{"nrhp_refnum":"11000926","name":"Park Towne Place","other_names":[],"category":"building","location":{"address":"2200 Park Towne Place","address_restricted":false,"city":"Philadelphia","county":"Philadelphia","state":"PA","lat":39.963476840000055,"lon":-75.17724398568949,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"2011-12-15","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Community Planning and Development"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"Park Towne Place is an enclave of four twenty-story apartment buildings with an underground garage, a one-story restaurant, and a pool and spa complex on a site between the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, the Vine Street Expressway, and 22nd and 24th streets in Philadelphia's Logan Circle section. It was built as a single project between 1957 and 1959.","why_significant":"The nomination argues the complex is significant for community planning and development. It traces the project to Louis I. Kahn's 1947 Triangle District design and to the postwar urban renewal program led by planner Edmund Bacon. It is described as the first modern housing complex for middle and upper middle class residents downtown, and as one of the earliest uses of the pilotis-based modernist motif in Philadelphia.","narrative":"Four nearly identical twenty-story towers of reinforced concrete, faced in limestone-tan brick with white marble and aluminum trim, stand on a wooded site along the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia. Built between 1957 and 1959, the complex sits above a two-level underground garage that links the towers and supports a lawn. Three towers run parallel to the Parkway, and a fourth, the South Tower, sits at ninety degrees to the group and holds the lobby with book-matched marble. Its lobby and marble cornerstone mark it as the administrative center. The buildings use vertical balcony groups and bands of dark glass to appear raised on pilotis, a motif the nomination describes as among the earliest in the city. The complex grew out of Louis I. Kahn's 1947 Triangle District design for the Better Philadelphia Exhibit and the postwar urban renewal program led by Edmund Bacon. It is significant as the first modern housing complex for middle and upper middle class residents in downtown Philadelphia, and it set the pattern for later projects such as the Society Hill Towers.","period_of_significance":"1957-1959","architect_builder":"Kahn, Louis I.; Bacon, Edmund; Schwartz, Milton","architectural_style":"Modern Movement: International Style","criteria":["A"],"status_note":"The document says the buildings survive in excellent condition with few alterations and remain in their original use as rental apartments.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.1-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 17:10:27.506911-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_PA/11000926.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/11000926/6c015136cc-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/11000926/6c015136cc-1600.webp","licence":"CC0","author":"Smallbones","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Park_Towne_Philly_2.JPG\" rel=\"noopener\">Smallbones</a>, <a href=\"http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/deed.en\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Park_Towne_Philly_2.JPG"},"district":{"nrhp_refnum":"72001151","name":"Fairmount Park","url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/districts/pennsylvania/fairmount-park-72001151/"},"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/71997454","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Park_Towne_Place","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7138107"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/pennsylvania/philadelphia/park-towne-place-11000926/"}