Eyewear brand Warby Parker, which does most of its business online, will be opening its third brick and mortar location in MoCo this summer. It will be located on Grand Park Avenue, taking over two different locations that will be moving- Olive & Loom and a neighboring storefront. Last month Olive & Loom announced a move to Kensington.
Warby Parker opened its first MoCo location at Bethesda Row in 2017, and its second this past November in Downtown Crown (Gaithersburg). The stores carry the brand’s full optical and sun eyewear offerings including its first brand of daily contact lenses. The store will offer eye exams and children’s glasses that are only available in store.
The New York-based brand has opened multiple stores across the country in recent years after years of being an online-only brand. The current expected opening is Summer 2022.
The Green Rooster Truck is now open in the parking lot of the Still Point Spa at 6 Grant Avenue in Takoma Park.
According to Main Street Takoma, “The Green Rooster is now open in Takoma Park. The mostly plant-based food truck sits permanently in the parking lot of The Still Point Spa and complements both the spa and other Takoma Junction offerings. The truck provides tasty and nutritious options for both clients and the community. Working with local purveyors, The Green Rooster Truck offers froths, fizzes, salads, soups and toasts on their evolving healthy menu. Online ordering is coming soon.
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Read more about the project here: https://washingtoncitypaper.com/article/540482/healthy-food-truck-the-green-rooster-will-park-outside-a-spa-starting-in-december/
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The Green Rooster Truck
6 Grant Avenue, Takoma
Winter hours: Wednesday-Sunday, 10:00 am-4:00 pm
(Note: for week of 1/9/21: open Thursday-Sunday, 10:00 am-4:00 pm)”
Feature photo courtesy of @greenroostertruck on Instagram.
View their full menu from their website below:
Pike & Rose restaurant Owen’s Ordinary, named after the Rockville tavern from the late 18th century, has announced via social media that it will be requiring proof of vaccination for indoor dining.
The 175-seat restaurant with a 60-seat beer garden serves a primarily American menu featuring fish and chips, flatbreads, crispy shrimp sliders, burgers, and more.
Per it’s social media,
For the safety of our guests and teams, we will require proof of vaccination for indoor dining at all neighborhood restaurant group establishments beginning January 1st.
We wish you Happy Holidays and look forward to hosting you soon.
Owen’s Ordinary opened in October of 2016.
Featured photo courtesy of the Owen’s Ordinary website.
Badlands, a children’s play space that offered a nature inspired, interactive environment for learning through risk and play, has been closed since March of 2020.
The play space, located in Loehmann’s Plaza (Rockville/North Bethesda), recently announced a “pivot” that involves donating a massive space to CityDance School and Conservatory– a nonprofit dance institution dedicated to developing young dance artists and innovators.
Their full statement can be seen below:
“The climate of the Covid19 Pandemic was devastating to our business; it forced our shut down resulting in the loss of memberships and staff. Despite this, we never lost sight of our mission:
We are committed to growing a conscious community by challenging ourselves to embrace uncertainty with bold imagination and curiosity.
We are pleased to announce that one of the ways we will achieve this moving forward will be through collaboration with our new partners at CityDance.
CityDance School and Conservatory – www.citydance.net – is a nonprofit dance institution dedicated to developing the next generation of dance artists and innovators.
At their studios and community sites located across the national capital region, CityDance trains young dancers for professional careers, nurtures talent and achievement through dance, and works to advance the field of professional dance. Anchored in a belief that diversity advances excellence, CityDance works to create opportunities that promote equitable access to dance education and performance.
Through partnership, Badlands and CityDance will provide programming centered on the unique cultures, histories and voices of our communities, artists and students.”
Planning Board Hearing December 16 at 9:00 am for Strathmore Avenue Project
The Property is currently developed with the vacant St. Angela Hall Retirement Home, open space, and frontage associated with the Academy of the Holy Cross School.
The rezoning will allow for the future redevelopment of the property with up to 125 single-family dwelling units (including a minimum of 15% MPDUs) and a 145-bed residential care facility.
An associated Preliminary Forest Conservation Plan and Tree Variance is recommended for approval and discussed in a separate Staff Report.
Subsequent Preliminary and Site Plan reviews will be required if the Local Map Amendment is approved.
Permitted uses on the Site include up to 125 single-family detached and attached dwelling units
(including a minimum of 15% MPDUs) and a residential care facility (with up to 145 beds).
- Commercial uses are not permitted on the Property, except permitted accessory uses associated with
the residential care facility. - A natural surface trail must be provided along the western side of the Site that is subject to a public
access easement. - The Property is limited to no more than three points of vehicular access from Strathmore Avenue.
- The Property must be subdivided to formally delineate the boundary of the area subject to the rezoning
at the time of Preliminary Plan. - A Phase I Noise Analysis must be submitted with the Preliminary Plan to identify noise levels that might
impact interior and exterior spaces subject to the Planning Department’s Noise Guidelines. The analysis
must be performed by a qualified acoustical engineer. If a combined Preliminary/Site Plan is
submitted, the Site Plan must include recommendations from a qualified acoustical engineer to
mitigate excessive noise levels per the Noise Guidelines.
At the time of Preliminary Plan and Site Plan(s) approval, the Applicant must address the following: - The Applicant will upgrade the Strathmore Avenue frontage through the construction of the 10-footwide shared use path and 6-foot-wide green buffer that complies with the North Bethesda/Garrett Park
Master Plan, the Bicycle Plan, and other applicable plans and policies. - Create a safe and attractive pedestrian trail that connects open spaces within the development and, to
the extent practicable, connects the development with the surrounding community.
a) The trail should be of a permeable material (i.e. natural surface, wood chip, wood mulch) that
provides good accessibility and low maintenance and seating should be provided along select
portions of the natural surface trail that are outside of the floodplain but may lie within the
stream valley buffer. - Create an attractive and walkable streetscape on both sides of Street C:
a) Continue to coordinate with Staff on the townhouse driveways to create a pedestrian friendly
environment. - Create useable public open spaces:
a) Consolidate public open space to two or three areas and work with staff to improve the utility
of these spaces at the time of Site Plan.
Read the entire staff report.
Classes will be all virtual this week for students at Georgetown Prep, a private Catholic boys school located in North Bethesda, after 30 students tested positive for the coronavirus.
According to WTOP, no teachers tested positive and “students were given the day off on Friday so teachers could prepare for the coming week of virtual learning.”
School officials contributed the outbreak to Thanksgiving break.
About Georgetown Prep, per its website:
“Founded in 1789, Georgetown Preparatory School is America’s oldest Catholic high school in the United States. It is also the only Jesuit boarding school in the country. Prep’s mission is to form men of competence, conscience, courage and compassion; men of faith and men for others.”
Georgetown Prep’s 2021-2022 Tuition:
- Day Student Tuition: $39,385
- Resident Tuition: $63,800 (US)
- English as a Second Language Program: $8,255 (US) additional
By Dan Reed of Just Up The Pike (as seen in Friends of White Flint)
With recent news of the Metro board of directors voting to approve changing the name of the White Flint Metro Station to North Bethesda, we wanted to share Dan Reed’s 2013 article highlighting how White Flint got its name.
Some call it White Flint, while others call it North Bethesda. One hundred years ago, they called it Windham. The White Flint Partnership, a coalition of area landowners seeking to transform Rockville Pike from a suburban strip into an urban downtown, are working on a branding scheme for the area. However, developers and residents alike disagree on whether to call it White Flint, North Bethesda, or something else. So where did these names come from, anyway?
In the early 20th century, Rockville Pike was a rural highwayand the area between today’s Rockville Town Center and Bethesda was rolling countryside, dotted with small villages. After Rockville, the biggest nearby towns were Kensington and Garrett Park. Annual maps from the United States Geological Surveyshow three tiny settlements in what’s now the White Flint Sector Plan area, each containing just a few houses. There was Montrose, located near the intersection of Montrose Road and Old Georgetown Road; Randolph, on Randolph Road near what today is Loehmann’s Plaza Shopping Center; and Windham, near the current intersection of Parklawn Drive and Boiling Brook Parkway.
Some of these place names persisted for decades, appearing on USGS maps as late as the 1970’s. However, others were more short-lived. Autrey Park, located near Rockville Pike and Edmonston Road, was wiped away after Rockville annexed it. Beane, a village at Old Georgetown Road and Grosvenor Lane, was renamed Mount Zion Church after its main landmark, before disappearing altogether after World War II. Windham’s last appearance on the USGS map was in 1923.
Seven years later, the White Flint Country Club opened on Rockville Pike near Nicholson Lane. That’s the first known use of the name, according to Clare Lise Kelly, research and designation coordinator for historic preservation at the Montgomery County Planning Department. The name was a reference to the white quartz rocks which can be found throughout Montgomery County.
By the 1950’s, suburban development took off along Rockville Pike, and with it came new uses for “White Flint.” Homebuilders laying out new subdivisions around the mall made references to the country club, like White Flint Drive, which was built between 1957 and 1959. The adjacent White Flint Park, which once held many of its namesake rocks, opened in 1978. Meanwhile, family-owned developer Tower Companies bought the country club in the 1960’s, according to Arnold Kohn, a lawyer for the company. Tower partnered with Lerner Enterprises to build White Flint Mall, which opened in 1977.
North Bethesda came a little later. It’s named for Bethesda, which was named in 1871 after a church named for a Biblical healing pool in Jerusalem, which in turn got its name from the Aramaic word for “house of mercy.” However, the Postal Service only recognized North Bethesda as an official mailing address in the 1990’s, a distinction White Flint doesn’t have. Other than a few scattered around the White Flint Mall property, and one in front of the Garrett Park post office, you won’t see many white flint rocks in White Flint, but the name remains as it has for over 80 years. How long it’ll stick around is another story.
12/9/21 Update: Metro has unanimously approved changing the White Flint Metro Station name to “North Bethesda.”
Metro’s board of directors will vote Thursday, December 9, on a proposal to rename the White Flint Metro station “North Bethesda,” per Friends of White Flint.
A social media post on the Friends of White Flint Facebook page states that, “Metro’s staff is recommending to its board of directors to approve the name change. In writing why they acknowledged that currently North Bethesda does not have much of a “sense of place.”
“That said, noteworthy developments such as Pike & Rose have started to adapt the namesake into their branding and identify as being located in the city of North Bethesda. We will continue to see this take hold throughout the county. Should the Board wish to approve the jurisdiction’s request, it is likely that the new name will become synonymous with the surrounding community over time and customers will find it sufficient for wayfinding.”
Friends of White Flint, Councilmember Andrew Friedson, and County Executive Marc Elrich have led the charge to change the station’s name.
Bethesda’s Pooch Portrait Studio is offering complimentary, holiday pet portraits to the first 75 guests on Sunday, December 12th at Rose Park at North Bethesda’s Pike & Rose.
WHAT: Pike & Rose presents complimentary holiday pet portraits in Rose Park by Pooch Portrait Studio.
WHEN: Sunday, December 12th from 10:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.
DETAILS: Pooch Portraits sessions are available to the first 75 guests.
Enjoy drinks at the Julii pop-up bar beginning at 10:00 a.m. while this festive photography experience captures pets for an unforgettable holiday moment.
For more information visit, https://www.facebook.com/events/384911723315668?ref=newsfeed
Recommendations will be used for the design of all public and private streets in this area of White Flint
Montgomery Planning has released the Pike District Streetscape Guidelines as a part of the Advancing the Pike District project. The recommendations in the document will be used to guide the transformation within the White Flint Special Taxing District by providing recommendations for the design of all public and private streets. The guidelines are based on an existing conditions analysis, stakeholder feedback and current best practices for creating safe and attractive streets with multimodal connectivity.
Read the Pike District Streetscape Guidelines. Watch the briefing to the Planning Board on November 18, 2021.
The Pike District Streetscape Guidelines were drafted to ensure that streets in the Pike District are developed in a manner that adequately accommodates all modes and users–pedestrians, cyclists, public transit, and motorists–in a safe and attractive environment. Streetscape guidelines help provide information about how the various components of streets such as travel lanes, sidewalks, street trees, bicycle and transit facilities should be organized. They provide overall guidance as well as context-based recommendations for specific streets.
About Advancing the Pike District
Advancing the Pike District is a Montgomery Planning initiative to accelerate the transformation of White Flint’s core into a walkable, mixed-use district by identifying short- and medium-term implementation-focused solutions that build on the Sector Plan’s recommendations, enhance mobility, and promote economic development, urban design and placemaking. The project revisits and builds upon the recommendations from the 2010 White Flint Sector Plan, which has guided infrastructure improvements and development in the White Flint area over the past decade, with the goal of accelerating White Flint’s transformation.
View the Advancing the Pike District Development Trends, Infrastructure Update and Short-Term Solutions report and learn more about the Pike District Connector. Sign up for the project’s eletter to stay informed.
Federal Realty has announced that Melina, a new full-service, fine casual Greek restaurant by the founders of Cava, Cava Mezze, and Julii, will open on Monday, November 22, 2021 at 905 Rose Avenue in North Bethesda’s Pike & Rose neighborhood.
Founded by Cava partners Ted Xenohristos, Dimitri Moshovitis, and Ike Grigoropoulos, the 3,593-square-foot establishment is the team’s second restaurant at Pike & Rose. Named after Dimitri’s daughter, Melina is located on the street level of 909 Rose near the group’s French concept, Julii, which opened in 2018.
For more information, menus and photos, visit Melina’s website here and Instagram here.
Image 1: Beef Tartare with Avgolemono Foam, Cabbage, Wild Fennel and Egg Yolk
Image 2: Roasted Heirloom Carrots with Smoked Manouri Cheese, Spiced Granola and Pickled Raisins
Image 3: Slow Roasted Lamb Neck with House Made Pita
