Look to your left to spot a striking row of grand, three-story brick and granite buildings with bold yellow trim and tall, elegant white columns-those are the Breslyn Apartments.
Standing in front of these mighty Beaux Arts beauties, you can almost hear the echo of 1913, when these five impressive buildings first rose up in Spruce Hill. Picture the clatter of streetcars, hats tipping, and the buzz of neighbors gathering on those large open porch-balconies, held up by Ionic columns that look like they were borrowed straight from a Roman temple. Each building is just the right mix of graceful and grand: thirty-eight feet wide, ninety-eight feet deep, with arching windows, curvy balconies, and little touches of terra cotta and iron that glint in the sunlight. If these walls could talk, they’d tell stories from the Roaring Twenties, the sleepy decades after, and all the way up to today-making them, in a way, official keepers of West Philly secrets. Fun fact: the apartments were so special, they landed a spot on the National Register of Historic Places back in 1982. Some say their majestic Corinthian-topped piers look so grand, they could make even ancient Roman architects jealous. So take a breath, enjoy the stonework at your feet and the columns reaching for the sky, and know you’re standing in front of one of the coolest, most stylish apartment buildings in all of Philadelphia. And if you hear a creak or two, don’t be alarmed-it’s probably just the building stretching its legs after over a century of stories!
