Amenities in newer Greater Boston real estate developments may have either jumped the shark or raised the bar in 2014, it's your pick of cliches. On the one hand, electric-car-charging stations seem inevitable (we saw two at a grocery store parking lot while traveling in the South this holiday season); but they also seem like overkill in the present day, no? Or take on-site pet-grooming facilities and staff—how urgent is the need to wash your dog? Still, it's always good to have options; and the region's newer developments provided plenty for owners and tenants.
The amenity that really grabbed our fancy this year and struck us as a harbinger of larger things to come, however, is not nearly as service-y as pet-grooming or juicing your ride from an outlet. No, bocce ball courts are mere playthings. But they're so much more. They are a red, white and green horseman of the hipster aesthetic conquering Boston real estate, that seemingly insatiable drive by marketers, brokers and developers to entice the young, the upwardly mobile and the tech-drenched to rent or buy in their buildings. Bocce ball courts—at least four new developments this year unveiled theirs—are like PBR and podcasts: So retro they're unavoidably cool. And they apparently work as a draw. Which is the whole point of a residential amenity.
· The Amenities of the Hub's Newer Apartment Complexes [Curbed Boston]
· 'Your Home Is Killing You'—Let This Boston Development Help [Curbed Boston]
· Bocce Ball Courts Are Now a Thing in Boston Apartments [Curbed Boston]
· Bocce Ball Court Proving Irresistible in Watertown [Curbed Boston]
· Malden Complex Drops Its Computer Nooks Next Month [Curbed Boston]
· Our Curbed Boston Awards '14 archive [Curbed Boston]