Image showing relationship between planned new tower and landmarked Robert and Anne Dickey House. Image credit: FXFowle Architects
Mixed-use development would restore Federal-era building to tenement period, adaptively repurpose for use as part of a new public school. On February 16, 2016, Landmarks considered an application for alterations to, and new construction above, the individually landmarked Robert and Anne Dickey House at 67 Greenwich Street in Lower Manhattan. The work would be part of a mixed-use development by Trinity Place Holdings that would see the creation of a tower at the adjoining lot to the north of the landmark. The development would include retail space, a public school at the lower levels, and residential units in the upper floors. The Dickey House would be integrated with the new tower and serve as part of the school.
(read more…)
The Windermere and Dickey House designated. Despite strong opposition by current owners, on June 28, 2005, Landmarks designated the Windermere Apartments in Manhattan’s Clinton section, and the Robert Dickey House in Lower Manhattan.
The Windermere, constructed in 1881, is a visually compelling three-building complex located at 400-406 West 57th Street and Ninth Avenue. Its design, attributed to Theophilus G. Smith, features distinctive cornices and polychromatic brickwork. At the public hearings, the owner strongly opposed the designation, arguing the Windermere was not one grand apartment building worthy of designation, but, in fact, was three separate uninhabitable tenements. 2 CityLand 61 (May 15, 2005). In approving, Landmarks noted that the building was the oldest-known apartment complex in the area and that it played a significant role in the history of women’s housing when, in the 1890s, it was the home of young women entering the work force. (read more…)
Experts clash over rehabilitation cost for 1811-built Lower Manhattan townhouse. On April 21, 2005, Landmarks held a public hearing on the proposed designation of the four-story Robert Dickey House, a 41-foot wide Federalstyle townhouse located at 67 Greenwich Street and Trinity Place. The Dickey House, constructed in 1811, is the only surviving Federal-period, bowed-facade townhouse in Manhattan and one of only two intact townhouses of this period remaining south of Chambers Street.
The Schessel family, owners of the Dickey House for the past 45 years, had four experts testify at the hearing to the cost of rehabilitating the vacant 9,000-square-foot building, including structural and soil engineers, a development consultant and their land use counsel. Calling it “not bankable or investment worthy,” the owners’ experts asserted that reuse of the Dickey House would cost $6 million due to the building’s failing foundation, weak supporting soil, proximity to the Hudson River waterline and the need to completely gut the interior, which had been converted to a boardinghouse with, as one expert noted, “bathtubs in the kitchens.” (read more…)
