One Bethesda Center, a Class A office building at 4800 Hampden Lane, is undergoing a $10 million renovation. Updates to the 12-story building include a new fitness center with private exercise kiosks and locker rooms with towel service, a new conference center, bike storage, a remodeled lobby, and - what you can see here - facade improvements. New glass is being installed right now. The project is scheduled to be completed this fall.
Looks better already.
ReplyDeleteThe large glass windows that will face the expanded privately owned public space (POPS) are very cool. This newly expanded plaza space will be quite nice, especially if the Hampden House include same nice restaurant space with outdoor seating, as well as a large new fountain, per their renderings.
ReplyDeleteIt’s quite amazing to see all of these new or renovated POPS in the area, including 7000 Wisconsin, the future Purple Line/Red Line plaza, the new covered plaza at the Avocet Tower, and this new expanded one coming to a the space between 4800 and the Hampden House. When the Capital Crescent Civic Green and perhaps the plaza area around the expanded Farm Women's Market, as well as the two new county parks over a new underground parking deck on lots 10 and 25 get done, and the new play area at the north end of Elm Street Park, this area of downtown Bethesda will soon have at least NINE new urban plaza and parks.
Lots of folks seem to complain about the new high rises and density, but the inclusion of these large publicly accessible plazas and parks create and greatly improve the public realm. Unlike Manhattan, many of these new towers will overlook large plazas with shade trees, pedestrian scaled lighting, benches and artwork or fountains.