Up until just a few years ago, Washington’s psychological map was reversed: “Outer” was in, the inner city was out. Developers talked up Georgetown and Old Town, Metro towns and “new towns”; but downtown D.C. was Deserted City, especially after dark. Washington’s poles of power may have been the White House and the Capitol, but the axis of influence—Pennsylvania Avenue, running wide between them—became a ghost town once the law and lobby firms locked up. The area just north of the avenue between about Fifth and 12th streets NW hadn’t had a significant residential population for more than a century. Chinatown, once a popular dining area, was deteriorating; and the handful of nightclubs and performance venues that were lured to the area in the ’80s by large warehouse spaces and low rents had increasing difficulty convincing patrons that the streets were safe. Even by day the aura of discouragement became so palpable (and the suburban malls so spiffy by comparison) that such establishment department stores as Garfinkel’s, Woodward & Lothrop and Lansburgh’s gradually shuttered their doors.