351 Washington avenue, CB, PS 2

Brooklyn, one building at a time.

Name: Private house
Address: 351 Washington Avenue
Cross Streets: Corner Lafayette Avenue
Neighborhood: Clinton Hill
Year Built: 1860-61
Architectural Style: Originally Italianate, now Colonial Revival/Federal (1922)
Architect: Ebenezer L. Roberts; architect used for renovation unknown
Other work by architect: Many houses in Fort Greene and Clinton Hill, including other houses on this block and a mansion for Charles Pratt at 232 Clinton Avenue. Also Washington Avenue Baptist Church, Chapel at Emmanuel Baptist Church, Clinton Hill. Also designed a bank at 160 Atlantic Avenue and row houses in Brooklyn Heights.
Landmarked: Yes, part of Clinton Hill HD (1981)

The story: I’ve looked at this house for years, and I never knew that it was originally much different. Back in 1985, I began working around the corner from here, on Hall Street, and this corner was my bus stop for the Lafayette Avenue bus. I must have stood looking at the side of this building hundreds of times. At the time, the foliage in the yard was always overgrown, but yielded a lot of flowers in the spring and summer, making the kind of run down house a colorful and pleasing addition to Clinton Hill’s streetscape. To be honest, I could probably tell you much more about the side of the house, and very little about the front, as my path didn’t often take me that way.

I never thought it a bit arbitrary that a Colonial Revival style brick house was built on a block chock filled with every other kind of building, but that was, and is, the charm of Clinton Hill’s architecture; just about any period style popular during the 19th and early 20th century shows up somewhere within its borders. It turns out that 351 and its neighbor, 353, were actually built in the same style, and at the same time. They are pretty early examples of the first wave of housing built in Clinton Hill, before the robber baron mansions.

The houses were built in 1860-1861, and were probably designed by Ebenezer L. Roberts, one of the most prolific of Clinton Hill’s architects. He became Charles Pratt’s favorite architect, designing the oil baron’s own mansion on Clinton Avenue, as well as churches and neighborhood row houses for him. Roberts trained William Tubby, who then took over as the Pratt architect de jour for many later projects in the 1880s and later.

The two houses once looked like 353, handsome brick Italianates with eyebrow window lintels and a deep porch. As the neighborhood became more well-to-do, the large house on the corner was expanded. The owners in the late 1880s and ‘90s were the Henry Treadwell family. They were both quite active in neighborhood activities and clubs, and Mrs. Treadwell hosted many luncheons here.

In 1922, the house was purchased by John B. Underwood, a member of the Underwood typewriter clan. The Colonial Revival style was very popular in architecture at that time, and it was not unusual for buildings to be refaced in a more modern style. Underwood had the entire original façade removed, and the current Federal façade put on the entire building. Fortunately, he had the money to do it well, and the builders put a new cornice on the building, as well as new lintels, a bay, and everything else needed for it to look like a newly built Colonial Revival, like the ones going up in Lefferts Manor and in the suburbs.

No. 351 still retains the same proportions, window size and placement and scale of its neighbor, No. 353, leading Andrew Dolkart and the members of his team at the LPC to wonder about its origins. The full length windows in the front were a great clue. Subsequent evidence in the records led to the alterations made by Mr. Underwood. Great detective work. The resurfacing was so well constructed, it’s held up to this day. The back bay on the extension with the louvered windows was much later than that, 1950s or ’60s, looks like, and is not nearly as nice. It was grandfathered in by the designation. But all in all, well done, both builders and LPC. GMAP

(Photo: Christopher Bride for PropertyShark)

Photo:Christopher Bride for Property Shark
Photo: Christopher Bride for PropertyShark
Scott Bintner for Property Shark
Scott Bintner for PropertyShark

What's Your Take? Leave a Comment

  1. I would be willing to bet the conversion to Colonial Revival was done by Slee & Bryson Architects (John Bay Slee and Robert Bryson). They were active from 1906 to 1938 and were responsible for a number of very similar Colonial Revival buildings and building conversions on that and neighboring streets during that time. The aesthetic and choice of brick tone are both very similar to many of their other works.

  2. I’ve often wondered about that house. As an impoverished Pratt student in the early 90’s I’d noticed a room for rent sign that looked like it had been there for years. The air of neglect in the yard you mentioned had me convinced I could get a good deal. No one ever returned my calls though, and I never happened to see anyone in the yard or going to and from the building.