Through the doldrums of America’s pandemic-triggered office downturn, the nation’s capital is quickly turning into a case study for the conversion of former commercial spaces into residential housing and mixed-use development.

The Washingtonian magazine recently did a survey of different office conversions in and around the District. Vacancy rates in the area climbed to an all-time high last quarter, and the city is predictably feeling the same housing crunch as nearly every other metropolitan area of the country. 

A 2019 report from the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments indicated that the area needs to bring online at least 325,000 units before the end of the decade in order to match rising demands, making its estimated 157.9 million square feet of rentable office space a prime target for prospective developers.

Among the projects mentioned are PGN’s conversion of the former Peace Corps headquarters building on K Street, Brookfield’s recently-completed luxury condos in the suburb of Alexandria, Virginia, and two Hickok Cole-designed properties downtown. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s 2023 budget proposal encourages such development via tax abatements aimed at the downtown core, which is lagging behind other neighborhoods and suburbs in terms of amenities-laden modern development like the RAMSA-planned Naval Yards and well-funded commercial projects like National Landing and the new Amazon HQ2. 

“The reason downtown needs more housing is to keep up with these newer neighborhoods — to create that 24-7 feel,” D.C.'s Mayor for Planning and Development John Falcicchio told the magazine. “We need to do it to save downtown. The only way to do that is to have a better mix of uses.”

“I certainly hope we are not the first and the last to do this,” Lincoln Property Companies' Duncan Slidell told the Washington Post this past December. “I don’t think you can do this in every situation and we’re fortunate to find the right opportunity at the right time, but in a city like D.C., especially in a downtown that’s already so dense, you’ve got to get creative to find an opportunity to create housing.”