Rendering of alley view courtesy of Bowie Gridley Architects

Back in July ’11 we learned that Meridian Public Charter school would be moving into the old Harrison School at 13th and V St, NW. They got their financing – from a press release:

“The historic Harrison School building has become the next development in Washington, D.C.’s dynamic U Street neighborhood. A $15.5 million renovation adds 12,000 square feet to the existing 49,000 square foot structure to serve hundreds of families and 530 children from early childhood through eighth grade at Meridian Public Charter School.

Meridian Chairman Ron Ridker explained the school’s commitment to the U Street area. “The Manhattan Laundry building has served us very well since our inception twelve years ago. We could have found a good permanent home for Meridian in other parts of the city, but waited until an appropriate building close to our current location came along, so we could continue serving the community we grew up with. The Manhattan Laundry space will soon be available for other uses.”

Primary funding for Meridian’s new home was provided through TRF’s Chase New Markets Tax Credit Charter School Fund, created in partnership with The Reinvestment Fund (TRF) and Chase. A fifty-year lease signed with the District of Columbia, construction began this week at 13th and V Streets, N.W. for completion in August of 2012.

In addition to its premier financing partners, Meridian has assembled a top team: Forrester Construction, Bowie Gridley Architects, Building Hope, and Brailsford & Dunlavey.”

Current alley view

What do you think of the addition renderings? You can see how the property looks now from the front here.

Alley view

Alley view

If you have any fun or interesting animal/pet photos please shoot me an email to princeofpetworth(at)gmail(dot)com with ‘Animal Fix’ in the title and say what neighborhood you’re from or upload to the PoPville flickr pool with your pets name and neighborhood. I can’t guarantee I’ll get them all posted but I’ll do my best.

“Pet name, Gold. Neighborhood, southeast DC anacostia. (Dog was visiting her grandparents house in maryland) My sister, the owner, put my socks on her paws to keep from messing up the hardwood floors.”

“My cat Luna Leopard (named after the famous geomorphologist Luna Leopold). He likes to slip out the front door and hang out on the neighbors’ porches, and one day my boyfriend, who lives in Penn Quarter and doesn’t know about your blog (can you imagine), let him back into the house and announced, “The Prince of Petworth has returned.” So that’s his nickname now.”

“I give you Marilyn Monroe (the blonde) and Mother Teresa.”

“This is Milo from Capitol Hill with his “friends” while I was prepping for Halloween decorations.”

Ed. Note: At first I thought those were real birds with Milo the cat… And for those that didn’t make it to last night’s pet costume contest you can see lots of photos here.

This rental is located at 1500 Massachusetts Ave, NW:

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The Craigslist ad says:

“Studio offers the following amenities:

Garage
Blinds
Air Conditioner
Microwave
Controlled Access
Large Closets
Refrigerator
Cable Ready
Disposal”

$1591 sound right?

Photo by PoPville flickr user ekelly80

“Dear PoPville,

I’m moving and I have a ton of wonderful books that I don’t feel the need to take with me. Does Popville have a recommendation for where to give away used books?”

and

“Dear PoPville,

My friend’s birthday is on Saturday and I’d like to get him a gift certificate for spa services (massage and/or facial). Can you get suggestions from PoPville for man-friendly spas in preferably the Logan/Dupont area or up around Friendship Heights?”

Photo by PoPville flickr user dcjabbour

If you have a second, I’d be grateful if you took this brief survey. If not, no worries. Thanks!

Click the Button below:

Photo by PoPville flickr user theraspberryexpress

theraspberryexpress writes:

“A Virginia pig’s liver, belly, Virginia dairy milk infused with warm spices, eggs, salt, diced fatback. Wrapped in bacon. 1 of 2 for sale at AM Wine Shop in Adams Morgan.
Rich, savory and spreads quite nicely on warm, toasted bread. Accompanied by a Mâcon Village ($18) is a pleasant start for autumnal evening decompression.”

Follow PoPville on twitter here on facebook here and google+ here.

Photo by PoPville flick user julianne’s

Back in Aug. ’11 we learned that the Hawk n Dove had been sold at 329 Pennsylvania Avenue SE. Even though we’ve had a couple months to digest the news it’s still crazy to see the photo above. Thanks to a reader for sending the photos.

This home is located at 4604 Iowa Ave, NW:

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The flier says:

“Enjoy the impeccable attention to detail in this gorgeous end unit row house. Recent renovations of the LL w/ rentable au pair suite, a sunrm/bfast rm, a renovated KT, a large custom closet/dressing area off the MBR. Exquisite features include original woodwork, custom- made radiator cover & stunning wood floors throughout & an exposed brick wall. Spectacular fenced yd w/ patio.”

You can find more info here and a mouse on house tour here.

This 4 bed/2 bath is going for $590,000.

Photo by PoPville flickr user Nikoo’s Photos

“Dear PoPville,

I live in the Adams Morgan/Columbia Heights area and I have been experiencing issues with packages being delivered by the USPS. For the third time in the past 2 months, I have not received a package that they marked as delivered. I live in a small building with a secure door, so I know these packages are not being left on the street. I also only have this problem with the USPS and not Fedex or UPS. I know two other friends in the area that have had this exact same problem as well. I have contacted the USPS and the local office on 14th and T, but so far they have not been helpful at all. I have recently contacted the inspection services and they claim to be investigating, but I’m just wondering if any readers that live in the area have experienced a similar problem.”

Ed. Note: If you’d like to contribute a recipe please send an email with at least one photo to princeofpetworth (at) gmail with recipe in the subject line.

LP writes:

Green Tomato Pie

4 to 5 green tomatoes, chopped
1 1/2 cups white sugar
2 tablespoons cider vinegar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg or allspice
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1 recipe pastry for a 9 inch double crust pie ( or 2 pre-repared pie crusts from the grocery if you are lazy like me)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Place diced green tomatoes and vinegar in a large bowl.
In a medium bowl, mix together sugar, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, salt and flour. Sprinkle over tomatoes and toss to coat evenly.
Pour into pie crust and cover with criss-cross lattice crust.
Bake at 350 degrees about an hour. Crust should be brown.

West End Cinema opened up back in Oct. ’10. They are located at 2301 M Street NW. You can see what movies are showing here. Since we often pine for new movie theaters – now that they’ve been around exactly a year – what do you think of West End Cinema? Do you like the films they show? Do you like the fact that you can also buy a beer or glass of wine there? I have to admit – it often falls off my radar – how does it compare to E Street Cinema?

“Dear PoPville,

I was wondering if you and your readers can help track down a burglary suspect…

Recently, my house in the U Street neighborhood was robbed in broad daylight. He entered by kicking in the back door from a shared alley. We have an alarm system and the police responded quickly, so that was good. However, we found out that 3 homes on our block had also been burglarized the week before and the number of DC Alerts for robbery this month is off the charts. It would be great to get the perpetrators off the streets so this doesn’t keep happening.

We just found out that our neighbor has video of a lone suspect, in gloves on a warm day, looking over his fence13 minutes before my alarm sounded 20 feet away. If anyone knows this man or sees him, call the police immediately and refer to this video. Will send an updated version if we can get a clearer picture or zoom in.”

“Dear PoPville,

I live in Mt. Pleasant and on my way to the metro this morning, I noticed something a bit out of the ordinary–a spike buck in the fenced-in playground of an apartment building around the intersection Mt. Pleasant Street and Hobart Street. A guy who walked up shortly after I stopped to take the attached pictures said that the spike had been there a little while and had apparently injured himself when he jumped the fence. The man said he called animal control and that they were responding.

Having grown up on a farm, I was accustomed to seeing deer almost every morning once the cold, autumn air arrived, so it was a nice surprise to see this reminder of home. I just hope the little guy didn’t hurt himself too badly when he hurdled the fence. I am also wondering what drove him so far out of Rock Creek Park (which is where I assume he came from).”

Hipchickindc is a licensed real estate broker. Her latest business venture can be seen here. Unless specifically noted, neither she nor the company that she is affiliated with represented any of the parties or were directly involved in the transaction reported below. Unless otherwise noted, the source of information is Metropolitan Regional Information Systems (MRIS), which is the local multiple listing system. Information is deemed reliable but not guaranteed.

Featured Property: 1424 Rhode Island Ave NW Unit F
Legal Subdivision: Old City #2
Advertised Subdivision per Listing: Logan
Original List Price: $791,424.
List Price at Contract: $791,424.
List Date: 09/09/2011
Days on Market: 10
Settled Sales Price: $780,000.
Settlement Date: 10/20/2011
Seller Subsidy: $0.
Bank Owned?: No Short Sale? No
Type Of Financing: Cash
Original GDoN post is: here.
The listing can be seen: here. To see the photos, after opening the listing link, scroll through the arrows on the main pic.

Good Deal or Not Revisited (GDoN-R) posts have profiled sales for a range of properties including formstone-laden Victorian castle-like structures, a multi-million dollar contemporary overlooking Rock Creek Park, gut renovated Victorian not-so-castle like structures, a post war apartment building turned condo, and plenty of porch front rowhomes built in the 1920’s and 30’s. Depending on what neighborhood in DC you might find yourself, the architectural vibe can be quite different from block to block. Clearly tastes, technologies, and perceptions of amenities change from one stylistic era to another. Personally, I enjoy stepping into the past and imagining the 1970s homeowners’ delight at upgrading to Harvest Gold Kenmore appliances.

Continues after the jump. (more…)

Photo by PoPville flickr user Flicker Clicker

“Dear PoPville,

I’ve got a bit of a dilemma and I really don’t know how to handle it. I live in a row house with a tiny yard and have a small dog that I walk around the neighborhood. There’s an apartment building directly across the street from my house and a woman has been harassing me for walking my dog – she can see me and yells profanity at me, but I can’t see her. It’s unnerving, especially since she’ll be yelling at me as I walk into my front door, so she knows where I live. I’m a responsible pet owner – I clean up after my dog. Not to mention there’s no yard to her apartment building – just grass between the sidewalk and the street which is public space.

This evening I watched an older man walk two large dogs walk right by the building but as I walked by she started yelling at me about my f*** dog, and how would I like it if she let her dog s*** and p*** in my d*** yard. My husband has told her to shove it, I’ve responded that I picked up the poop and have a right to walk the dog along the street. I’ve now started to ignore it but it continues. What do I do to get this to stop? I’m pretty sure this is anti-gentrification blowback. Maybe I should just stop scooping the poop so at least her yelling is valid…”

I def. feel your frustration but I don’t think this situation is “anti-gentrification blowback”. I think it is more likely that the neighbor could be mentally ill. Or the neighbor may have simply been pushed over the edge by others not scooping that she is venting her anger on you. Though the fact she yells only at you and not others with dogs is of great concern. It sounds like a rational discussion is not gonna work here. How would you guys deal with this situation – alert the authorities or try to ignore it? Something else?