Franklin Place

Franklin Place was a residential complex of sixteen three-story brick townhouses arranged in a curved formation about 480 feet long. The development also contained a garden and four double houses that together formed a cohesive housing settlement.

Charles Bulfinch built this residential complex between 1793 and 1795 as the first large-scale row-house project in the United States. The city acquired the site in 1858 and demolished it to make way for granite warehouses as Boston rapidly developed as an industrial center.

The place was home to prominent residents like John and Judith Sargent Murray, who shaped the city's intellectual life. The Library Society used the spaces for its activities and left marks on the local community.

The site no longer exists today as it was demolished in 1858, but the curved line of Franklin Street in Boston still follows the original ground plan. Visitors can see the legacy in the street layout itself, where modern buildings now stand on the site of the former houses.

The project was so innovative that it reshaped how Americans thought about modern housing and was copied by other architects. The fact that an entire community of houses was planned together was completely new and revolutionary for its time.