AT&T Building. Image credit: LPC.

Designation will include that owners intend to demolish, but report will focus on the significance of the main tower. On July 31, 2018, Landmarks voted to designate the former AT&T Headquarters Building, at 550 Madison Avenue, an individual City landmark. The 37-story-tall, granite-clad tower was designed by Philip Johnson and John Burgee, and completed in 1983. An early major work of postmodern architecture, the tower rejected the unadorned glass curtain walls of the International Style, and reintroduced masonry cladding and ornament, in a playful pastiche of quotation. The pinkish Stony Creek granite recalled the City’s Beaux Arts architecture, while at the base a monumental central entrance arch is flanked by Renaissance-inspired flat arches that originally opened to twin arcade beneath the tower. The iconic pediment topping the building, with its circular opening, recalls sources such as Chippendale furniture and a 15th-century Florentine chapel. (read more…)

Rendering of development at 119-121 Second Avenue. Image credit: LPC.

Public speakers and commissioners sought to ensure that deaths in 2015 catastrophe suitably memorialized. Landmarks considered an application to build a new development on two lots at 119-121 Second Avenue at its July 10, 2018, meeting. The empty lots are the site of a 2015 explosion, caused by an illegal gas set-up, which killed two people, caused multiple injuries, and destroyed three buildings. The site lies in the East Village/Lower East Side Historic District.  The site’s developers, Nexus Development Group, acquired the property in 2017. (read more…)

Hans S. Christian Memorial Kindergarten, at 236 President Street. Image credit: LPC.

Owner of one of two buildings associated with Methodist Church and the immigrant community of Carroll Gardens threatened litigation should Landmarks designate the property. On June 26, 2018, Landmarks held a joint hearing on the potential individual landmark designations of two buildings in the Carroll Gardens neighborhood of Brooklyn. The adjoining buildings are the 238 President Street House and the former Hans S. Christian Memorial Kindergarten, at 236 President Street. The Italianate-style building at 238 President Street was built in 1853 as a one-family residence, and converted to a training center and residence for Methodist deaconesses in 1897. The two-story Beaux Arts building at 236 President Street is a rare early example of a purpose-built Kindergarten in the United States. (read more…)

Boerum Hill Map. Image credit: LPC.

Commission rejected modifications to 288-property extension to Boerum Hill Historic District, composed of three discrete pieces. On June 26, 2018, the Landmarks preservation Commission voted to designate a 288-building extension to the existing Boerum Hill Historic District. The extension is composed of three distinct sections to the east, north and south of the existing district. The extension shares it development history and architectural character with the existing district. The first wave of residential development in the area, in the 1850s to 1870s, followed the industrialization of the South Brooklyn waterfront, and saw the construction of speculatively built rowhouses, primarily in Italianate and Greek Revival styles. Following the Civil War and the opening of the Gowanus Canal, a second wave of development in the 1880s included Second Empire houses and neo-Grec rowhouses. The area’s original denizens were largely German and Italian immigrants who worked in port-related industries. (read more…)

Image credit: LPC.

Some commissioners lamented loss of Music Room and house museum character, but acknowledged those issues were outside of Landmark’s purview, and found impact on the exterior fell within bounds of appropriateness. On June 26, 2018, the Landmarks Preservation Commission voted to award the Frick collection a certificate of appropriateness to allow for an expansion that will improve circulation, increase exhibition, education and conservation space, and create a café. The individual City landmark was built for industrialist Henry Clay Frick by Carrere & Hastings in 1914. After the deaths of Frick and his wife, the mansion at 895 Fifth Avenue, was converted into a museum based around Frick’s art collection. The conversion and expansion were overseen by architect John Russell Pope, and include the construction of a library adjoining the museum. (read more…)

AT&T Building. Image credit: LPC.

Proponents of revitalization stressed need for adaptability in redeveloping currently vacant building, others lamented destruction of lobby, and urged Landmarks to maintain oversight of entire lot. On June 19, 2018, Landmarks held a public hearing on the potential designation of the former AT&T Corporate Headquarters at 550 Madison Avenue in Midtown Manhattan. The 37-foot-tall tower was completed in 1984 and designed by Philip Johnson, recipient of a 1979 Pritzker Prize, and John Burgee. An early significant work of postmodern architecture, in the Headquarters Johnson and Burgee, rejected the unadorned glass curtain walls of International Style modernism, exemplified in New York by the Seagram Building. The building is clad in masonry and employs historicist quotations, including its famous pediment recalling design motifs in Chippendale furniture. It possesses a monumental entrance arch on Madison Avenue that is flanked by more arches that originally opened to Italian Renaissance-inspired arcades beneath the tower, and covered pedestrian space between east 55th and 56th Streets. The arcades have since been filled in. (read more…)