By Albert Amateau
The city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission has been eyeing parts of the East Village for potential historic district designation.
The commission this week is talking to property owners in a study area between First Ave. and Bowery from E. Second to E. Seventh Sts. and on the north side of E. 10th St. across from Tompkins Square Park about historic district designation.
“There is a significant concentration of intact 19th-century residential buildings, including tenements, row houses and institutional buildings, that tell the story of the immigrant experience in this area,” said Elizabeth de Bourbon, commission spokesperson.
The study area, with nearly 300 individual buildings, was the subject of a larger East Village L.P.C. survey last year.
“We intend to work with elected officials, Community Board 3, block associations and advocacy groups with a view to preserving the architectural and historical contributions of this neighborhood,” de Bourbon said.
In addition to informal talks with property owners, the commission will make a public presentation of the survey to C.B. 3 at 6:30 p.m. Thurs., May 12, at the Sara D. Roosevelt Park house on Delancey St. between Chrystie and Forsyth Sts.
The East Village has one historic district, the St. Mark’s Historic District along Stuyvesant, E. 10th and E. 11th Sts. between Second and Third Aves. with 38 buildings, designated in 1968. In addition, there are 27 individual landmarked buildings designated after a 2006 L.P.C. survey.
Among the recent individual landmarks are Webster Hall, 119-125 E. 11th St., built between 1887 and 1892 and designated in 2008; The Wheatsworth biscuit factory, 444 E. 10th St., built in 1928 for the firm that invented Milk-Bone dog biscuits, and designated in 2008; the Isaac T. Hopper House, the 1838 home of the abolitionist and leader of the Women’s Prison Association, at 110 Second Ave., designated in 2008; The 11th St. Public Baths, 538 E. 11th St., built in 1905 and designated in 2008; The Aschenbroedel Verein, 74 E. Fourth St., now La MaMa Theatre, built in 1873 as a German-American musicians’ club and designated in 2009; Hamedrash Hagadon Anshe Ugarn, a synagogue for a Hungarian immigrant congregation rebuilt in 1908 from an 1883 house at 242 E. Seventh St., designated in 2008; The Elizabeth Home for Girls, 307 E. 12th St., a four-story Queen Anne-style women’s shelter built in 1891 and designated in 2008; and the Public National Bank building at 106 Avenue C at E. Seventh St., built in 1924 and designated in 2008.
