As Philadelphia gears up to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, one of the city's founding streets is back in the spotlight.
The site of Meantime on Market on the 900 block of Market Street (Photo Charlie Shuck for Meantime)
Philadelphia’s Market Street has been something of a bellwether for the changing fortunes of the city itself. Although it served as the city’s central commercial corridor for much of the city’s history, in recent years the Market East neighborhood has struggled to attract and retain businesses, culminating in a failed proposal to build a sports arena.
Enter Meantime, the nonprofit founded by architect and Weitzman faculty member Brian Phillips.
Phillips, who is also principal at the Philadelphia firm Interface Studio Architects (ISA), leads a coalition of landlords, city officials, and real estate professionals that has activated vacant storefronts across the city since 2023. Last month, thanks to a $1.85 million grant from the City of Philadelphia secured by Center City District, Philips and his team launched Meantime on Market, a temporary, eclectic collection of local retailers operating in a refreshed building on the 900 block of Market.
There’s Siddiq’s Water Ice (938 Market Street), a beloved West Philadelphia business making its Center City debut, and Almost Famous (922), a purveyor of upcycled clothing, vintage pieces, and live artistic interventions. There’s Jos Duncan-Asé’s Love Lab (932-934), where Art Philly is convening artists, storytellers, and community members. There’s I Turned My Living Room Into a Record Store (926), an ongoing, immersive experience from Alex Colas designed to foster connection through music, design, and shared cultural experience. There’s Two Persons Coffee (920), a new outpost from the popular café in the Bok Building. And there’s Rarify (924), a gallery for collectible design and material culture that is hosting an exhibition of furniture designs by Weitzman architecture students inspired by the iconic Emeco aluminum chair.
“Meantime is about creating the conditions for possibility,” says Phillips. “We’re testing ideas, supporting local talent, and strengthening connections across the city. At the same time, we’re bringing the vibrancy of Philly’s neighborhoods into the heart of the commercial core, putting what makes the city distinct on full display.”
Phillips has led multiple studios at Penn focused on Market East, and he’s not the only faculty member to explore the possibilities for revitalizing the neighborhood. In recent years, students in architecture, historic preservation, and city and regional planning have taken a deep dive into the area’s complex history and conditions. In the Fall of 2025, three separate studios—led by Randy Mason, professor and chair of historic preservation; Miles Owen, a lecturer in city and regional planning; and Brian Philips—looked at Market East.
A 1907 photograph of the 900 block of Market Street sourced from the Free Library of Philadelphia's Print and Picture Collection is among the archival images featured in the zine. The PennPraxis team also relied on the Temple University Library Special Collections Research Center.
“It’s a wonderful collection of buildings from different periods that represent the continuities of the grid of streets and its traffic and density of people,” Mason says. His students conducted site visits as part of their research into what has and hasn’t been preserved on site. Students’ proposals included car-free pedestrian zones and mixed-used developments with multiple green spaces.
While most of the activity at Meantime on Market is focused on Philadelphia’s present—from shopping and dining to making art and building community—the project also offers the opportunity for residents and visitors alike to get to know the city’s past better.
The storefront at 930 Market holds a visual history of the street going back to the founding of Philadelphia by William Penn in 1683, when he named it “High Street” following the British tradition for identifying the main commercial corridor. Open by appointment, the eye-opening exhibition is the work of PennPraxis, the applied research, engagement, and practice arm at the Weitzman School.
Just at Meantime on Market has brought together people from different parts of the city, PennPraxis enlisted students from across the Weitzman School (the departments of architecture and historic preservation) for research and design services on the project. The team included Shen-Tzu Chen (MSHP’26), Iqra Khalid (MSHP’26), Zhijie Wang (MSHP’26), Margaret Balich (MArch’27), Jonathan Bonezzi (MArch’26) and Ryan Lane (MArch’26).
Working with Mason and PennPraxis Associate Director Darcy Van Buskirk, Weitzman Lecturer Ashley Hahn also created a free zine tracing Market Street’s evolution. Meet Market, as the publication is titled, brings together historic maps and archival photos from the collections of the Athenaeum of Philadelphia and the Free Library that reveal “a stage for experiments in history building.”
“It’s a great palette for urbanism,” says Philips of Market Street. “Maybe, if we imagine it in the right way, things could happen.”
Meantime on Market runs through July 31, 2026.
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