House of the Day

Park Slope Brownstone With Mantels, Plasterwork, Pocket Doors Asks $4.95 Million

This Park Slope brownstone has a long list of period details and is a short stroll from Prospect Park.

park slope - street view of a row of brownstones

by Susan De Vries

07/24/2024 0

The list of original details is fairly impressive in this Park Slope brownstone with built-ins, mantels, moldings, encaustic tiles, and pocket doors. At 539 3rd Street, it is also a short stroll from Prospect Park.

Although the house is within the Park Slope Historic District, the designation report doesn’t divulge a great deal about the 20-foot-wide structure, other than to say it is one in a row of five that all have projecting bays on the upper stories, some Neo-Grec details, doorways with stained glass transoms, and L-shaped stoops. The houses were likely constructed when much of the block was being developed from the late 1880s to the early 1900s. A map of 1898 shows the row already in place and, going by newspaper stories of the time, they were likely put up a few years earlier. By 1895, Charles and Delia Hart were living in one of the houses in the row, and it’s possible Charles, a builder behind a number of properties within the historic district, also developed the row.

Records show that the house last sold in 1951 — and the sale got a mention in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle. The former single-family home is currently a legal two-family with two duplexes.

The lower duplex includes the parlor level with high ceilings, plaster details, and wood floors. There is a console mirror in the front parlor while in the rear is a carved wood mantel with Minton-style figural tile and, on the opposite wall, a built-in with glass doors flanked by closets. A library, not shown, is in a rear extension.

On the garden level, that rear extension holds the kitchen. It isn’t pictured, so presumably some updates might be in order. The front of the garden level has the original dining room with mantel and wainscoting. There is a full bathroom — the only bathroom in the lower duplex — and a bedroom with a window to the rear yard.

The upper duplex is on the original bedroom floors and includes a petite kitchen and two full bathrooms. One is shown in the listing photos and it has a circa-1900 Roman tub and pedestal sink. The bedrooms depicted all have wood floors and three have mantels, some with their original inserts.

According to the listing, from Phillip Acha of Douglas Elliman, recent updates include a new boiler and hot water heater.

The brownstone is asking $4.95 million, down from $5.2 million when it was originally listed in March. What do you think?

[Listing: 539 3rd Street | Broker: Douglas Elliman] GMAP