Illegal Paint Job on Landmarked Block of Clinton Hill
We just got a tip that someone just started painting one of the brownstones on Grand Avenue between Gates and Putnam white this morning. (Yes, a certain blogger does live on this block.) Something tells us the Landmarks Preservation Commission didn’t sign off on this. If any readers are nearby, we’d appreciate a photo asap….
We just got a tip that someone just started painting one of the brownstones on Grand Avenue between Gates and Putnam white this morning. (Yes, a certain blogger does live on this block.) Something tells us the Landmarks Preservation Commission didn’t sign off on this. If any readers are nearby, we’d appreciate a photo asap. If anyone from LPC is reading, please get on the stick! Update 7/27: Here’s the photo from about 11:20 this morning. The address is 373 Grand Avenue. LPC confirms that there are no permits out on this.
Update 7/29: As the Daily News article reports, it turns out that—luckily—the owner was only repainting the area around the door. While we understand that some people feel it was an overreaction on our part to post about this before all the facts were known, here’s why we think it was warranted: First of all, had the painters been intending to paint the entire facade, every second counted when we got the tip (we were in fact in Dumbo, and not just across the street, when the tip came in, so popping over for a friendly chat was not an option); secondly, we were on the phone with LPC within five minutes of getting the tip, and LPC told us that (1) the owner had no permit for the painting and (2) that he had racked up, and failed to cure, several other landmark violations over the years. All these factors led us to conclude that, on balance, it was not worth taking the risk that something really destructive might happen. You know, better safe than sorry. With 20/20 hindsight, this was clearly the wrong call. Apologies to the owner—our obsession with historic brownstones may have gotten the better of us on this one.
Bottom photo by Rosier for the Daily News
Hot purple (or white or any other color) would only be kosher with the LPC if it was already that color when the area was landmarked.
ItsAWrap,
That was not an LPC SOS, at all.
That house in Park Slope has been painted that way for a long, long time (due to some neighborly dispute, I think).
Brownstoner merely called to attention that it had a fresh coat of paint.
It was nothing like this case, and was not at all a call to arms for LPC.
Nice try.
I think 311 should be called on this. It’s landmarked and if you don’t like those rules move on to non-landmarked locations.
Last summer you sent out a LPC SOS alert regarding the hot purple paint job on Garfield in Park Slope. http://bstoner.wpengine.com/brownstoner/archives/2006/08/brownstone_not_1.php
I doubt the Garfield paint job was illegal as its still standing there in all it’s violet beauty.
If hot purple is kosher with the LPC then surely white would be OK.
BTW, homeowners paint their buildings ALL THE TIME. Stucco is not MANDATED by LPC
For those who are asking why you don’t do this, it is because brownstone is the finished surface and is not meant to be painted. As a poster said above, paint degrades the brownstone physically. Is isn’t the color that’s objectionable, it’s the paint itself.
I agree with some of the above posters. This is an inappropriate thing to “out” someone for. If you want to be a jerk call 311 and be done with it. But to publicly shame some poor (and I do mean poor, they probably really are poor) property owner for this kind of thing is wrong.
373 Grand Ave Housing Devp Fund Corp
is owner of 373 Grand Avenue.
Not a poor schuck who has owned for 60 years.
But probably some agency that can get around LPC
Crown Heights Proud, please add “eyesore” to your list of tragedies.
I’m with RELAX! and 12:37. The owner is probably some poor schmuck who has owned the house for the last 60 years and doesn’t have a clue that NY has become a Nazi state. And as 12:37 said, there are more important things in life.