Historic former embassy in D.C. chops $685K from price, asks $5.8M

This Flemish Revival-style townhouse on Embassy Row has been featured on Curbed DC multiple times before, but it’s worth featuring again as it recently underwent a price chop, dropping it down to $5.8 million. When it first landed on the market in February 2017, the price was $6,485,000.

D.C. architect William J. Palmer designed the property in c. 1908 as a “family house” with four stories and an English basement. In 1927, Mrs. Frank Cummings Cook purchased it in order to create a school, called The Sheridan School, which eventually grew to over 100 students. The school later relocated to the Van Ness neighborhood in the 1960s before the government of Libya bought the home in order to use it as an embassy.

Approximately 20 years later, the property was abandoned once again and fell into disrepair. Despite this, it was never demolished, thanks to preservation activists.

In 2007, D.C. resident H. Keith Powell purchased the abandoned townhome for $2,265,000, later recruiting Barnes Vanze Architects to refresh it. By 2012, the architecture firm completed a massive restoration to the property, creating an addition while also replicating millwork. The architecture firm also stabilized the rear of the home and created a new facade. Still, seven original period chandeliers and sconces remain.

With this renovation, Barnes Vanze Architects added new details and finishes to the historic property in order to further raise its value. Now, there is a rear garden with terraces, a roof terrace, and an elevator that passes every floor.

Other luxurious highlights include that there is heated flooring, an attached garage, and even a heated driveway. There are multiple fireplaces throughout the house. Across the listing’s 6,760 square feet of space, there are five bedrooms, five full bathrooms, and two half bathrooms.

According to the listing, the property has been featured in several publications, including The Washington Post, and it even received a John Russell Pope award in recognition of the excellent blending of classical and traditional architecture.

• 2344 Massachusetts Avenue NW [TTR Sotheby's International Realty]

• After $4M renovation, expansion, this Embassy Row mansion wants $6.4M [Curbed DC}

• Flemish Flourish [Architecture D.C. Magazine]

• Former embassy becomes a stylish residence [The Washington Post]