The Merchant’s House Museum at 29 East Fourth Street offers a most comprehensive view into what life might have been like for the wealthy merchant class in New York City during the 19th-century. While the house and its history date to 1832, its life as a museum began more than a century later in 1936 […]
The South Village is an area rich in architectural, cultural, and historic resources, distinct from (though connected to) those of its surrounding historic communities, such as Greenwich Village, Soho, and Noho. Much of this area’s history is defined by tenements and immigrants, particularly Italian-Americans; by speakeasies, jazz clubs, beatnik coffeehouses, and folk music clubs from […]
Part of our blog series Why Isn’t This Landmarked?, where we look at buildings in our area we’re fighting to protect that are worthy of landmark designation, but somehow aren’t landmarked. Most of us remember the famous line from Alfred Hitchcock’s 1954 thriller, Rear Window, “Meet me in the bar at the Albert Hotel,” delivered hauntingly […]
Six sites were recently designated landmarks by the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission based on their LGBT history and association, two of which were part of a five-year campaign by Village Preservation: the LGBT Community Center and the former Gay Activists Alliance Firehouse. This comes four years after the first and until recently only NYC individual landmark […]
On January 16, 2014, GVSHP sent a letter to the then-chair of the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) Robert Tierney calling for landmark designation of the Stonewall Inn.
Among the many delights included in this weekend’s Open House New York will be three iconic Greenwich Village buildings–a Gothic Revival church with many architectural firsts, a library that was originally a courthouse which heard the “Trial of the Century,” and a groundbreaking artists’ housing complex that was formerly home to Bell Telephone Labs and the site […]
There were many moments to celebrate along the arc of fighting for the protection of the Gansevoort Historic District, also known as the Meatpacking District. One such milestone took place on July 17, 2002, when the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation determined, in response to an application by GVSHP, that […]
The Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum at 2 East 91st Street is a renowned museum and institution, the only of its kind in the United States, born of a long history and connection between philanthropy and industry.
This is a re-posting of a piece originally written in 2011. Architect Phillip Johnson and others protesting the demolition of Pennsylvania Station We speak often of historic districts, individual landmarks and national and state register sites but, what do those terms really mean? This post will review how the designation of landmarks came to be, […]
On November 14, 1851, Herman Melville’s magnum opus, Moby-Dick, was published. Unlike the search for a white whale, it isn’t difficult to find Melville’s deep connection to the Village, as his grandfather is the namesake of Gansevoort Market.
Lafayette Street in NoHo is much on my mind today. September 6 happens to be the birthday in 1757 of the man for whom the street is named, the Marquis de Lafayette — an immigrant and a hero of the Revolutionary War. It’s also on my mind because I grew up in Lafayette, Louisiana, and […]
This year’s Spring House Tour Benefit is right around the corner; on Sunday, May 7th to be exact! This year’s tour features seven incredibly beautiful Village properties including hidden gardens, fabulous art, and the answer to “what’s behind that golden door on Morton Street?”
On this date in 2011, the New York State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO), presented a “Resource Evaluation” that agreed with the Landmarks Preservation Commission’s earlier finding that the complex known as Washington Square Village was eligible for inclusion in the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places. In this evaluation, SHPO noted that Washington […]
Working in historic preservation, you know that you win some and you lose some. The forces of real estate in New York are quite powerful, and as passionately as New Yorkers feel about the character and spirit of their city and their neighborhoods, there’s no denying the big money interests are going to win some […]
Last week GVSHP took an important step in documenting the South Village for its listing on the National Register of Historic places by photographing a selection of sites to be included in the nomination report. This nomination, written by architectural historian Andrew Dolkart, will soon be sent to the State Office for Historic Preservation to […]
Last month we all cheered when it was announced that the Bowery Historic District was added to the State and National Register of Historic Places – a well-deserved recognition of one of New York’s oldest and most historic streets. We are also thrilled that another historic site in our neighborhood, an East Village icon, was […]
We speak often of historic districts, individual landmarks and national and state register sites but, what do those terms really mean? This post will review how the designation of landmarks came to be, what a landmark is and the differences between state and local landmarks.
View A Guide to Lesbian & Gay New York Historical Landmarks in a larger map The Village erupted in riotous celebrations this past weekend at the news of passage of marriage equality legislation, which carried over into the annual Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride March that ends in Greenwich Village. Of course the Village […]
