The latest proposal to bring housing to downtown McLean targets a pair of modest office buildings, one of which was built nearly a century ago.
Reston’s Cypress Real Estate Company, under the name Beverly & Elm Development, submitted plans to Fairfax County last Tuesday (June 17) for a seven-story residential building that would replace the McLean Office Center at 1368 Beverly Road.
Seeking to rezone the commercial site to a primarily multifamily, residential district, the developer contends that the office buildings are in a prime spot for redevelopment, as encouraged by the comprehensive plan for the McLean Community Business Center (CBC) that the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors adopted in 2021.
“At the corner of two prominent streets in the heart of the CBC, the Property offers a rare opportunity to create additional momentum in implementing the broad revitalization goals of the Plan to refresh the CBC into a more welcoming, dynamic, and livable community,” Wire Gill land-use attorney Evan Pritchard wrote in a statement of justification for the application.
The McLean Office Center consists of the “Corner House,” a two-story building that has been standing at 6830 Elm Street since 1934, and the “Carriage House,” another two-story building constructed at 6834 Elm Street in 1998, according to the application and county property records.
Current tenants of the complex include a tutoring service, T Paws Therapeutic and Sports Massage, and a real estate agent with Washington Fine Properties.
Acknowledging the relatively small size of the lot, which spans only 24,471 square feet or 0.56 acres, Pritchard said in his statement that the prospective developer had approached owners of two neighboring properties to gauge their interest in selling “to facilitate a larger development.”
“These discussions have not resulted in acceptable purchase terms,” he wrote. “Further, we believe the proposed development will be highly successful as a standalone project and will not impede future development on surrounding properties.”
According to the submitted plan, the proposed residential building would deliver a total of 56 apartments, including seven workforce dwelling units (WDUs). Half of the units (26) would have one bedroom, with the remainder split between two bedrooms and two bedrooms, plus a den.
The building would be seven stories tall for a maximum height of 89 feet with a two-level, 85-space parking garage in lieu of the existing parking lot.
About 5,369 square feet of private amenity space for residents and 2,313 square feet of retail space will be provided on the ground floor along both Elm Street and Beverly Road. An approximately 3,000-square-foot, publicly accessible open space is provided, the application says:
The retail space, which will include ample room for outdoor dining, will be complemented by an adjacent public open space that will be thoughtfully programmed to further activate this key intersection. Based on early feedback from staff and [Dranesville District Supervisor Jimmy Bierman’s] office, we pulled the building footprint back from the intersection of Elm and Beverly to create a more inviting open space at the corner that will include a focal element to serve as a gateway feature.
The proposed amenities for residents include a 2,000-square-foot courtyard on the building’s second floor.
As part of the project, the developer plans to eliminate a curb cut on Elm Street, shifting all vehicle access to Beverly Road. It would also plant a total of 10 new street trees — six on Elm and four on Beverly — in 6-foot-wide landscaping zones adjacent to new 8-foot-wide sidewalks.
Per the application, all existing overhead utilities would be moved underground, and the development would accommodate “interim” reconfigurations of Elm and Beverly that include 6-foot-wide bicycle lanes. The ultimate setup for both roads, as envisioned by the county’s design guidelines for McLean, won’t be realized until the neighboring properties decide to redevelop.
The design guidelines, which were last updated in 2023, describe Beverly and Elm as “main streets” where “a high level of pedestrian activity” and “diversity of adjacent uses” should be encouraged. The plan imagines that pedestrians and bicyclists will primarily travel on a shared walkway, rather than on the road.
While the county’s vision of downtown McLean as a more modern, walkable “village” with a mix of residential and commercial development remains mostly conceptual, a few projects have made progress in recent years.
The Board of Supervisors approved a major overhaul of Mars’ headquarters and a multifamily residential building called the Astoria of McLean in October 2023. Construction on the Mars renovation started last August and is slated to finish in 2026.
The county board has also given its support to a proposal to partially replace the McLean Professional Park offices with residential condominiums, and the McLean Project for the Arts anticipates starting work this summer on a new arts center.
Pritchard wrote that the McLean Office Center redevelopment will join the Mars and Astoria projects in enlivening Elm Street and the heart of the CBC.
“The proposed redevelopment is carefully designed to implement the vision of Plan for a more walkable, welcoming, and functional downtown, with a more vibrant mix of uses that will add color and life while retaining the convenience of the legacy McLean Community Business Center,” he said in the application.
