Maryland
Kensington

Kensington began as a land grant of 4,220 acres that was awarded to William Joseph in 1689. His son sold the land to Daniel Carroll (one of only five men to sign both the Articles of Confederation and the U.S. Constitution), who broke up the property and sold parcels to local farmers. In 1891, the Metropolitan Branch, a train line that connected Virginia with Washington, D.C., built a station in the area. Soon after, real estate developer Brainard Warner purchased land nearby and established a town in 1894, which he named after Kensington, a borough in London. Warner’s vision was to create a garden suburb, a community surrounded by green space that was modeled after English urban theorist Ebenezer Howard’s concept of Garden Cities. Kensington is filled with large late 19th and early 20th-century homes on landscaped lots, surrounded by lush shrubbery and gardens. It has a range of architectural styles, including Queen Anne, Shingle, Colonial Revival, Functional, and Victorian.