The Renovator

11.2005

Baltimore Magazine

There’s a joke Christopher Pfaeffle likes to tell: How many Baltimoreans does it take to screw in a lightbulb? Two: one to change the lightbulb, and another to talk about how good the old lightbulb was.

“Don’t get me wrong. I love this town,” Pfaeffle says. “But it is very much a town rooted in its history and past, and doesn’t take to change or modernization quickly.”

The 42-year-old Pfaeffle is in the business of breathing new life into buildings that have seen better days. His 10-person, Locust Point-based architecture firm, Parameter Inc., has renovated everything from a grain elevator to an old duckpin bowling alley into upscale housing and office space designed to draw residents and business back into the city.

A New York City native and graduate of the Pratt Institute, he was burned out by the Big Apple’s pace 10 years ago, and thought Baltimore would be a good place to raise his family – and it didn’t hurt that the city “hadn’t been fully built.” Six years ago, Pfaeffle grew tired of the bureaucracy at big design firms, and decided to go solo.

One day, during a meeting with a potential client who had a sketch for a loft project he really didn’t like, Pfaeffle started sketching. “We put a design together right then and there, knowing each others for only about 10 minutes,” he says.

After citizens complained about the project—the conversion of a duckpin bowling alley on Charles Street into New York-style loft apartments – Pfaeffle learned firsthand just how stubborn some Baltimoreans can be. “Apparently, duckpin bowling is sacred around here,” he says.

Impress by Pfaeffle’s approach, that client – real estate mogul Pat Turner – remains one of the firm’s best clients.

The firm, which grossed $800,000 last year is currently working on two more Turner developments. One of those, Silo Point, a $200-million condominium complex in Locust Point, in being built on the site of an abandoned grain elevator. When this project is completed, all 156 silos will be converted into over 300 condos and high-end townhomes. As a result, the tax base in Locust Point is expected to jump to $7-$10 million a year – from a mere $150,000 now. Pfaeffle is also overseeing the design of a 52-acre living, dining, and entertainment complex on the Middle Branch, adjacent to the Inner Harbor, near the Westport neighborhood.

But perhaps Parameter’s highest profile project to date is the design of a master plan for the Morris Mechanic Theatre, recently bought by businessman Ben Greenwald. While the ultimate fat of the Mechanic remains unknown, Pfaeffle and his team put together a plan that would put a new skin on the theatre and use its east side plaza for outdoor seating for restaurants and cafes.

“We’re making changes, but in my opinion we’re making them in the right direction and trying to help Baltimore,” he says. “This city severely needs more population and anything we can do to get more people to move in and live in these great neighborhoods is valuable.”