Nineteenth-century dry-goods warehouses approved as individual landmarks. On March 13, 2007, Landmarks designated 23 and 25 Park Place, cast-iron buildings built between 1856 and 1857 in lower Manhattan, as individual landmarks. Architect Samuel Adams Warner designed both buildings, which also have Murray Street entrances and share a party wall and facade, for the dry-goods firm Lathrop Ludington and Company. Warner designed several buildings in the SoHo-Cast Iron and Tribeca Historic Districts, as well as the individually-landmarked Collegiate Reformed Church. Decorative elements of the buildings include carved ornamentation around the windows and Corinthian columns.

During the mid-1800s the area below Chambers Street and west of Broadway was known as the “dry goods district.” The buildings at 23 and 25 Park Place were among the storehouses built to warehouse goods and furnish an attractive space for shoppers. Lathrop and Ludington sold fabric and associated supplies. Later, a series of similar merchants, a boxing gym, and apartments occupied the buildings. In 1921, The New York Daily News leased the space. The ground floor at 25 Park Place is currently home to an off-track betting parlor and both buildings are now primarily residential. (more…)

Landmarks unanimous in designating all three buildings. On March 6, 2007, Landmarks voted to designate three nineteenth century buildings in the Far West Village as individual landmarks. The 159 Charles Street House, the 354 West 11th Street House, and the Keller Hotel all received wide community support at the November 2006 hearing. 3 CityLand 170 (Dec. 2006).

Built between 1841 and 1842 for a carver and manufacturer, the Greek Revival style row house at 354 W. 11th Street, which Commissioner Thomas Moore called a “true survivor,” occupies the site of the former Newgate Prison. The building later housed merchants, businessmen, a grocer and a jazz pianist. One of the few remaining row houses in the waterfront neighborhood, the house retains its original brickwork, wrought-iron areaway, and ornamented entrance. Landmarks Chair Robert B. Tierney called the building “a great tribute” to the various owners who had maintained it so well through the years. (more…)

Landmarks unanimously designated the 1886 piano factory. On February 27, 2007, Landmarks voted to designate the Sohmer Piano Factory in Long Island City, Queens as an individual landmark. The architectural firm of Berger and Baylies designed the factory as well as many of the warehouses and lofts in Tribeca historic districts.

Though not as well known as the nearby Steinway Piano Factory in Astoria, Sohmer was a significant manufacturer in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, and the preferred piano of Irving Berlin. Founded by a German immigrant in 1872, Sohmer Piano lasted until 1982, when the Adirondack Chair Company purchased it. At one time, there were 171 piano companies in New York City, but the industry gradually disappeared in the face of competition from the phonograph and radio. (more…)

Idealistic planned suburban housing to be considered as historic district. On March 6, 2007, Landmarks voted to consider the potential designation of Sunnyside Gardens, a 600-building complex of one- and two-family homes and multi-family apartment buildings built between 1924 and 1928 in Sunnyside, Queens. Covering almost 16 blocks, only 28 percent of the site contains buildings, and much of the housing is built around large landscaped courtyards. Landmarks also included Sunnyside Park and the Phipps Garden Apartment buildings, added in the early 1930s, within the district’s boundaries.

Designed by Clarence Stein and Henry Wright and developed by the City Housing Corporation, Sunnyside Gardens was the first development to incorporate the planning theories of the Residential Planning Association of America, a progressive planning organization formed by Stein to respond to the nation’s housing crisis and the lack of quality low-income housing. An RPAA member, Alexander Bing, formed the City Housing Corporation as a limited dividend corporation to show that quality lowincome housing could be built while providing a guaranteed six percent return to investors. As one of the first low-density housing projects constructed around significant landscaped open space and designed for the working class, Sunnyside Gardens influenced regional planning throughout the United States. (more…)

Proposed rule would set new qualifications, registration requirements and suspension rules. The Department of Buildings proposed stiffer requirements for the designation of construction superintendents on all demolition and construction jobs.

Under the new rules, Buildings would not issue demolition or building permits without a designated construction superintendent who met certain qualifications. To qualify, the construction superintendent must be a licensed professional engineer, a registered architect or a site safety manager certified by Buildings. Alternatively, the construction superintendent must provide proof of five years of construction superintendent experience and seven to ten hours of completed safety courses, or five years experience in the construction industry as a mason, carpenter, or building inspector and 50 hours of appropriate safety courses. (more…)