A three-alarm fire at a historic Hampden building that houses several small businesses was contained shortly after 6 p.m. Monday, Baltimore City Fire Department officials said.

No injuries were reported and no residents were displaced, officials said, though multiple businesses may be affected by the fire.

John Marsh, a spokesperson for the Baltimore City Fire Department, said the call for the fire came in around 4:30 p.m.

The fire mostly moved through the third floor and attic of the large building known as “The Castle” on the 3300 block of Keswick Road.

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Over 80 firefighters and emergency personnel responded to the fire and fought it amid heavy winds where “you could see the actual flames bending,” Marsh said.

A structural engineer is examining the building’s condition, and the Baltimore Police Department’s Arson Team is investigating, officials said.

City Council member Odette Ramos, who represents the area, said she and her staff will work with the businesses located in the building as they recover.

“This building is very special not just to this neighborhood but for the entire city,” Ramos wrote in an email. “They don’t make buildings like this anymore.”

Photos from the scene showed a partial roof collapse and smoke and steam pouring out of the building between exposed beams. Dark smoke filled the sky earlier in the evening, and some flames took on a green hue as they burned.

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Baltimore Fire Department crews respond to a fire at West 34th Street and Keswick Road in Baltimore's Hampden neighborhood on Monday, November 10, 2025.
Flames emerge from the roof of The Castle in Hampden. (Wesley Lapointe for The Banner)

Alex Samets, a therapist who owns a mental health practice in the building, learned about the fire from a patient who texted her as they were leaving the building.

Samets looked outside, saw an “incredible amount of smoke” and a fire that was burning intensely, she said.

She alerted her colleague, who was in the middle of a virtual therapy session, about what was happening, and the two left.

“I never in my life interrupted another therapist’s session,” Samets said.

Samets and her colleague evacuated and had people come to pick them up. Samets said their cars were both still in the parking lot.

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“It was definitely scary and a little hard to process how quickly we had to move,” Samets said.

The Castle was constructed in 1899, when Hampden was home to farmers and mill workers. It was once the Northern District Police Station, and the basement still holds grim solitary confinement cells.

In 2001, the building earned a spot on the National Register of Historic Places and was recognized by the city as a “masterpiece from the Victorian era.”

Baltimore Fire Department crews respond to a fire at West 34th Street and Keswick Road in Baltimore's Hampden neighborhood on Monday, November 10, 2025.
Baltimore City Fire Department crews on deck in the street as teams address the fire. (Wesley Lapointe for The Banner)
Baltimore Fire Department crews respond to a fire at West 34th Street and Keswick Road in Baltimore's Hampden neighborhood on Monday, November 10, 2025.
The historic building once housed the Northern District Police Station. (Ulysses Muñoz/The Banner)

“The Castle, I think, is the most beautiful building in Baltimore,” Samets said. “It was such a wonderful place to have a therapy practice.”

In 2003, the city sold the building to a limited liability company for $225,000. In 2016, the building was sold to another LLC for $2.5 million.

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This fire comes just days after a four-alarm fire at a commercial building in nearby Remington displaced over 20 people and took crews hours to contain. Samets said her partner has a business in Remington that had to evacuate because of that fire.

“My guess is it has something to do with old buildings full of flammable stuff,” she said.

Keswick Road was also the site of multiple house fires earlier this year that rattled the community. A man was arrested and charged with arson in those fires last month.

Freelance photojournalist Wesley Lapointe and Banner reporter Cody Boteler contributed to this story.