Page 25 - ArchDC_Spring 2021

Main building entrance.

Traditionally, such small buildings have offered a relatively
affordable form of housing. Given the crisis of affordability of
many metro areas in the U.S.—certainly including metropolitan
Washington—there has been strong interest in learning
why this middle is so often missing nowadays. Community
opposition is part of it, of course, but there is also the fact
that single-family houses largely escape an array of code
requirements (for example, sprinkler systems, fire separation,
inclusionary zoning quotas, and accessibility for disabled
residents), while larger buildings can amortize these expenses
(plus elevators, code-required acoustic separation, and so
forth) across multiple units, reducing the per-unit costs to a
manageable level. New buildings in the middle must comply
with most of the requirements but have relatively few units over
which to spread the costs. Academics have proposed regulatory
tweaks to ease the burden on the middle, although to date, few
have been implemented.
Jonathan Kuhn, AIA, principal of his eponymous
firm, Jonathan Kuhn Architect (JKA), has a great deal of
experience with this project type. One of JKA’s most recent
projects, the Kozo, a new eight-unit condominium building,
is an eye-catching example of the missing middle. It is one
of many new buildings in the long sloping blocks of Chapin
and Belmont Streets that connect 14th Street, NW, to Meridian
Hill Park. On these blocks, modest lot sizes and medium-to-
low-density zoning align to compel new buildings to be of
a size that fits in the middle range. That said, designing and
Kozo Condominium as seen from across the street.

MISSING MIDDLE MADE MOD 23