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Michelle Williams and her “Tara.” Photo at left by Gage Skidmore for Wikipedia Commons; photo at right by Kate Leonova for PropertyShark

Hollywood in the Hood?

Called “The Tara of Prospect Park South” (even the garage has columns!), this gigantic house will be home to movie star Michelle Williams. The eight fireplaces should keep her warm in winter and the 18 rooms will leave her less cramped than that old row house she’s been cooped up in. Montrose Morris wrote about this grand home’s history in 2011, and despite the asphalt shingles, she called it a “wonderful massive Victorian steamboat of a house.” We’re hoping Ms. Williams will restore the clapboard siding.

Spring cleaning for the Flatbush Trees, a 70s-era landmark, came just in time for summer, thanks to local installation artist Dave Eppley, blogger and activist Tim Thomas of the Q at Parkside, and 100 middle school kids.

If you miss Saturday’s walking tour of Sunset Park by preservationist Joe Svehlak — who grew up on 57th Street in the mid 20th century when the area was still called Bay Ridge — catch him on August 1 when he talks about the area’s community activism.

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Standing on Barclays Center’s green roof. Photo by Chris Ryan for The Architect’s Newspaper

It must have been a disappointment to many architecture enthusiasts when they discovered that the plan to build a green roof for Barclays Center had been nixed for budgetary reasons. The roof had been part of the original Frank Gehry design — along with a running track around its perimeter — but those features were scrapped during the recession.

The resulting white top, with its big blue logo, gave the stadium a feeling of being somehow unfinished. Now, three years after the grand opening of Barclays Center, the green roof is back in play — and it looks as if all the greenery may be in place by the end of July. Fingers crossed.

The 135,000-square-foot area is in the process of being covered with a layer of sedum, a genus of flowering plants that store water in their leaves. The idea is to capture rainwater, reduce noise output, and provide a more pleasing view for both passers-by and future residents of the Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park highrises being built around it.

The Architect’s Newspaper recently got an exclusive tour of the roof in construction, and the photos give the otherworldly impression of a park floating above the streets of Brooklyn.

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The Architect’s Newspaper got up on top of Barclays Center to see its green roof under construction. Some facts revealed in the video it shot: Barclays had to add a new truss system under the roof to support the sod and vegetation.

The roof will feature four varieties of sedum, all of which is grown off site in Connecticut, shrink wrapped and trucked in. The sedum is loaded onto pallets and hoisted by crane onto the roof.

In fact, we caught some of this action below on the street this weekend, as you can see in the photos after the jump. Construction of the roof will wrap in the fall, Forest City’s deputy director of construction says in the video.

A Video Tour of Barclays Center’s Under-Construction Green Roof [AN]
Video by The Architect’s Newspaper; photos by Cate Corcoran