House of the Day: Astonishingly Ugly in FG
There are plenty of ugly buildings going up in Brooklyn these days, but occasionally a design comes along which truly boggles the mind. We’d driven by this house on Fort Greene Place (one block outside the landmarked district) a couple times during construction and were pretty taken aback. The proportions of the stair case are…
There are plenty of ugly buildings going up in Brooklyn these days, but occasionally a design comes along which truly boggles the mind. We’d driven by this house on Fort Greene Place (one block outside the landmarked district) a couple times during construction and were pretty taken aback. The proportions of the stair case are truly strange, as are the choices of materials and design details. We hadn’t realized it was on the market, though, until a regular reader brought it to our attention
with the following commentary:
I hereby nominate this house for the Fucking-Ugliest-Most Out-of-Context-Tackiest-Entire-Block-Destroying-Piece-of-Shit-House-That-I-Have-Ever-Seen Award. They had an open house a few weeks ago and I walked by and nearly barfed on the sidewalk. You have to see it in person to believe it. My eyes! They’re burning!
While we might have avoided the expletives, that’s about what we would’ve had to say about this place. What’s more unbelievable than the fact that someone could have designed this place is that the developer was so out of touch with his potential market. This might fly in some other nabes, but we doubt there are going to be too many takers in Fort Greene. We feel sorry for the broker who has to sell this place with a straight face. The price has already dropped once but in our humble opinion it has a ways to go before anyone will touch it.
28 Fort Greene Place [Rita Knox] GMAP
For many old time Bklyn residents this place is
“just georgious”.
It’s definetly not my taste or the taste of the new Brooklynites but where I’m from in the Sheepsead Bay area there were plenty of people who aspired to live in a place just like this and would have no interest in a Brownstone. Too dark, they’d probably say.
I did take a walk last night to see and to me this is far from ugliest thing that gets built these days. Yes, the staircase is a bit over the top, but a few years of city grime and it won’t stick out so much. The exterior doors are definitely bad choices.
That said I think house (exterior) is ok. And for the size (very large) I think great price – think ‘all new no maintainance’.
Its not the front staircase that makes yard small its the size(depth) of the building itself.
Also – if this were S. Elliot or Oxford I’d be upset. But this block has varied mix of looks so doesn’t break up uniformity (in fact block is a bit depressing).
Maybe they can pick it up and move it back to New Jersey and plop it down in one of those new McMansion nabes
Take a look at 266 22nd street in Brooklyn….It wins any fugly award you can throw at it. It’s covered with 10 foot pole marks. Right now it is being used as a dormitory for Methodist Hospital doctors.
Can we burn it tonight? Anyone wants to go with me ?
Just like they do in Canarsie
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/19/nyregion/thecity/19snap.html?pagewanted=2&adxnnl=0&adxnnlx=1119278991-RYMK2N1isegpqZH4kjjSbg
Exept for different reason.
I was out for a walk this weekend and wandered into the open house. My favorite pointless consequence of the monstrous staircase out front is that they moved the entire house back so far that the remaining yard is miniscule. Plus, there’s an open to-be-developed lot right next door.
The only justification I could see is that the builder really went out of em’s way to make a high-rental-income top-floor 2-BR. The entrance is completely separate (if gargantuan), and the upper apartment is pretty spacious and well-laid out. The owner gets the bottom three floors, the lowest of which (the ‘den’) is completely underground. The price now stands at 1.37 M. Maybe when it goes for half that….
this is good example of how it should not be done.
On the same block there is quite oposite example
how it can be done quite well
It is worth a trip just to compare this two.
http://brownstoner.com/brownstoner/archives/2005/05/diy_townhouse_i.html#comments
As horrible as it is, I don’t think it is nearly as awful as the row of mutant houses on Warren St near Smith.
We would call it “Queens special” but now i think it is not fair to Queens.
It is the worst one i have seen this year.