Photo by Cremeglace.
Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:
Filed under The Morning Metropolitan
Dumbarton Oaks stairs by Amberture.
Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:
Filed under The Morning Metropolitan
As a follow up to Tuesday’s survey of Georgetown shops, GM wanted to publish a complete list of all the stores and restaurants that closed and opened in Georgetown in 2009:
The dearly departed:
Filed under Stores of Georgetown
In one of his earliest posts, GM documented all the stores in Georgetown that are on M St., Wisconsin Ave., or just off these two corridors. The study was inspired by an article by the great Marc Fisher lamenting the “generification” of Georgetown.
The results demonstrated that while there are a lot of chains in Georgetown, there are even more independent stores. A lot more. As of December 2008, of the 427 stores in Georgetown, almost 70% were independent stores.
So what does the picture look like a year later? Pretty much the exact same. [Click here to download the complete list of establishments].
Overall Numbers:
Two weeks ago, GM walked the streets again cataloging every store, restaurant, bar, etc. Here are the overall numbers:
Total Establishments: 443
Total Independents: 308 (69.53%)
Total Chains: 122 (27.54%)
Total Regional Chains (e.g., Five Guys): 13 (2.93%)
(While as discussed below, there were openings in 2009, not all the disparity between 2010’s totals and 2009’s totals can be explained by new establishments. GM was simply a bit more diligent about tallying them all this year.)
For the visually minded, here’s what Georgetown looks like in pie form:
Filed under Stores of Georgetown, Uncategorized
2009 was the first full year of the Georgetown Metropolitan’s existence (except, of course, for it’s earlier existence as a genuine newspaper). While there were certainly some nights when GM has to stretch for content, overall Georgetown provided plenty of stories this year to fill these pages. So before we ring in 2010, GM wants to take one more look back at the year that was in Georgetown.
A Bad Apple Turned Good
2009 started off with a bang in Georgetown as Apple had four different designs rejected for its proposed store at 1220 Wisconsin Ave. While the decisions to reject the designs weren’t being made by “Georgetown,” there were howls of complaints from commentators who should know better lamenting about the monied-elite squashing their dreams of a District-based Apple Store.
The fact is that Apple simply made several bad decisions, perhaps out of pique, before they finally realized what they were up against. The first design was rejected based on the mild complaint that the wall of glass along the sidewalk was too monotonous:
Rather than actually address those concerns they went off the deep end and proposed these two successive designs, which may have their own merit but which are completely inappropriate for Georgetown:
Two designs later, Apple finally got a design approved by simply going back to the first design and making the glass wall slightly less monotonous. You know, like the Old Georgetown Board was asking for from the beginning. Continue reading
Filed under Celebrations, Restaurants, Retail, The Schools of Georgetown
Last night, the Citizens Association of Georgetown held its September meeting at the Thomas Moser store on M St. Georgetowner and real estate magnate Anthony Lanier held court for the entirety of the meeting dispensing his wisdom and world view to the packed furniture show room.
A native of Vienna (Austria, not Virginia), Lanier arrived to Georgetown in the 80’s. He founded East Banc in 1987, and has since then gradually brought the best of European urbanism to our village through fantastic projects like Cady’s Alley.
Last night, Lanier spoke off-the-cuff for over an hour discussing his projects, both past and future, and the challenges we face making Georgetown even better. It was a fascinating window into the business of real estate and the thinking of a man who’s been called more than once the “Mayor of Georgetown”.
Filed under Citizens Association of Georgetown, Development
Well probably not, but there was an interesting article in the New York Times yesterday discussing the fact that with the economic downturn, a lot of smaller retail shops who would have otherwise been cast aside for higher paying tenants are able to negotiate acceptable terms with their landlords. Does this describe Georgetown as well?
Filed under Stores of Georgetown
After posting that chart listing all the businesses in Georgetown that are on either Wisconsin or M (or just off either), GM realized there were some errors in the chart that needed the be corrected:
With these revisions, the overall stats are not really different (the Georgetown Mall actually has many independent shops, although that may change with Lanier’s Bloomingdale’s proposal). Here is some of the revised data, with some further breakdown:
Total
Independents 298 69.79%
Chains 117 27.40%
Regional Chains 12 2.81%
427
Wisconsin
Independents 155 77.11%
Chains 36 17.91%
Regional Chains 10 4.98%
201
M St.
Independents 143 63.27%
Chains 81 35.84%
Regional Chains 2 0.88%
226
Within One Block of Wis. & M St.
Independents 39 45.88%
Chains 45 52.94%
Regional Chains 1 1.18%
85
Restaurants
Independents 76 74.51%
Chain 21 20.59%
Regional Chain 5 4.90%
102
Clothing
Independents 72 59.50%
Chain 49 40.50%
Regional Chain 0 0.00%
121
Salon
Independents 25 96.15%
Chain 1 3.85%
Regional Chain 0 0.00%
26
The revised chart is available here. Please feel free to review it and offer corrections. Whether something is a “chain” or an “independent” or a “regional chain” is not a scientific distinction, so feel free to weigh in.
Filed under Retail, Stores of Georgetown
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