Dranoff says Nutter, who recently appointed Mark Alan Hughes as the city's first director of sustainability, is "particularly proud" of the new project "because it shows that Philadelphia is a leader in sustainable buildings." He adds, "One of our motivations is that we think this is a trend; it's not a fad and people genuinely want to be more eco-friendly."

Building green does increase construction costs by about 3%, Dranoff acknowledges. "It does cost more to recycle materials, to send them to different landfills, to have higher-efficiency equipment and to use local materials that don't have to be trucked in from across the country," he says. "We expect the premium to be going down in future years."

With 777 South Broad, Dranoff aims to continue the process of revitalizing the city's Avenue of the Arts district which runs one block east and west of Broad Street and is bordered by Washington Avenue on the south and Glenwood Avenue on the north. When Symphony House was proposed, the district, created in 1993 by then-Mayor Ed Rendell, was known for arts and entertainment attractions but not for residential.

"Symphony House was the most successful ground-up high-rise condominium in the history of Philadelphia, and it certainly validated the attractiveness of the Avenue of the Arts as a place to live," Dranoff says. "It might be the most attractive one in the city right now."