Image Credit: NYC Public Design Commission.

Butler has been serving the Public Design Commission in various roles for 15 years. On December 16, 2020, Mayor Bill de Blasio appointed Keri Butler as the Acting Executive Director of the Public Design Commission (PDC). The Public Design Commission serves as the City’s design review agency. The Commission oversees the design of permanent structures, landscape architecture and art proposed on City-owned property, and considers the appropriateness of the design, the materials used, how the space can be maintained and how a design best serves the public. Butler will be taking over for Justin Garrett Moore, who had been the Executive Director of the Commission for the past five years. (read more…)

Kenseth Armstead and Deborah Marton (pictured above) are the two new members of the NYC Public Design Commission. Image Credit: NYC Public Design Commission

Kenseth Armstead and Deborah Marton join the eleven member board. On November 5, 2020 Mayor Bill de Blasio appointed two new members, Deborah Matron and Kenseth Armstead, to the Public Design Commission. Both were approved by an overwhelming majority of the City Council. (read more…)

Key kiosk features. Image Credit: LinkNYC.

Following public testimony on proposed rule, it was modified to require that new kiosks in residential historic district go before Landmarks for review, and increased the distance from which a kiosk replacing a pay phone may be sited near another public communications structure. On June 28, 2016, the Landmarks Preservation Commission voted to adopt modifications to existing rules regarding pay phones to account for a Mayoral plan to replace all pay phones with new public communications structures. The new kiosks will provide phone service and free Wi-Fi access, and ability to contact emergency services in an initiative named LinkNYC.  The aluminum-clad kiosks will also possess stations for charging one’s phone and an interactive tablet. The rectangular, eleven-inch-wide kiosks will have a smaller footprint than pay phones, but will be taller, with those displaying advertising over ten feet high. (read more…)

Key kiosk features. Image Credit: LinkNYC.

Proposed rule change would change text governing installation of public pay phones in landmarked area to allow for installation of Public Design Commission-approved public communications structures with digital advertising. On March 3, 2016, the Landmarks Preservation Commission held a hearing on a proposed amendment to agency rules governing the installation phone booths. The proposed rule changes would update the agency rules pertaining to public pay phones. The updated rules responds to the de Blasio administration’s initiative to replace public pay phones with new public communications structures providing phone service and free Wi-Fi, with a tablet that accesses emergency services, and charging stations for cellphones and other electronic devices. (read more…)

The Thomas-Lamb designed Loew’s 175th Street Theater in Washington Heights was prioritized for designation. Image credit: LPC

Some items will be removed from calendar due to political reality that designations will not be ratified by Council; others are found to be adequately protected so as to not require prioritization; others to lack significance that would merit immediate designation. On February 23, 2016, Landmarks made determinations on the disposition of 95 items added to Landmarks’ calendar before 2010, but never subjected to a vote on designation. In 2015 the commission had announced an initiative to clear the calendar of the backlogged items. Landmarks held a series of public hearings to give the public an opportunity to testify on the items, some of which had languished on Landmarks’ calendar for decades. At the meeting on February 23, 2016 commissioners voted to keep 30 items on the calendar for a vote on designation during 2016. The remaining 65 items will be decalendared. Landmarks’ determinations on all 95 items are listed in the associated chart.

(read more…)

Faith Rose of O’Neill Rose Architects is the new Executive Director of the Public Design Commission. Image credit: Office of the Mayor

Appointee previously served as Director of the Design Excellence program. On October 7, 2014, Mayor Bill de Blasio appointed Faith Rose to serve as Executive Director of the Public Design Commission. Ms. Rose, a licensed architect and partner at O’Neill Rose Architects, earned her Masters of Architecture from Yale University and comes to the Commission from the Department of Design and Construction. As Director of the Department’s Design Excellence program, Ms. Rose oversaw the renovation and expansion of the Queens Museum of Art, along with over two hundred other projects. Ms. Rose told CityLand via email “I look forward to working with Mayor de Blasio to harness the power of public architecture, landscape architecture and art to benefit all New Yorkers.”

Since 1898, the Public Design Commission has been responsible for reviewing the construction, renovation, and restoration of public buildings, and currently oversees the rehabilitation of City Hall. The Commission also designs, installs, and conserves public parks, playgrounds, and artworks, as well as serving as curator and caretaker of the City’s public art collection. The Commission is composed of eleven members, serving pro bono, and include an architect, landscape architect, painter, sculptor, and representatives from the Brooklyn Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the New York Public Library.