Brick Kilns


Next to the National Arboretum's New York Avenue entrance sits a group of low brick buildings that resemble half-buried bee hives. They're so overgrown the entire site looks like a scene from Jurassic Park or Alien v. Predator (minus the non-humanoids). Despite its menacing and crumbling appearance, however, the abandoned United Brickyard Corporation offers few dangers apart from being a "No Trespassing" zone. Kilns that fed the post WWII construction boom now sit silent and cold.

Inside, the kilns take on a Parthenon-like appearance, arching up to a single hole in the ceiling. Their doors are welded shut with the exception of one. It contains chairs, tables, and a poster ad for cigarettes - like its inhabitants were trying to simulate a local café. Rail tracks partition the area and act as convenient sidewalks, keeping the weeds at bay. The factory layout resembles the city it built, with transport routes connecting activity hubs and a central building overseeing everything. Men worked here around the hive-like structures, and even though this place is silent now it tells the story of how DC was built, changed, and moved on.