REPORT: D-Day At the LPC
Yesterday was Designation Day, or D-Day, at the LPC. Fifteen properties were calendared (starting their way down the path to designation), three designated, and thirteen more heard.
The items to be calendared were a diverse group spanning two centuries and included townhouses, an apartment complex, a farmhouse, an office and a park. The first two items were turn of the century Beaux-Arts townhouses, 10 and 30 West 56th Street, part of “banker’s row.” You might remember last summer there was an up-roar over a group of Beaux-Arts townhouses across the street at 31, 33, 35, and 37 West 56th Street scheduled to be torn down to make way for high-rise luxury condos. The LPC decided not to hold hearings after their ornament was removed. Those buildings are lost, but it looks like two others will be protected.
Moving well ahead into the 20th century, the Guardian Life Annex, a sleek glass and aluminum structure added in 1961 to the Renaissance Revival landmark, was also calendared, as was the 1950 Manhattan House, an International style apartment building.
They were followed by two Federal style rowhouses, 486 and 488 Greenwich Street. They are part of a list proposed by the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation and the New York Landmarks Conservancy of thirteen Federal homes to be landmarked (more about that later.)
Morningside Park, designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux with its stonework, was the next calendared item. If designated, it would be the city’s tenth scenic landmark.
The commissioners calendared seven items from Staten Island, apparently culled from the top-secret survey of the borough. The Wyeth house, featured on HDC’s heard, but not designated list, was heard last in 1966. It is nice to know 41 years later the Italianate Villa has another chance. A charming, one-story, c.1893 general store on Main Street drew “oohs” from the crowd (well, at least from the three people from HDC.) Two vernacular, transitional Greek/Gothic revival (that’s a mouth full) homes with ties to Staten Island’s historic oyster trade will have hearings. The commissioners also calendared early 19th-century farmhouse on Amboy Road. On the north shore, the Standard Varnish Works was calendared.
Then there was a rather odd item to be calendared. 41-45 240th Street is already in the Douglaston Hill Historic District. Apparently, the owners (who bought the home when the district had already been calendared and have been issued certificates of appropriateness for additions) do not want to be part of the district. They claim that there was an error in the designation and have brought the LPC to court over it. (The designation report calls it a mid-19th-century home remodeled in the first decades of the 20th century. The owners claim it was built c.1920 on the footprint of an earlier house.) Chairman Bob Tierney and Counsel Mark Silberman explained to the confused commissioners that there was “new evidence” to decide if the building is “contributing” and a court has ordered the LPC to hold a hearing. This would not be an individual landmark hearing, but a decision as to whether or not the building was “contributing” (although the words “contributing” and “non-contributing” are not used in the designation report.) Either way this home sounds very much a part of the district (which is made up of only 31 very carefully selected houses). If the house is mid-19th century, it dates to the time when the Flushing and Northside Railroad reached the area, aiding the creation of a suburban residential development. If it is an early 20th-century Colonial revival it fits in perfectly with the LPC’s description of the district, “wood frame houses constructed largely between 1890 and 1930, which was a period of enormous growth for the borough of Queens and Douglaston.”
The former Horn & Hardart Automat Cafeteria at 2710-2714 Broadway was designated! Hip, hip hooray! Besides its “extraordinary,” intact fenestration and terra cotta details, commissioners recognized the building as an important part of daily life in mid-twentieth-century New York.
For the first time in 25 years, a Roman Catholic Church was designated – and not just one, two churches! St. Aloysius and Church of All Saints (including its parish house and school) were both constructed in Harlem at the turn of the twentieth century in the Gothic style. Commissioners described the two as “exquisite” and praised their parishioners for keeping them in excellent condition. Commissioner Roberta Brandes Gratz was happy that the LPC was “smart enough and brave enough” to landmark a church. All agreed that the commission had “a lot of catching up to do” and that more religious institutions should and will be designated. Both churches were on HDC’s heard, but not designated list – the list keeps getting shorter!
94, 94 ½, 96 Greenwich Street are three more buildings from GVSHP and NYLC’s list of Federal houses and HDC’s heard, but not designated. A number of people spoke in favor, while the lawyer and architect for the owner of 96 opposed designation. For more details see Gary Shapiro’s piece in “The Sun” listed below. (If nothing else, it is certainly our favorite preservation-related title in quite sometime.)
The hearing for the Garner Mansion in Staten Island was laid over.
The final items on the agenda were nine pools/play centers built with funds from the Works Progress Administration by Robert Moses and opened in the midst of a record-breaking heat wave in 1936. Eleven pool complexes were opened that year; two of them, Orchard Beach and the Astoria Pool, were designated last year. Up this time around were Crotona, Betsy Head, McCarren, Red Hook, Sunset, High Bridge, Thomas Jefferson, Jackie Robinson and Tompkinsville Play Centers (along with the bath house interiors of Crotona, Sunset, Jackie Robinson and Tompkinsville). These items were heard back in 1990, and two (McCarren and Crotona) are on HDC’s heard, but not designated list. Supporters, including representatives of local elected officials, spoke glowingly of the pools and their need to be landmarked. There was a bit of debate from those interested in McCarren over the Vollmer plan. Christabel Gough of the Society for the Architecture of the City spoke up against the current polishing of Robert Moses’s reputation. She noted passages on Moses’s racist views and actions in Robert A. Caro’s book “The Power Broker” and ended by saying that if the pools were designated, it is hoped that it is “done with recognition of the broader history of the city.”
Another Public Designation Hearing is scheduled for April 10th, so mark your calendar for another full day of fun and landmarking!