Presser Home for Retired Music Teachers, view northwest

Rendering of Presser Home for Retired Music Teachers, 1913

In the summer of 2005, Powers & Company, Inc. successfully listed the Presser Home for Retired Music Teachers on the National Register of Historic Places.  THe Presser Home is located at 101-121 W. Johnson Street in the Germantown neighborhood of Philadelphia.   This grand former retirement facility is in the process of being rehabilitated using the Federal Historic Tax Incentives Program with the assistance of Powers & Company, Inc.  The Presser Home will be converted into 45 affordable residential units for seniors. 

Completed in 1914, the Presser Home for Retired Music Teachers remains an important example of an early 20th century philanthropic institution.  Theodore Presser, a former music teacher and a successful music publisher of sheet music and a music magazine known as The Etude, built the Home expressly for retired musicians and music teachers. Constructed of brick, limestone and terra cotta in the Italian Renaissance Revival style, the building was designed to accommodate approximately 100 retirees and featured a music room, library, dining room, a roof garden, private practice rooms and an infirmary.  The final original cost of the construction and furnishings amounted to $200,000.  The Presser Home for Retired Music Teachers represents an outstanding work of the Philadelphia architectural firm of Seymour & Paul Davis.