A 136-year-old house at 1945 W. Potomac Avenue in Wicker Park has been cleared away, and in its place a developer is now building two luxury condominiums complete with rooftop decks, a pergola, and a two-car garage. The full construction permit for the replacement project came through on July 7, marking the latest chapter for a corner lot that has sat at the edge of one of Chicago's most sought-after neighborhoods since 1890.
The house was built in 1890, according to Chicago YIMBY, and stood on a corner lot formed by West Potomac Avenue and a north-south side alley. EZMB LLC purchased the property in January 2026 for a reported $755,000, then submitted an application on January 23 to demolish both the home and its detached garage. The demolition permit took 110 days to come through, finally winning approval on May 13, with the teardown itself carrying a reported cost of $20,000 and Builder Luxury of Willowbrook serving as the demolition contractor.
The house's loss did not go unnoticed by preservation advocates. Preservation Chicago included the residence in its “Spotlight on Demolition” report for May, according to the group, which tracks the monthly loss of historic buildings across the city and connected the 136-year-old home's demolition to a broader pattern of vanishing 19th-century housing stock.
Why No Preservation Hold Applied
Despite its age, the house never faced a mandatory review that might have slowed or blocked its demolition. Under the city's 2003 Demolition Delay Ordinance, only structures rated “red” or “orange” in the Chicago Historic Resources Survey trigger a 90-day review period before the Department of Planning and Development, per the department's own guidance. This home carried no such rating, so it could be approved for demolition without a preservation hold.
Geography worked against the house as well. While 1945 W. Potomac Avenue sits within Wicker Park, it falls outside the boundaries of the official Wicker Park District, which was designated a Chicago Landmark in 1991 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979, according to the City of Chicago. Landmark district rules restrict exterior alterations and teardowns only inside those boundaries, leaving surrounding 19th-century homes like this one without local protection.
What's Replacing It
Hanna Architects is the architect of record for the new construction, which is approved to replace the single-family residence with a building containing two dwelling units, likely planned as one duplex-down condo and one duplex-up condo. The construction project has a reported cost of $567,468, with an application start date of June 8 that led to full permit approval just 29 days later on July 7. EZMB LLC is also serving as general contractor for the two new homes.
The new building is planned with three stories above grade plus a basement level, rear terraces off the back of the first two floors, and a rear stair leading to the third level. The rooftop will feature a stair enclosure, an occupiable deck, and a pergola. A detached garage on the property will hold two vehicle spaces and will itself be topped by a roof deck.
Hanna Architects has been active elsewhere in the area, with recent 2026 approvals including a four-story multi-unit development at 1257 W. Fry Street and a five-story condominium building at 2343 W. Chicago Avenue, according to Urbanize Chicago.
The Market Forces Behind the Teardown
The economics of Wicker Park real estate help explain why projects like this one keep replacing older single-family homes. As of July 2026, the neighborhood's median home sale price stood at $635,000, with homes spending an average of just 42 days on the market and selling at 101.8% of list price, according to Redfin. Nearby sales underscore the payoff for developers pursuing multi-unit projects: a three-unit condominium building at 2034 W. Potomac Avenue sold for $1.5 million on July 31, per the same brokerage's data.
The shift toward two-unit buildings also fits into a wider citywide push. In gentrifying West Side neighborhoods such as West Town and Wicker Park, replacing single-family structures with duplex-down and duplex-up developments aligns with municipal density goals aimed at curbing single-family deconversions, according to Assembly Squad, which notes Chicago has lost thousands of multi-unit buildings to such conversions since 2010.
The project also benefited from a city program designed to speed up construction. The full permit was issued under Chicago's Self-Certification Permit Program, which allows licensed architects to certify code compliance and bypass standard plan reviews for qualifying residential projects, per the Chicago Data Portal, letting the developer move from application to approval in under a month.
A Transit-Rich Corner of West Town
The site's location near multiple CTA lines adds to its appeal for dense residential redevelopment. The Damen Blue Line station sits a slightly shorter distance to the north, while the Division Blue Line subway station is located roughly half a mile to the east, per Chicago YIMBY's reporting. CTA Route 50 bus stops are half a block west on North Damen Avenue, Route 70 buses stop two blocks south on West Division Street and connect with the Division Blue Line station, and Route 56 buses run along nearby Milwaukee Avenue.
Wicker Park's residential character traces back to the late 1870s and 1880s, when wealthy merchants and industrialists built homes there in the years following the Great Chicago Fire of 1871, according to background compiled on Wikipedia. That history is part of what made the loss of the 1890 house notable to preservationists, even as the neighborhood's continued desirability now drives its replacement with modern, multi-unit housing.
