Luxury development is coming to East Kensington following artist evictions

The future of East Kensington’s Viking Mills complex as a luxury apartment project is coming into focus, as the Chatham Bay Group releases details for review by a board of city-appointed architects and planners.

The project, at 2019-53 E. Boston St., will transform the longtime warren of artisan workshops, recording studios, and gallery spaces into a 178-unit apartment building with top-of-the-line amenities such as an infrared sauna, a lap pool, a 2,000-square-foot gym, and a pickleball court.

“Our goal was to make it the best project [near] Fishtown,” said Patrick Duffy, CEO of Chatham Bay Group. “It’ll have a resort-style amenity package from top to bottom.”

The project calls for the demolition of the existing one-story industrial building on the south side of the site, to be replaced by a six-story apartment midrise with 100 new units, a basement, and a roof deck. On the north end of the site, the existing building will have its roof removed and replaced with amenity space and another roof deck. The remaining 78 units will be in this refurbished structure, which used to house artist studios.

The complex will include a mix of studios renting for an average of $1,550, one-bedrooms in the low $2,000s, and two-bedrooms in the mid-$2,000s.

According to city records, Duffy and his partner, Jay Freebery, bought the existing site, which is zoned for industrial and residential use, for $9.6 million on Aug. 29. Chatham Bay estimates that the price of construction, which has begun, will be $45 million to $47 million.

Building initially was expected to start by the end of 2022, but Duffy said they experienced a three-month delay because the previous owners “misrepresented” the state of the building during the sale. Specifically, he claims, they were not forthright that it was still occupied by some of the previous artist and entrepreneur tenants.

“We were supposed to have been inheriting an empty building,” Duffy said. “It was a complete mess. The sellers misrepresented everything that they were supposed to do. We’re in litigation with him now.”

A case was filed in municipal court on Oct. 14 between 2019 E. Boston St. LLC (Chatham Bay) and Viking Mill Associates. A trial date is projected for April. The previous property owners, David Hirsh and Bob Weinstein, did not respond to requests for comment.

Chatham Bay said it negotiated with individual tenants to secure their exit from the building. The last occupant moved out in December, at which point interior demolition had already begun, according to previous tenants. On Dec. 15, the Department of Licenses and Inspections cited the property for “work done without notifying inspector,” and the case remains unresolved, according to city records.

In September, the previous tenants organized to try to delay their eviction. A Change.org petition circulated, and they turned to local elected leaders for help.

“In the back of your head, you always know it’s not your space, you’re paying rent,” said artist Clifford Bailey, one of the longest-term tenants at Viking Mills. “As fast as that [arts space] popped up, it can go down again just as fast. It’s very discouraging.”

Councilmember Mark Squilla tried to help Chatham Bay and the previous tenants negotiate fair exit terms. He said he found the experience eye-opening and hadn’t realized that notification requirements of eviction for residential and commercial spaces could be so different.

Squilla wants to explore legislative solutions for similar situations, ensuring that artists and small businesses have enough time to relocate and remove their property. Several tenants at Viking Mills said they weren’t able to retrieve all their belongings from the building.

“We need to look at how we put better protections in place for small artists and businesses moving forward in events like this,” Squilla said. “How much time is enough to relocate knowing that when a developer buys a property, we’re not sure if they’re told everything about who’s in there. Once people are notified, there’s panic involved.”

Duffy said Chatham Bay, which has operated in Philadelphia since 2006, hadn’t dealt with a situation like Viking Mills before, “where the seller outright lied and misrepresented the status of tenant leases.”

Originally a small company that renovated individual rowhouses in South Philadelphia, Chatham Bay Group has expanded into mid-sized housing developments and industrial-turned-residential projects from East Falls to Fishtown (the borders of which seem to expand yearly).

The owners are “very bullish” on Fishtown, Duffy said, noting that, nationally, it ranks with the hottest neighborhoods of Nashville or Austin, Texas. Chatham Bay hopes to concentrate its efforts there the next 10 years.

In this case, he said, there wasn’t anything Chatham Bay could have done to avoid the situation besides sue the previous owners for misrepresentation.

“Our bank and our contractors were all up in arms that we weren’t able to start on time,” Duffy said. “It was a difficult situation to navigate.”

Bailey said a lot has been lost with the sudden closure of Viking Mills. Many of the tenants have had to relocate away from the area, where rents have grown too expensive. He worries that there are fewer neighborhoods anywhere in Philadelphia where creative, artistic, or just plain weird uses can set up shop.

“It was one of the first things that turned the tides of the area and the gentrification aspect of what’s going on,” Bailey said. “It was also a community of creative people that put their best leg forward to help the community become what it is. Now it’s going to become housing for the mainstream. It’s a shame, I’m upset about it, but it is what it is.”