Landmarks Lollapalooza Part II

Photo credit: Urbanite

Back in October, preservationist Roger Lang described the slew of landmark designations on October 30 as a "landmarks Lollapalooza." We were so taken by the phrase that we made it a cover headline. Well, the Lollapalooza tour is back, and this time, its stopped at Webster Hall, which became a landmark today. The several other designations today bring the number of protected sites in the city to 1,189. Take it away commission:

* Webster Hall in Manhattan, 125 E. 11th St,

Says the commission:

Constructed in 1886 in the Renaissance Revival style, Webster Hall is one of New York City’s most historically and culturally significant 19th-century assembly halls. Architect Charles Rentz, who was responsible for a number of flats and tenements, factories, and stables buildings across the City, designed the assembly hall, which is clad in red Philadelphia pressed brick with brownstone trim and features a metal cornice and unglazed red terra cotta ornament. Now a nightclub, Webster Hall has been the venue for numerous balls, receptions, lectures, meetings, conventions, political and union rallies, military functions, concerts, performances, and sporting and fundraising events. It was the site of the formation of the Progressive Labor Party in 1887, and the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America in 1914.

Here's AP on Webster's landmarking.

* The Fiske Terrace-Midwood Park Historic District in the Flatbush

Per the commission:

This district comprises 250 eclectic houses that were largely completed and occupied by 1914, and were built by two prominent local builders and developers. Most of the houses in the district adhere primarily to the popular early 20th-century architectural styles, especially the Arts and Crafts, Colonial Revival and Dutch Colonial Revival styles. The houses were typically constructed in one of three forms: the box-like foursquare, crowned by a hipped or pyramidal roof; the temple-house, featuring a prominent front-facing gable; and the bungalow, with its low profile, deep porch with thick tapered columns, and broadly overhanging eaves.

* Congregation Beth Hamedrash Hagadol Anshe, 242 E. 7th St.

Per the commission:

This Beaux Arts-style synagogue, whose name translates to Great House of Study of the People of Hungary, was constructed in 1908, and rebuilt from an existing house by the architects Samuel Gross and Joseph Kleinberger for a Hungarian congregation that had formed in 1883. The congregation ceased to exist by 1975 and in 1985 the building was converted to residential use.

* Elizabeth Home for Girls, 307 E. 12th St.

Completed in 1891, Elizabeth Home for Girls was a shelter for young women operated by the Children’s Aid Society, which was established in 1852 by Charles Loring Brace to house and educate the City’s poorest children. The Elizabeth Home for Girls, a four-story brick and sandstone building in the Queen Anne style with German Renaissance flourishes, was used by the Children’s Aid Society until 1930. It has retained virtually all of its original defining characteristics

11th Street Public Bath, 538 E. 11th St.

Per the commission:

This elaborate Beaux-Arts style building was designed by Arnold W. Brunner, the architect and city planner who is responsible for the public baths at Asser Levy Place, Shearith Israel Synagogue and Temple Israel—all of which are New York City landmarks. It was used as a public bath until the 1950s, and purchased in 1995 by Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer Eddie Adams and converted into a fashion and corporate photography studio.

* The Allerton 39th Street House in Murray Hill.

Per the commission:

The Allerton House was completed in 1918 as a long-term residential hotel for young, middle class, single men. Designed in the Northern Italian Renaissance style by architect Arthur Loomis Harmon, the Allerton House was one of a chain of six that were built in New York City between 1913 and 1924. The base of the building is clad in granite and its main façade is structured around three bays of windows, constructed primarily of red brick with projecting headers that ascend to a central hipped roof tower. The prominent roof garden, emphasized by the three arched openings separated by twin terra cotta columns forming the crown of the building, was a central feature of the hotel’s communal facilities. In 1956, the Salvation Army converted the building to the Ten Eyck-Troughton Memorial Residence for Women, and remained in use by the organization until it was purchased recently by a private developer.

And the commission held a public hearing, a key step toward landmarking, of this neighborhood:

* The proposed NoHo Historic District Extension, which includes 60 buildings, and the proposed designations of the former American Society of Civil Engineers Clubhouse, now the site of Lee’s Art Supply at 218-222 West 57th St. former Fire Engine Company No. 54 at 304 West 47th St.; and St Michael’s Church, Parish House and Rectory at 201-225 West 99th St.

In addition, the commission scheduled hearings for Chase Manhattan Plaza and these sites:

* The West Chelsea Historic District in Manhattan, comprised of 55 19th- and early 20th-century industrial buildings; to expand the Douglaston Historic District in Queens, with a proposed extension that includes 21 Greek Revival, Italianate, and Mediterranean Revival-style structures.

* George Bruce Branch of the New York Public Library at 518 W. 125th St., a Georgian Revival-style building designed by Carrere & Hastings; the East 125th Street Branch of the New York Public Library at 224 E. 125th St., a Renaissance Revival style building by McKim, Mead & White; 275 Madison Avenue, a 42-story Art Deco-style skyscraper at 40th Street

In related landmarking news, the Daily News today looks at an issue we covered last month: Complaints that Queens is behind on the landmarks game. Here's David Freedlander's story, an Urbanite post, the News piece today, and a post on Queens Crap.

Photo: Wallg on Flickr

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