clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Spare a Thought for the Curbed Boston Preservation Heatmap

By Tom Acitelli
3 comments / new
View as Map
By Tom Acitelli
3 comments / new

Aside from the city's efforts to preserve triple-deckers in general (for better or worse), there are other preservation efforts under way in Boston—and some recently acrimoniously concluded. We decided for our first-ever Curbed Boston Preservation Heatmap to focus not just on the rancorous but on the harmonious as well, those efforts that really have no sides, only allies. So, from Roxbury to JP to Hyde Park to Downtown Crossing to Chinatown to the edge of Boston and over it, here are 12 preservation efforts and earfuls.

· Spare a Thought for the Triple-Decker—Effort to Save Icon [Curbed Boston]
· Why the Hub Housing Market Could Get Worse, Much Worse [Curbed Boston]
· Our Curbed Maps archive [Curbed Boston]

Read More

Home for Little Wanderers

Copy Link

This former orphanage in JP gave up the ghost to become the 161-unit Olmsted Place, but not before one of the most contentious development sites in recent Boston history.

161 South Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA

Blessed Sacrament Church

Copy Link

The former Blessed Sacrament Church off Hyde Square in Jamaica Plain will likely become at least 32 condos priced from $269,000 all the way to $725,000. The change itself is not the battle—it's the market-rate condos bit that has some people peeved.

361 Centre Street, Boston, MA

Locke-Ober Building

Copy Link

The building housing the Locke-Ober restaurant, which shuttered suddenly earlier this year after 137 years in business, is slated to become apartments, with another restaurant on the ground floor.

1-4 Winter Place, Boston, MA 02108

Burnham Building

Copy Link

The nearly 100-year-old Burnham Building will be incorporated into the mother of all recent Boston condo towers, Millennium Tower, as an homage not only to its age but to its architect, Daniel Burnham, who also designed the Flatiron Building in Manhattan and Union Station in D.C.

426 Washington Street

Old Northern Avenue Bridge

Copy Link

The 104-year-old truss bridge over Fort Point Channel is slated to become a “bridge of flowers,” as The Globe put it, linking the Greenway with the booming Seaport District.

Old Northern Avenue Bridge, Boston 02110

Ferdinand Building

Copy Link

The big redo in Dudley Square, that may or may not include the state Registry of Motor Vehicles’ Boston branch, will preserve the Baroque Revival façade of the Ferdinand Building. As we always say, if it’s baroque, don’t fix it.

Dudley Street and Washington Street

The Kensington-Gaiety Theater

Copy Link

The 27-story, 381-unit building now under construction supplants the site of the old Gaiety Theater, but only after a spirited preservation fight in the previous decade.

659-665 Washington Street, Boston

120 Kingston-Dainty Dot

Copy Link

The 123-year-old Dainty Dot Hosiery building was done away with to make room for the 26-story apartment building dubbed 120 Kingston Street.

120 Kingston Street, Boston

Hayden Building

Copy Link

The old Combat Zone building, designed by 19th-century legend Henry Hobson Richardson, was saved from demolition by a Harvard historian who happened upon it and by Historic Boston, which bought it. Its façade and interior features preserved, the building’s slated to be retail on the ground floor, with floor-through apartments upstairs renting for at least $3,500.

681-683 Washington Street, Boston

Vertullo Building

Copy Link

Historic Boston plans to restore the approximately 150-year-old Hyde Park building’s exterior to its Second Empire glory, with changes to the interior as necessary. It currently has five storefronts on the ground floor and five apartments above.

74–84 Fairmount Avenue, Boston

Alvah Kittredge House

Copy Link

The nearly 175-year-old Greek Revival house in Roxbury had fallen into repair when efforts emerged (led by Historic Boston) in the last couple of years to restore it and turn it into a mix of market-rate and affordable housing.

10 Linwood Street, Boston, MA

The Malcolm X Ella Little Collins House

Copy Link

The National Trust for Historic Preservation earlier this year named the last known surviving residence of civil rights icon Malcolm X as one of the country’s most endangered historic places. Efforts are under way to save it, and to incorporate it into the community as student housing.

72 Dale Street, Boston

Loading comments...

© 2023 Vox Media, Inc. All rights reserved.
Link copied to the clipboard.

Home for Little Wanderers

161 South Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA

This former orphanage in JP gave up the ghost to become the 161-unit Olmsted Place, but not before one of the most contentious development sites in recent Boston history.

161 South Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA

Blessed Sacrament Church

361 Centre Street, Boston, MA

The former Blessed Sacrament Church off Hyde Square in Jamaica Plain will likely become at least 32 condos priced from $269,000 all the way to $725,000. The change itself is not the battle—it's the market-rate condos bit that has some people peeved.

361 Centre Street, Boston, MA

Locke-Ober Building

1-4 Winter Place, Boston, MA 02108

The building housing the Locke-Ober restaurant, which shuttered suddenly earlier this year after 137 years in business, is slated to become apartments, with another restaurant on the ground floor.

1-4 Winter Place, Boston, MA 02108

Burnham Building

426 Washington Street

The nearly 100-year-old Burnham Building will be incorporated into the mother of all recent Boston condo towers, Millennium Tower, as an homage not only to its age but to its architect, Daniel Burnham, who also designed the Flatiron Building in Manhattan and Union Station in D.C.

426 Washington Street

Old Northern Avenue Bridge

Old Northern Avenue Bridge, Boston 02110

The 104-year-old truss bridge over Fort Point Channel is slated to become a “bridge of flowers,” as The Globe put it, linking the Greenway with the booming Seaport District.

Old Northern Avenue Bridge, Boston 02110

Ferdinand Building

Dudley Street and Washington Street

The big redo in Dudley Square, that may or may not include the state Registry of Motor Vehicles’ Boston branch, will preserve the Baroque Revival façade of the Ferdinand Building. As we always say, if it’s baroque, don’t fix it.

Dudley Street and Washington Street

The Kensington-Gaiety Theater

659-665 Washington Street, Boston

The 27-story, 381-unit building now under construction supplants the site of the old Gaiety Theater, but only after a spirited preservation fight in the previous decade.

659-665 Washington Street, Boston

120 Kingston-Dainty Dot

120 Kingston Street, Boston

The 123-year-old Dainty Dot Hosiery building was done away with to make room for the 26-story apartment building dubbed 120 Kingston Street.

120 Kingston Street, Boston

Hayden Building

681-683 Washington Street, Boston

The old Combat Zone building, designed by 19th-century legend Henry Hobson Richardson, was saved from demolition by a Harvard historian who happened upon it and by Historic Boston, which bought it. Its façade and interior features preserved, the building’s slated to be retail on the ground floor, with floor-through apartments upstairs renting for at least $3,500.

681-683 Washington Street, Boston

Vertullo Building

74–84 Fairmount Avenue, Boston

Historic Boston plans to restore the approximately 150-year-old Hyde Park building’s exterior to its Second Empire glory, with changes to the interior as necessary. It currently has five storefronts on the ground floor and five apartments above.

74–84 Fairmount Avenue, Boston

Alvah Kittredge House

10 Linwood Street, Boston, MA

The nearly 175-year-old Greek Revival house in Roxbury had fallen into repair when efforts emerged (led by Historic Boston) in the last couple of years to restore it and turn it into a mix of market-rate and affordable housing.

10 Linwood Street, Boston, MA

The Malcolm X Ella Little Collins House

72 Dale Street, Boston

The National Trust for Historic Preservation earlier this year named the last known surviving residence of civil rights icon Malcolm X as one of the country’s most endangered historic places. Efforts are under way to save it, and to incorporate it into the community as student housing.

72 Dale Street, Boston