Bed-Stuy Brooklyn -- 1386 Fulton Street History
Photo by Nicholas Strini for Property Shark

The BOTD is a no-frills look at interesting structures of all types and from all neighborhoods. There will be old, new, important, forgotten, public, private, good and bad. Whatever strikes our fancy. We hope you enjoy.

Address: 1368 Fulton Street, between New York and Brooklyn Avenues
Name: Former Sheffield Farms milk processing plant
Neighborhood: Bedford Stuyvesant
Year Built: early 1900’s
Architectural Style: Renaissance Revival
Architects: Unknown
Landmarked: No

From the early 1900’s until the 1960’s, this was a Sheffield Farms milk processing plant, one of several in the city. Sheffield was one of the big two milk distributers in the entire city, the other being Borden. It was a large local employer, and its closing had a severe impact on the local economy.

It stayed empty for several years and then became the cornerstone for the Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Project, spearheaded by Senator Robert Kennedy in 1967. In 1972, this building, and several others in the complex opened as Restoration Plaza.

The Sheffield Plant now houses the Billy Holiday Theatre, the Skylight Gallery, office and retail space. Thankfully, the architect, Arthur Cotton Moore, kept the iconic façade of the old milk plant, especially the busts of cows and the milk bottle reliefs.

Today, the entire complex is undergoing a much needed redesign by the firm of Garrison Designs, with most of the work going on in the inner spaces of the plaza.

Bed-Stuy Brooklyn -- 1386 Fulton Street History
Photo via New York Public Library
Bed-Stuy Brooklyn -- 1386 Fulton Street History
Photo by Suzanne Spellen
Bed-Stuy Brooklyn -- 1386 Fulton Street History
Photo by Suzanne Spellen
Bed-Stuy Brooklyn -- 1386 Fulton Street History
Photo by Suzanne Spellen
Bed-Stuy Brooklyn -- 1386 Fulton Street History
Photo via eBay
Bed-Stuy Brooklyn -- 1386 Fulton Street History
Photo via eBay

What's Your Take? Leave a Comment

  1. Very nice. Wonder where the milk processing happens now. Upstate I suppose. That must be why the label says “good for two weeks after expiration date — except in New York, where we live it sitting on the sidewalk for hours.”

    I don’t think we’ve had wooden Renaissance Revival on here before. Looks very San Francisco and like the boardwalk in Santa Cruz.