1830 Rittenhouse Square South
Apartment House for Samuel Wetherill
1913, Frederick Webber
This 18-story, limestone-sheathed Beaux Arts apartment building marked the end of Rittenhouse Square as an exclusive enclave of private mansions and townhouses. Occupying the former site of the 52-room mansion of Thomas A. Scott, a president of the Pennsylvania Railroad, the first high rise constructed on the Square was soon followed by ever taller apartment buildings and hotels. Factors in the transformation were the exodus of well-to-do families to the suburbs, newly accessible by automobile, and the new social acceptability of apartment living. With its elegant cast-iron-and-glass canopy and classical detailing, 1830, as it is known, remains after almost a century the grande dame of Rittenhouse Square.