480 Greenwich Street House/502 Canal Street House

Designated June 30, 1998

The red brick double building at 480 Greenwich Street/502 Canal Street is part of a rare surviving cluster of early nineteenth-century structures in lower Manhattan on a block partially created on landfill and located close to the Hudson River waterfront. It was built in 1818-19 on an irregularly-shaped comer lot at the intersection of Greenwich and Canal Streets by John Y. Smith.

Smith, a manufacturer of starch and hair powder, operated his business on the ground floor and lived with his family upstairs in the building. The building retains distinctive characteristics of the Federal style, including Flemish bond brickwork, brownstone window lintels and sills, and the curved bay which links the facades of the two sections at the comer.

STATUS Designated Individual Landmark

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“I don’t know what the City would be without HDC. [They] testified before LPC time after time and helped us focus on the right issues. We would not be an historic district without HDC! ”

Doreen Gallo: DUMBO Neighborhood Alliance

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Fern Luskin: Lamartine Place Historic District; Friends of Lamartine Place & Gibbons Underground Railroad Site

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Zella Jones: NoHo Historic District; NoHo East; and NoHo Extension

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“I remember Richard saying at a meeting, we have someone here from HDC, Nadezhda Williams, Director of Preservation and Research, to help us. She said to us, ‘You are not the only ones going through this.’ HDC included us in an enormous community”

Erika Petersen: West End Preservation Society

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Elena Martinez
City Lore, Folklorist
Bronx Music Heritage Center, Co-Artistic Director

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Welcome2TheBronx