By Craig Hubert
Back in August 2019, a distinctive, long-decaying building in Bed Stuy was suddenly demolished, with plans calling for a seven-story building with 40 residences. Now, over a year later, renderings for that building have been released.
The new building at 435 Tompkins Avenue will replace the red brick building that stood at the corner of Halsey Street and boasted an impressionistic mural from the street artist Alan Aine. Its storefront was topped by an eye-catching curved metal cornice painted green. A neighboring brick townhouse at 433 Tompkins Avenue was demolished in 2017 after its rear collapsed. The new building combines two lots.
Ralph Kowalczyk of Issac and Stern is the applicant of record. Renderings on its site, first published by New York YIMBY, show a modern building with red brick on the sides and grey brick at the corners. The bulk of the building steps up toward the seventh story and has large windows and a number of balconies, some quite large, that look down over the street. The building will be condos and have the address of 429 Tompkins Avenue, according to Issac and Stern.
The longtime owner sold both properties to Dragonfly Design Build for $6 million in July 2018. Halsey Supply Co., a refrigeration and air-conditioning business, operated out of the mostly boarded-up corner building since 1945, the owner told the Brooklyn Eagle back in 2014.
A new-building permit issued in 2019 shows that 19 parking spaces will be available on the first floor, along with a private garage for one car and space for 14 bicycles (room for an additional eight bicycles is available in the building’s cellar). An outdoor recreation area will be located on the second floor, and outdoor terraces will be available for many of the units on the top three floors.
The development adds to a growing section of Bed Stuy along Tompkins Avenue, where many projects are currently rising on what was once a small-scale neighborhood. Across the street, the block is dominated by two new seven-story buildings, one on the former site of the Weinstein hardware store at 420 Tompkins Avenue, and another, designed by Fischer + Makooi, at 410 Tompkins Avenue.
This story first appeared on our sister publication brownstoner.com.
