Building of the Day: 418-422 Classon Avenue

Editor’s note: In honor of the 50-year anniversary of the Pratt Area Community Council, we are pleased to feature historic buildings PACC has redeveloped as our Building of the Day for four consecutive days. PACC is a community development corporation that preserves and develops affordable housing in central Brooklyn. Brownstoner is a proud media sponsor of PACC’s 50th Anniversary Gala, which takes place April 23.

Brooklyn, one building at a time.

Name: Row houses, now called “The Hawthorne”
Address: 418-422 Classon Avenue
Cross Streets: Gates Avenue and Quincy Street
Neighborhood: Clinton Hill
Year Built: Early 1890s
Architectural Style: Queen Anne
Architect: Langston & Dahlander. Rehab by Feder & Stia Architects, LLP
Other work by architect: L&D – numerous row houses and flats buildings in Bedford, Stuyvesant Heights, Crown Heights, Park Slope. F&S – 272 Gates Ave for PACC
Landmarked: No

The story: This is one of those great examples of rehabilitation that shows that even the worst looking group of buildings can be brought back from the dead, if you have a vision, good architects and a reason to do so. Of course, it always helps to have something great to work with in the first place.

This group of three houses was designed by Frederick B. Langston and Magnus Dahlander in the early 1890s. The two men, both talented architects on their own, were partners for a couple of years, during which time they designed some of Brooklyn’s most interesting row houses and flats buildings. They specialized in the Romanesque Revival/Queen Anne style, characterized by massing of shapes and forms, a combination of building materials, such as smooth and rough-cut brownstone, brick and terra cotta, along with ornamental stained glass and decorative pressed metal.

The use of Romanesque style arches was a big feature of these styles, and here, Langston & Dahlander used them with great skill and even daring, as in stretching the arch all the way across the building, and incorporating the door into the arch. The partners used this building-wide arch only four times, and their buildings are the only houses with this feature in Brooklyn. The other houses are on Herkimer Street and Jefferson Avenue in Bedford Stuyvesant and on Garfield Street in Park Slope.

All of Langston & Dahlander’s homes were marketed for upper middle class buyers. This part of Classon Avenue in the 1890s was close to the mansions and fine row houses on Gates Avenue, and the rest of “the Hill,” and near elegant apartment buildings, private schools and fine churches. The people who lived here were comfortably well off, although not rich, and made the papers when they got married, had parties and social events, or died. A wedding with 125 guests took place in the center house, No. 420, in 1900, when Lillian Felton Belton married Henry Beekman DuMont. The house was decorated with flowers, palms and lanterns, and the event was described in the papers as a “pretty pink wedding.”

But by the first decade of the 20th century, all three houses were renting out furnished rooms or apartments. In 1907, one of the rooms in 418 was rented to an elegant and well-spoken man calling himself Jay Walker. He called on a diamond merchant in Manhattan, telling them that he had come into some financial success, was the owner of this house, as well as other properties, and was looking to buy diamonds as a gift for his wife, as well as an investment. He invited the jewelers to come by the house with some possible gifts. They were quite taken by this elegant gentleman and came to 418 with some diamond jewelry worth thousands of dollars. Jay led them to a fine room in the house, and chose several pieces.

He picked several necklaces and earrings out of the assortment and told the men he wanted to show his wife. He called upstairs to her, but there was no answer, so he asked them if he could take the jewelry upstairs to show her. The jewelers agreed, and Jay disappeared. He never came back. After about 20 minutes the men went to look for him, and realized they had been ripped off. They went down the street to the precinct, and later investigation by detectives revealed that “Jay Walker” had rented the room the week before, and had been so charming and had paid in advance, so the landlady had not gotten any of the usual references. “Jay Walker,” and $1,500 worth of diamonds, was never seen again.

This part of Clinton Hill settled into middle and working class comfort in the ’20s and ’30s. In 1924 young Edward Adams, who lived at 420, won an autographed Babe Ruth baseball and bat at his summer camp in Plattsburg. His photo made the paper. The neighborhood was integrating, as well. The Gem Music School, also at 420, was in operation here in the late 1930s. It was owned by Leon Jemmett, an African American impresario. He was sponsoring a concert by a black coloratura soprano named Marguerite Turner.

But by the end of the 20th century, this block and these houses had taken a nose dive. The block was run down and so were the houses. One by one, they were abandoned and wrecked. I used to take the Gates Avenue bus past here in the late ’80s, and was always struck by how beautiful the houses must have been, even though at least two out of the three were totally abandoned. These were the kind of houses that got razed for ugly infill Fedders housing, or parking lots. But no – that didn’t happen here.

The Pratt Area Community Council, advocate and developer of affordable neighborhood housing, was able to acquire all three buildings in 2007. It got two of the properties through the 203K-Neighborhood Homes program, a joint federal-city program that enables organizations to take properties like this and rehab them for affordable housing. PACC was able to purchase the third house from its private owner. It engaged the services of Feder & Stria Architects to develop all three properties as one large condominium called “The Hawthorne.”

Feder & Stria made 12 condo units in the building: eight two-bedroom units and four one-bedroom apartments. The first tenants, all of whom were chosen by lottery, were able to move in October of 2009. The building is now a fine example of creative and affordable rehabbing, and is again a neighborhood landmark, known for the success of the project, and a large part of the revitalization of this and surrounding blocks. PACC is celebrating its 50th year of community revitalization. This is one of their most successful and beautiful examples of what can be done to the rundown buildings of our formerly inner city neighborhoods. Don’t tear them down – fix them up! GMAP

(Photo: Christopher Bride for PropertyShark)