Story

Monarch is a luxury high-rise 97-unit, 202,200 SF condominium in Tysons, Virginia. The Monarch offers one, two and three-bedroom units with four to six units per floor. Amenities include an outdoor swimming pool, butterfly gardens, fitness center and community room. Most notable are its balconies, which present the illusion of fluttering butterfly wings soaring over Tysons. This impressive 20-story tower is part of the exciting new 19-acre Arbor Row development in the area. From the beginning, Renaissance Centro made clear that one thing was integral to the success of this project: quality. After touring a previous Hoar residential project, The Lumen, the owners asked for a similar quality of units for their residents. So, our team got to work planning and preparing to procure top-notch materials--all while keeping the owner’s budget in mind. We signed the contract on March 11, 2020 and were looking forward to getting started on this impressive residential project. However, the unprecedented pandemic was a huge challenge for everyone involved in this project. Suddenly, the whole world was on pause, including everything we had planned for Monarch. Finally, construction began in December 2020; and with it came a whole new set of problems. Once we were finally able to begin work, we almost immediately were faced with a major foundation issue that had to be solved. Left exposed as the jobsite sat untouched during the height of the pandemic, the soil and, in turn, the foundation itself now had extensive issues. To combat this, our team provided the client with numerous foundation systems to determine the most cost effective solution. With the help of the geotechnical engineer and a foundation contractor, it was decided that we would use geopiers to create a foundation that coincided with the owner’s budget. Because of our streamlined process and our early involvement with the owner and design team, we were able to complete this in a few weeks rather than months and get construction started again. We also faced a new kind of challenge with this project: purchaser specifications. Many of the units were purchased prior to construction start in 2019 and early 2020. In order to compensate for the delay in the project’s start due to the pandemic, Renaissance Centro allowed purchasers to make any desired changes to their floor plans, upgrade their appliances and make a number of other specifications. While we were happy to do this for purchasers, this did result in significant challenges in altering the design and procuring materials and threatened to delay construction. Our team had to execute impeccable project management and proficient scheduling in order to complete the project on schedule despite these added tasks. In the face of these challenges, our team decided to trust our processes and focus on what we could control. The result of everyone’s hard work was a beautiful luxury building that the owners and residents both are pleased with and proud to live in.