle housing — may soon triple in density.

Vitis Investments has filed a zoning application to combine vacant lots adjacent to the property at 421 T Street NW (map) to convert the three-unit property into 11 units. Square 134 Architects is the designer. 

421 T Street NW, photo courtesy of HomeVisit.

The proposed conversion would append a three-story rear addition to the 6,400-plus square-foot house, while removing several interior partitions and framing, the rear porch, a prior rear addition, and an interior spiral stair between the cellar and first floors.

Rendering of proposed conversion, from 4th Street. Click to enlarge.

Located in the LeDroit Park Historic District, the property currently functions as two two-bedroom units and a three-bedroom unit. It was dubbed the Butterworth Mansion after original owner (and former patent commissioner/Ohio politician) Benjamin Butterworth.

Rendering of proposed conversion, from 5th Street. Click to enlarge.

The unit mix would include one- and two-bedroom units, and four of the new units, including two of the two-bedroom duplexes, would be inclusionary zoning. The application explains that the inability to create a rectangular addition, along with the configuration of the existing building, require that units be stacked separately in each volume. With the addition, achieving fewer units by combining them could result in awkward unit sizes. 

Rendering of proposed conversion, from T Street, west. Click to enlarge.

The conversion would provide four long-term bicycle spaces, and would also add two parking spaces, for a total of five spaces. 

Selected UrbanTurf reporting on missing middle housing in DC:

This article originally published at https://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/the-butterworth-mansion-from-best-new-listing-to-11-units/16696

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