So many dates feature prominently during a walk of the church and property of Trinity Episcopal Church in Saugerties, N.Y. A large Bible from 1857, with delicate pages, is behind the church pulpit. A lectern contains four intricately carved wooden images of the evangelists such as St. Mark as a wooden lion and John as […]
Entries Tagged as 'architecture'
Trinity Episcopal’s Storied History
August 31st, 2022 · 4 Comments · Beyond Gotham
Tags: architecture·art·historic preservation·Hudson Valley·spiritual places
Jane’s Walk NYC 2021 Steps Up
May 4th, 2021 · No Comments · Explore New York
The house where Dennis Harris lived, at 857 Riverside Drive, is worse for the wear of many decades, shorn of its dignified shutters and cupola. Yet the rich history the house holds and the life story of Harris, the man who owned this Greek Revival-Italianate place in Washington Heights, are important to keep alive even […]
Renewal On Track At Newark Penn Station
April 12th, 2021 · No Comments · Beyond Gotham
Newark has its own Pennsylvania Station – and it’s getting a renewed lease on life. On the day that the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) opened its new, spacious, and grand Pennsylvania Station in Newark, on March 23, 1935, dignitaries, railroad executives and workers, and some 5,000 people gathered for a ceremony of much fanfare. Those on […]
Tags: architecture·cities·New Jersey
At Risk: The McGraw-Hill Building’s Lobby
February 24th, 2021 · 4 Comments · Be a Mindful Activist
A gleaming Streamline Moderne lobby of New York City’s original McGraw-Hill Building is under threat of a renovation that could obliterate its historic character. Architect Raymond Hood, who designed some of the very finest, awe-inspiring Art Deco skyscrapers of the era, created the lobby as a perfect entrance statement that fit with the McGraw-Hill’s bold, […]
Bill Aimed At Halting Trump Design Edict
July 20th, 2020 · No Comments · Beyond Gotham
The Trump Administration may soon order that all new major federal buildings look like 21st century renditions of Greek temples or the U.S. Capitol. But a new bill from a Democratic Congresswoman could head the Administration off at the pass. The news first came out in February that Donald Trump and his Administration were going […]
Tags: architecture·landmarks·Washington
Marking 55 Years of New York Landmarks
April 24th, 2020 · No Comments · Explore New York
This week is an anniversary worth honoring, yet one that is going by relatively quietly. Fifty-five years ago, on April 19, 1965, New York City Mayor Robert F. Wagner signed the city’s Landmarks Law. Groundbreaking at a time of widespread demolition and clearing of buildings and blocks in New York and elsewhere, it established the […]
Tags: architecture·landmarks·new york
Trump’s Bid To Dictate Architectural Style
March 16th, 2020 · 2 Comments · Beyond Gotham
Carol Ross Barney designed the Oklahoma City Federal Building to “let the materials” create a “strong and beautiful presence.” Indeed, it’s an agile structure that even at just three stories soars and opens in a graceful way to the surrounding green spaces that honor the 168 people who perished in the 1995 bombing at the […]
Sacred Sites, Priceless Opportunities
May 18th, 2019 · 14 Comments · Beyond Gotham
Amid the bustling Lower East Side, a place today with a millennial scene, gleaming glass buildings, and expensive cafes, the old remains, and in fact, finds ways to renew itself. The 132-year-old Eldridge Street Synagogue sits unpretentious in its presence. The structure is strong and commanding in a gentle way, inviting a long look and […]
Tags: architecture·historic preservation·new york·spiritual places
Preservation Triumphs of 2018
January 26th, 2019 · No Comments · Explore New York
The beautifully proportioned, sand-colored, two-story Beaux Arts building at 236 President Place in Brooklyn is not as grand as the larger structures of this style one finds in New York City. Yet its purpose was great and historic, in its own way, as those places, and its stateliness reflects that higher good. The late 19th […]
Tags: architecture·Brooklyn·historic preservation·Hudson Valley·landmarks·manhattan
Rondout Walks: Listen to the Stories
July 7th, 2018 · 2 Comments · Beyond Gotham
A look around Kingston’s Rondout neighborhood reveals many signs of the buildings’ lives. Walk past a storefront or home and you can see how well-tended and cared for many places are. The signs, shapes, materials, or features convey a structure’s past as well as its present life. What isn’t visible as often to the eye […]
Tags: architecture·art·historic preservation·Hudson Valley·stone
Sacred Sites: Spring’s Rite of Reverence
May 5th, 2018 · No Comments · Beyond Gotham
Tomorrow is the second day of the annual Sacred Sites Open House throughout New York State. From the 1842 Bridgehampton Presbyterian Church on eastern Long Island to the 1905 First Baptist Church of Niagara Falls at the northwest tip of New York, dozens of Sacred Sites are open to the public this weekend. More than […]
Tags: architecture·historic preservation·new york·spiritual places
Honoring the Landmark IRT Powerhouse
January 9th, 2018 · 10 Comments · Explore New York
It may be the most underappreciated major historic building in New York City. Finally, however, the magnificent powerhouse that generated electricity for New York City’s pioneering rapid transit subway system when it first opened in 1904 is a protected city landmark. The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission’s (LPC’s) recent action to designate the IRT […]
Tags: architecture·cities·historic preservation·manhattan·midtown·new york·terra cotta
Join in Walks of Kingston’s Rondout
October 10th, 2017 · 4 Comments · Beyond Gotham
If one personified Kingston’s Rondout neighborhood as a storyteller, you might well be inclined to pull up a chair and listen for many hours. In this compact Hudson Valley neighborhood of city blocks and winding streets, hills and paths, architectural gems and eye-catching details, and waterfront setting, you can see, sense, and discover a microcosm […]
Tags: architecture·art·historic preservation·Hudson Valley·stone
Victory in Saving an Underground RR Site
June 3rd, 2017 · No Comments · Be a Mindful Activist
In a win for those seeking to preserve the history of an abolitionist’s house where escaped slaves found safe passage, the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) decided early last week that the owner must abandon plans for a fifth-floor addition and restore the building to its original height. In a city of 8 […]
Tags: architecture·historic preservation·landmarks·new york·women
A Subway Powerhouse Speaks To Today
March 11th, 2017 · 4 Comments · Beyond Gotham
Sometimes a message of resilience can come in an instant, and often not predictably. The IRT Powerhouse on 11th Avenue isn’t giving a speech or waving a flag, and it’s not a talking head seeking to shout a point of view at passersby or boast of its strength. Yet, the sight of this 1904 building […]
Tags: architecture·cities·historic preservation·manhattan·midtown·new york·terra cotta
A Newburgh Church Embodies Resilience
August 26th, 2016 · No Comments · Beyond Gotham
In the center of Newburgh is the oldest church building in the city. In good times and bad, particularly through the turmoil of the 1960s and the demolition of more than a thousand buildings in the city for so-called urban renewal in the early 1970s, St. George’s Episcopal Church on Grand Street has remained steadfast. […]
Tags: architecture·historic preservation·Hudson Valley·spiritual places·stone
Sacred Sites Open for Exploration
May 20th, 2016 · 2 Comments · Explore New York
New York’s sacred places of worship possess countless life stories and historical chapters as well as inspiring and magnificent art, architecture, and design. Jacob Riis, the social reformer and photographer whose works brought to light the suffering of the poor living in New York City tenements, was one of the early parishioners of the Church […]
Tags: architecture·historic preservation·landmarks·new york·spiritual places
Art Deco’s Wisdom of the Ages, Part II
January 29th, 2016 · 4 Comments · Explore New York
How many schoolchildren over the decades glanced above the doorway to see a woman reading to a boy while a girl nearby is working on an abacus? It is a simple, beautifully sculpted panel, attentive to detail, as the architectural historian William Rhoads writes, “down to the shoelaces.” The scene is one of two on […]
Tags: architecture·art deco·Hudson Valley·manhattan·new york
Symbol and Story in Art Deco Panels
November 18th, 2015 · 2 Comments · Beyond Gotham
Buildings possess energy that can at times elevate or depress the people who view and inhabit them. Like other art, architecture can both be in and rise above its times. Talking about the stock market crash of 1929 and the Great Depression, bandleader and jazz singer Cab Calloway once said that people really needed entertainment […]
A Message in a Lobby
January 26th, 2015 · 8 Comments · Columns and Features, Explore New York
It was just before Christmas, and thousands were in the mad rush and jostling along Fifth Avenue, with their cameras and shopping bags, to see the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree. The shoppers lined up at the boutiques and gift shops in Midtown Manhattan. Just south, however, is a building that doesn’t make a list of […]
