Landmarking | Prospect Heights Historic District

Prospect Heights is an area rich with the historic architecture that helps shape Brooklyn’s special identity. The neighborhood contains blocks lined with beautiful Italianate and neo-Grec rowhouses, interspersed with churches, small commercial buildings and multi-family structures. Originally a quiet farm area crossed by the historic Flatbush Turnpike Road, Prospect Heights became a residential neighborhood in the second half of the nineteenth century after the completion of nearby Prospect Park. The area is widely recognized as an important historic neighborhood, and indeed, part of the neighborhood is listed on the National Register. It has remained remarkably free from large-scale physical change, making it a perfect candidate for historic district designation.

Because much of Prospect Heights was developed during the post-Civil War period (with the construction of Prospect Park), there is a noticeable uniformity in the building fabric. The area largely consists of neo-Grec and Italianate style row houses, many built in brownstone. This uniformity gives Prospect Heights a unique sense of place and coherence. However, many architects worked in the area at the time of its development, giving each building its own unique set of details and architectural features, and lending the neighborhood rich architectural diversity.

What follows is a selection of some of the buildings that embody the unique character, history, and architectural quality of Prospect Heights.


129 Prospect Place

129 Prospect Place, constructed in 1873 and designed by architect John Porter, retains its elaborate door surround with carved ornamentation. This feature is one typically found in Italianate style houses but the building’s rectangular window enframements are a look ahead to the more austere neo-Grec style that also dominates the area. Finally, the building has a mansard roof. Initially of French origin, the mansard roof came to symbolize the glamour of Second Empire France and became popular in the United States in the 1860s. The stoop (graced with cast iron railings) leading to the front door on the parlor level offers a buffer between the public life of the street and the private life of the interior of the building. But the activity and liveliness of the area proves that the stoops are not merely an intermediary zone between public and private but a setting for interaction and engagement with neighborhood life in and of themselves. For example, residents speak fondly of their stoops as the perfect place to sit and watch passers-by or await trick-or-treaters on Halloween night.


153 Prospect Place

Unlike 129 Prospect Place which is a composite of several architectural styles, 153 Prospect Place (constructed in 1870) is a more traditional Italianate style brownstone. It features not just a rounded door surround but rounded lintels as well, giving the façade of the building a quality that is sometimes described as exuberant. Additionally, the building features a beautiful intact cornice with shallow segmental arches supported by heavy foliate brackets. The arches of the cornice echo and reinforce the slight arch of the rounded window lintels. As with many buildings in the area, 153 Prospect Place retains its original windows.


130 St. Marks Avenue

130 St. Marks Avenue (built in 1881 and designed by architect M.J. Morrill) is characterized by the two-sided bay running the full height of the building.


376 Sterling Place

This building is situated on Sterling Place in the midst of a long row of Romanesque Revival Houses. In addition to Italiante and Neo-Grec style rowhouses, Prospect Halso contains a significant number of housesbuilt in the Romanesque Revival Style. Romanesque Buildings often employ more than one material on their façade (mixinfor example, brick and stone), feature substantial entry arches – often accompanied by stained glass transoms – and “leaf-work” style ornamentation. Though 376 Sterling Place is one in a long line of 17 Romanesque Revival houses, monotony is counteracted by the varying types of stone used on the row (limestone, brownstone, and Beriaston). Further, the shapes of the bays are varied (squared, three-sided and swelled), thus giving the street further architectural diversity. It is worth noting too, that 376 Sterling Place sits well outside the National Register Historic District yet its architectural quality and its significant place in the development of Prospect Heights demonstrates that the Prospect Heights Historic District should extend well beyond the National Register District.


562 Bergen Street

Built circa 1880, 562 Bergen Street is an example of a larger scale residential building in Prospect Heights. The building’s scale and proportions are complimentary to the surrounding area and this, combined with the familiar materials, makes it a harmonious anchor on the corner of Carlton and Bergen Streets. Its use of varying materials (brick and stone), and the monumental arch surrounding the entrance, situate this building in the Romanesque-Revival tradition.


597 Vanderbilt Avenue

Vanderbilt Avenue, a bustling commercial corridor featuring dozens of small-scale local shops, is at the heart of Prospect Heights. Everything from bakeries to barber shops and small grocers can be found on Vanderbilt Avenue, contributing to the livability of Prospect Heights. By 1880, Vanderbilt Avenue already appears on maps of the area as a wide corridor, overlaid with street railways. Like 597 Vanderbilt, many of the buildings keep to the general low scale, row-house style of the neighborhood, but the commercial spaces on the ground level provide the area with a vibrant retail strip.


191 Sterling Place

The uniformity of Prospect Heights is on occasion surprisingly (and pleasantly) punctured by buildings that give the neighborhood a playful sense of unpredictability. 191 Sterling Place (built around the beginning of the 20th Century) is just such a building. Though larger in scale than much of the buildings in Prospect Heights it (like 5Carlton Avenue) fits harmoniously into the area because of architectural elements borrowed from its surroundings. Like many buildings in tarea, it features a bracketed cornice. It also has swell bays which can be fouon many of the smaller scale row houses in Prospect Heights.

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