1500 Spring Garden Street
1500 Spring Garden Street has been in the news over the last two years, both for having our neighborhood's most controversial business and for its owner who ended up in prison for seven years with a fraud conviction. Read on.​
Photo from 2026
The building covers four acres extending from Spring Garden to Hamilton Street and from 15th to 16th Street.
Introduction to the Building
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Built in 1947 for a single tenant, 1500 Spring Garden Street had an addition placed along 15th Street in the 1950s and underwent more than a combined $100 million in renovations in 2002 and 2020. The building has 16-foot ceilings, heavy-floor loading, large efficient floor plates, and morning and evening shuttle service for employees wishing to get to and from Center City, Philadelphia. It is the largest building by floor area in the Baldwin Park neighborhood: at 1.2 million square-feet it has more floor area than all the buildings of the Community College of Philadelphia combined. It is now a multi-tenant building and has space available for lease. Much of the building is currently utilized as data centers. More on the current and previous tenants will follow.
History of the Site
Photo from here.
After the Civil War cast iron was all the rage for building facades. Think of the Lit Brothers Department Store on Market Street and even the upper tower of Philadelphia City Hall. Philadelphia's iron workers stepped in to accommodate. One such manufactory was the H. C. Oram Company at the northwest corner of 15th and Hamilton Streets, occupying the southern part of what is now the 1500 Spring Garden Street building site. To its east and northeast was the Baldwin Locomotive Works, to its southwest was the William Sellers machine shop, to its west was the Norris Locomotive Works and to its south was the Edwin Harrington Machine Shop.
Portion of an 1867 map. North is at the top and the street marked "STREET" is Hamilton Street.
H. C. Oram & Co is on the right occupying the southern half of what is now the 1500 Spring Garden Street building site. Note for later the William Sellers Machine Works southwest of the Oram Iron Works.
421 Chestnut Street in 2026.
One example of work from H. C. Oram.
Bank at the northwest corner of 2nd and Pine Streets in Philadelphia. Originally built in 1868 as a three-story structure, the ground floor was a painted cast iron facade manufactured by H. C. Oram in an Italian Renaissance arcade style. The upper two stories of brick have since been removed. Compared to stone the cast iron allowed for larger windows and more delicate columns. The plaque on the lower right edge of the building explains the history of this building.
Photo from 1898 from here.
As a sign of what was to come, this pill factory was just south of Oram on Hamilton Street.
Portion of a Hexamer survey from 1874 (excellent high resolution image available here).
The Bush Hill Iron Works in 1874 still occupied much of the northern half of the current 1500 Spring Garden site but the lower half had been taken over by BLW. The "drug and spice mill" at the northwest corner of Hamilton and 15th is the McIlvaine factory.
Baldwin Locomotive Works
As the 19th century ended the Baldwin Locomotive Works (BLW) continued its expansion to the east by completing its acquisition of the entire block between 15th and 16th and Spring Garden and Hamilton Streets. It put up a six-story brick industrial building by 1901. BLW would also acquire the site of the McIlvaine Brothers drug plant. The story of BLW in our neighborhood is told in our most popular website article here.
Looking southeast at 16th and Spring Garden Street in 1901.
Part of the new mint is seen on lower right.
Both the BLW building seen here and the Mint were completed in 1901. BLW was still expanding locally although the gradual move to Eddystone would begin in 1906.
Portion of 1901 map of the BLW from 16th (running vertically on the right) to 18th Street and Spring Garden Street at top to the Callowhill Cut at bottom. Most of the BLW shops were connected with the tracks on the Cut via ramps. One siding ran right through the middle of the buildings on the current site of 1500 Spring Garden Street.
Portion of a 1928 photo looking east. The Mint is in the lower left. The BLW buildings were made of red brick and the near-century of burning coal had made the brick even darker. In 1928 BLW abandoned its manufacturing in our neighborhood, leaving the 1500 Spring Garden Street complex, just across 16th Street from the Mint, empty.
Aerial photo looking northeast in 1938, after the demolition of the original Baldwin Locomotive Works buildings. The Mint Building is still bright and white on the left edge of the photo, with the current Masterman School building and the second Wills Eye Hospital across Spring Garden Street. The Elverson Building, finished in 1924, is in the lower right, and is now serving as the fifth home of our 9th District Police Station.
Smith Kline and French
In 1945 BLW sold the 1500 Spring Garden site to the pharmaceutical firm of Smith Kline and French (SKF).
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SKF was started by Philadelphian John K. Smith at 296 North 2nd Street in 1830. He sold the usual early 19th-century potions and remedies. He was joined by his former bookkeeper Mahlon N. Kline in 1865. In 1891 the business merged with another local company, that of Harry B. French at 10th and Market, and moved to the 400 block of Arch Street as the Smith, Kline & French Co. In 1948 the company moved into new headquarters at 1500 Spring Garden Street, on a site vacated in 1937 by Baldwin Locomotive Works. There were 1,600 employees working in the building across 16th Street from the Mint Building.
By 1971 Smith Kline & French owned 1500 Spring Garden as well as much of the land on which CCP would be built. SKF was one of the original five partners in the Franklin Town Development Corporation and shaped the southeast section of the project. In 1980 One Franklin Plaza at the northwest corner of 16th and Race Streets was completed as office space for SKF. Two Franklin Plaza (now the Sheraton Hotel with 757 rooms) was completed at the same time, at a combined cost for the hotel and SKF office tower of $97 million. One and Two Franklin Plaza towers share a parking garage with 450 spaces. There was originally a 40-foot glass walkway connecting the SKF offices to the hotel. The adjoining Albanian Orthodox Church had been scheduled for demolition for the project, but was not only spared, but its exterior was sandblasted clean through the generosity of the SmithKline Foundation. In 1980 SKF vacated the 1500 Spring Garden Street building to move into the new office tower at 16th and Race Street. The building at 1500 Spring Garden Street was subdivided as a multi-tenant office tower. With construction eliminating much of the surface parking lots near the building a parking garage was built at this time at the northwest corner of Callowhill and 16th Street and leased to SKF.
In 1989 a merger led to a company called Smith Kline Beecham and in 2000 another merger led to GlaxoSmithKline, by far the world’s largest pharmaceutical firm. In 2011 GSK moved from 16th and Race Streets to the Navy Yard in South Philadelphia, and in 2021 to the FMC building in University City. Conversion of One Franklin Plaza in 2016 resulted in 350 luxury apartments on floors 10-24, 200,000 square feet of office space on floors 2-9, and first floor retail. There was one recent remnant of GSK on the CCP campus, a ghost sign on the parking garage at 16th and Callowhill Streets which was removed in 2024.
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​​In 2000 Smith Kline Beecham Corporation sold the 1500 Spring Garden Street building to 1500 Network Associates for $13 million, a bargain price at $11 a square foot. Renovations were done in 2002 and again in 2020, with the latter including a new lobby, improved facade, updated tenant-only cafeteria, refurbished underground parking garage for 70 cars, and a new conference center and training room. Within the building there are food service options, Vybe healthcare and a gym. For transit there is a tenant-only shuttle service to Center City as well as a Broad Street line subway stop a block away.
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The assessed value of the 12-story, 1.2 million-square-foot 1500 Spring Garden St. building has dropped from a high of $191 million in 2022 to $76 million in 2026, reflecting nationwide loss of value in office towers.​​
The office building on the left was demolished and replaced by the fourth Philadelphia Mint building.
The laboratory at 305-307 Cherry Street would move to a larger facility at Delaware Avenue and Poplar Street. That laboratory exploded and burned in October of 1947, just as the 1500 Spring Garden building was being finished. Photo credit here.
Get out the sunglasses!
Photo of 1500 Spring Garden looking southeast in 1953. By 1958 a twelve-story addition was placed on the east side of the building.
Photo credit here.
And as seen today looking south with the 12-story addition on the east side
This last remnant of GSK on the parking garage at 16th and Callowhill was removed in 2024.
If you like name changes through mergers, here is another story with a few neighborhood connections.
Three blocks north of the 1500 Spring Garden Street building is the Mulford Building. Its official address is 640 North Broad Street with the name Mulford Building proudly etched in stone over the door. It was built in 1913 and originally housed clothing manufacturers until purchased by H. K. Mulford in 1918 and enlarged. Mulford had started out as a druggist at 18th and Market Streets and later expanded into drug research and manufacturing. Our neighborhood's Albert Barnes had his first pharmaceutical job at Mulford as described in our article here. In 1929 Mulford was acquired by Philadelphia-based Sharp & Dohme and then the latter was merged with Merck in 1953. The Mulford Building continued to have research and manufacturing of pharmaceuticals within its walls until it reverted to clothing manufacture in 1963. It is now the block-long Lofts 640 Apartments.
Other pharmaceutical firms with origins in Philadelphia are discussed at outside link here. ​​The robust presence of so many firms was aided by the education offered in the first pharmacy school in the country, Philadelphia College of Pharmacy (later renamed University of the Sciences and now part of Saint Joseph's University). Let's not forgot about Temple's College of Pharmacy which was at 18th and Buttonwood from 1907 to 1947, as discussed in our article about Garretson Hospital.
Lofts 640 in the Mulford Building at 640 North Broad Street.
Day & Zimmerman: The Controversy
Now to that controversial neighborhood business.
In 2007 Day & Zimmerman (D&Z), a fortune 100 company, announced that it was moving its global headquarters from 1818 Market Street by leasing 122,000 square feet at 1500 Spring Garden Street. D&Z is a privately held company in the fields of construction, engineering, staffing and ammunition manufacture. Its history is found here but here is a synopsis relative to our neighborhood.
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In 1873 the machinist William Sellers mentioned above took over a much larger steel plant in the Nicetown section of Philadelphia. This plant made much of the steel placed in bridges and also ramped up to make munitions in the world wars. It was there in the 1880's that Frederick Winslow Taylor, now considered the father of scientific management, pulled out his stopwatch and began studying the motions of men and machines with the goal of improving efficiency. There were as yet few unions, and one way the workers gained control, so management thought, was to work themselves and the machines at the slowest pace that would avoid punishment. In 1911 Taylor put his ideas together in a book, The Principles of Scientific Management, and his ideas of time-and-motion-studies, best practices, and "working smarter not harder," still plague our management lingo today.​ Charles Day (1879-1931) was an acolyte of Taylor. He worked in mechanical and civil engineering and joined with James Dodge in 1901 to form Dodge and Day, specializing in engineering and management. They were joined by John Zimmerman in 1907. When Dodge withdrew as partner in 1911, the firm became Day and Zimmerman (D&Z), and was incorporated in 1916. In 1961, Day & Zimmermann and Yoh Company (a staffing solutions firm) merged, with Harold L. Yoh becoming president of Day & Zimmerman. The business expanded to 150 locations worldwide, and for a little while longer is headquartered at 1500 Hamilton Street. The plan is to move to 1835 Market Street in 2026.
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What is the controversy? Since World War II D&Z, like neighborhood stalwarts Baldwin Locomotive Works and William Sellers, has been involved in ammunition manufacturing and storage. Ordinance manufacture continues within its subsidiaries and ordinance is sold to the United States government which then either uses them or sells them to allies. In particular, it manufactures large shells such as 155mm rounds, fired by M109 howitzer guns, and 120mm M830A1 High Explosive Anti-Tank rounds, fired by Israel's Merkava battle tanks. Neighborhood protest signs, rallies outside 1500 Spring Garden Street and marches through the City have drawn public attention to D&Z's role in the military action in Gaza. D&Z is a $3 billion business with 30,000 employees worldwide. Like other large companies (including Ford, General Electric, General Motors, General Dynamics, Caterpillar, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Toyota, Mercedes-Benz, Rolls Royce, Amazon, Google, and Microsoft), D&Z has defense contracts with the United States government.
Protestors marching south on 17th Street near Callowhill Street on March 3, 2026.
In the background is the former parking garage for GSK. The garage is now part of the Community College of Philadelphia.
One of many signs plastered throughout the neighborhood in 2025. The former Third Philadelphia Mint at 1600 Spring Garden Street is in the background.
Nightingale Properties: The Fraud
The first three rules of real estate are location, location and location. Others should be timing and caveat emptor.
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New York real estate investment firm Nightingale Properties, under founder and CEO Elie Schwartz, went on an office tower buying binge in Center City starting with 1835 Market Street in 2013 with 800,000 square feet of office space; 1635 Market (2014 with 318,000 square feet); and the twin towers of Centre Square at 1500 Market Street (2017 with a combined 1.8 million square feet). Nightingale already owned 1500 Spring Garden Street with its 1.2 million square feet since 2000. It had purchased 1700 Market as well but flipped it after renovations. Nightingale purchased 1500 Spring Garden in 2013 leaving the LP 1500 Network Associates name on the deed. Between 2012 and 2017 Nightingale spent nearly $900 million acquiring office buildings in Philadelphia's Center City core. Even as late as 2022, Nightingale's director of acquisitions said in a press release "We are firm believers in the future of office." In 2021 the company looked for a new equity partner in the crowdfunding platform CrowdStreet, which allows smaller investors to buy pieces of real estate deals online.
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​The Covid pandemic of 2020 dealt a blow to office occupancy, both occupancy by employees and by lease holders. The office market collapsed. Centre Square had been purchased in 2017 for $330 million but went through foreclosure and sold for less than $100 million in February of 2026. It had a 47% occupancy rate in 2024. The assessed value of 1500 Spring Garden Street dropped from $191 million in 2020 to $76 million in 2026. Amidst the increase in vacancies and the decrease in property valuations, Nightingale defaulted on the $190 million mortgage at 1500 Spring Garden in 2023.
Bad timing, but there were other concerning issues.
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In May of 2025 Nightingale CEO Elie Schwartz was sentenced to seven years in a federal prison after he pleaded guilty to wire fraud. His legal counsel was a public defender. He had embezzled more than $53 million he had raised on the crowdfunding platform CrowdStreet for two commercial real estate purchases in Georgia and Florida. CrowdStreet had not put the investors' money in a dedicated escrow account and Schwartz did not use the investors' money for those purchases. He instead funneled it into ongoing financing of already purchased properties like those in Philadelphia. Besides running this Ponzi scheme, he also had purchased an $18 million penthouse in Manhattan, a $4 million second home, art, and luxury watches. He also lost $12 million on bad stock options for First Republic Bank in the weeks before it collapsed. As one egregious example, a 1941 Remontoire watch cost Schwartz $120,000 and part of the purchase price was transferred across state lines from New York to California. This is the source of the wire fraud conviction. (What is it with these guys and their need for luxury watches? Most of us just tell time with our cell phones.)
During the Department of Justice proceedings against Schwartz, CrowdStreet investors put liens on 1500 Spring Garden Street, 1635 Market Street and 1835 Market Street, liens which may prove worthless. Schwartz's creditors and investors will eventually get back only cents on the dollars owed to them. The 1500 Spring Garden Street building is in receivership but actively leasing, including a recent long term lease to CBS. For extensive coverage of this case see here (articles are free with registration). ​​
Schwartz's $4 million second home at 320 Mountain Road in Englewood, New Jersey on Google Earth view. This manor was for get-aways from his $18 million Manhattan penthouse.
The plurality of square footage in the building is currently dedicated to data centers. In February of 2026 CBS Philadelphia (KYW-TV channel 3 and WPSG-TV channel 57 ), present in the building since 2007, signed a long term lease for 74,000 square feet through 2042. KYW and WPSG had combined in 2006 to form a new network called The CW. Channel 57 had been located in the Hancock-Gross building at 2000 Hamilton Street from 1985 to 2004, so it has a long history in the neighborhood.
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The Library of Accessible Media for Pennsylvanians also has had a long presence in the neighborhood, first at the Parkway Central Library and then at the Spring Garden Library that was at the southwest corner of 17th and Spring Garden Street.
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Another interesting tenant for the last five years is Evolution Gaming, a provider of live online casino games like blackjack and roulette with a presence in over forty countries. You may have seen some of their 250 employees at the west entrance to the building, all wearing black pants, white shirts, black vests, and bow ties.
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The lobby directory in 2024.
Other tenants are Vybe Medical, Old Nelson Deli, Retrofitness Gym.
Day & Zimmerman plans to move to 1835 Market Street in 2026. Coincidentally or not, this new address was also a Nightingale property.
Other Sources
https://philadelphia.citybuzz.co/article/431464 2017 lease
https://archive.org/details/dayzimmermanninc0000yohh/mode/1up 80-year history by Harold Yoh in 1981 (free article with registration)
https://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/news/2025/10/05/day-zimmermann-relocation-philadelphia.html 2025 article about the move of D&Z to 1835 Market Street
https://crowdfundingpicks.com/how-elie-schwartz-went-from-rising-real-estate-star-to-alleged-fraudster/