How Gramercy Park Was Saved

The Work of the Block Association  •  Letter IV

Historic Preservation

Sixty years of landmark protection — and nearly two centuries of preservation

Gramercy Park, about 1912, in the years the City proposed to open Irving Place straight through it. Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

Dear Neighbors,

Gramercy Park did not remain Gramercy Park by accident. For nearly two centuries, its character has endured because protections were written into deeds, defended by organized neighbors, and eventually reinforced by City law.

That history is the thread running through the Block Association’s work today. Clean streets, safe blocks, tended trees, and an informed neighborhood all contribute to a larger purpose: preserving historic Gramercy Park and the quality of life of the surrounding residential neighborhood. This Sunday marks sixty years since one of the most important protections was put in place.

1831: Preservation Written into the Deed

Samuel B. Ruggles did not simply create a park. He built preservation into its legal foundation. His 1831 indenture set aside forty-two lots as “an ornamental private Square or Park” for the use of the surrounding lot owners. Preservation here is older than the Landmarks Law by more than a century. It is written into the ground.

1912: The Neighbors Organize

For its first eighty years the Park was defended case by case. In 1890 a bill permitting a cable road through the Park passed the Legislature, only to be stopped when Governor David B. Hill refused to sign it; the Trustees sent him a letter of thanks. Twenty-two years later came another threat, tied to the Lexington Avenue subway: plans to take an easement beneath the Park and extend Irving Place through it to Lexington Avenue. The Board of Aldermen even adopted an ordinance condemning the easement.

This time the neighbors organized. Lot owners and residents formed the Gramercy Park Association specifically to stop the proposed street through the Park. Organized opposition helped persuade the City to change its plan. Four years later, the Association helped secure residential zoning for the streets around the Park under the City’s first zoning resolution — adding the force of public law to Ruggles’ private covenant.

That episode established a civic tradition the Block Association has sought to carry forward since its founding in 1994: historic places endure when the people around them are organized, informed, and prepared to speak for them.

1966: The City Draws the Line

Sixty years ago this Sunday, on September 20, 1966, in only the second year of New York City’s Landmarks Law, the City designated the Gramercy Park Historic District, among the city’s early historic districts. At the hearing that spring, Sherman Drake, president of the Gramercy Park Association founded fifty-four years earlier, spoke for four hundred members. The Trustees submitted a statement in support. No one spoke in opposition.

The Commission’s report captured exactly what was at stake. It called the Park “an early instance of town planning” and found a neighborhood that had “to a remarkable degree, retained much of its original character,” its houses “displaying many handsome details and much fine ironwork.”

The Commission’s designation report, September 20, 1966.

What the District Protects, and Where It Stops

The Gramercy Park Historic District and its 1988 extension.

Within the District — the Park, much of what faces it, and the blocks running south to 18th Street — most exterior changes require Landmarks approval and are evaluated for their effect on the historic character of the district. Landmark designation does not freeze a neighborhood in time; it manages change so that the character of the place survives it. You can see the principle on Gramercy Park West, where five townhouses dating from 1844 to 1850 still read as a coherent row.

Nos. 3, 4, and 5 Gramercy Park West, 1935. Berenice Abbott for the Federal Art Project. The New York Public Library.

The line has moved once. After a 1985 public hearing at which twenty witnesses spoke in favor, the District was extended in 1988 to include a single building: the white terra-cotta Gothic tower at 36 Gramercy Park East.

The original sales advertisement for 36 Gramercy Park East, built in 1908–10 as a cooperative for the Gramercy Park Club and added to the District in 1988.

Most of the north side of the Park, including the Gramercy Park Hotel, lies outside the District, as does the corner beyond No. 36 at 21st Street. That is why neither the Hotel’s redevelopment nor the building now rising at 38 Gramercy Park required Landmarks review. Many of you have asked how projects of this scale could proceed in a historic neighborhood. This is why. Where the District ends, our work changes shape — from a voice at the hearing to a presence at the curb.

There, our role is monitoring construction hours, sidewalk protections and sanitation, and holding developers to their commitments.

Inside the Fence

The Trustees of Gramercy Park remain responsible for the Park itself: its governance, maintenance and security, and the preservation of everything inside the fence. That stewardship is theirs. The Block Association keeps the wider neighborhood informed while tending to the civic life of the streets around the Park.

The gates mark a boundary, but they also safeguard the landscape within it. At the Park’s centennial in 1931, Dr. John H. Finley gave thanks not only for the families who looked out on it from their windows, but for the millions who had caught “reviving glimpses of its beauty and refreshing breath of its air” from the sidewalk. Ninety-five years later, that remains part of what preservation gives the neighborhood: beauty, greenery, continuity, and a sense of place shared by everyone who walks by.

What We Carry Forward

The Landmarks Preservation Commission regulates the Historic District. The Trustees steward the Park itself. Property owners care for individual buildings. The Block Association’s role is civic: keeping the neighborhood informed, organizing community support, advocating when preservation issues arise, caring for the public realm, and helping preserve the residential environment around the Park.

Ruggles established the framework. Organized neighbors defended it. The City added the protection of public law. Our role is to help keep those protections meaningful in the life of the neighborhood.

Warmest regards,

Arlene Harrison
President, Gramercy Park Block Association

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