Landscape Information
Located approximately half-mile east of the Anacostia River on a flood plain and former site of the Benning Racetrack, this 28-acre community in a parklike setting was designed by African American architect, Albert I. Cassell. Framed by Jay Street, Kenilworth Terrace, and Hayes Street, it was the first privately developed, multi-family housing project to be insured by the Federal Housing Administration for African American tenants, providing access to high-quality public housing. Edged by a wrought-iron fence, the rectangular property contains seventeen rectilinear Colonial Revival apartment buildings, occupying just eighteen percent of the property’s total acreage, which includes a central mall.
Acquiring the property in 1938 with personal funds, Cassell partnered with Elder Lightfoot Solomon Michaux, an African American, religious leader and radio evangelist. With political support from Civil Right activist Mary McLeod Bethune, broadcaster Harry C. Butcher, and first lady Eleanor Roosevelt—honorary chairperson of the Washington Committee on Housing—Cassell designed the property between 1940 and 1944 with landscape architects, Pierre Ghent & Associates.
At the primary entrance, off Kenilworth Terrace, two buildings flank a modest, gated courtyard that anchors the mall extending the length of the site. Framed by linear walkways, it is shaded by irregularly spaced oak specimens and includes expanses of lawn and a trio of recreational amenities. On each side of the mall, apartment buildings are laid out parallel to one another, in a row. To maximize sunlight exposure, the buildings are oriented diagonally, obtusely angled relative to Jay Street and Hayes Street. Alternating in the spaces between the buildings are lawn courtyards—edged by linear walkways and planted with oak, magnolia, and pine trees. Parking lots screened from the mall by wingwalls, project out from adjacent apartment buildings.
Mayfair Mansions Apartments was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1989 and rehabilitated in 2009 by architects Wiencek + Associates.
