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Gracie Mansion, the gracious Federal-Style mansion that overlooks the East River from Yorkville’s Carl Schurz Park, has been New York’s Mayoral residence since 1942. But the house had a long history before it started hosting municipal magistrates. Since construction began in 1799, Gracie Mansion has served as a residence, a museum, and even an ice cream stand. From a connection to Alexander Hamilton's death to the stubborn mayors who refused to live in the residence, here are 10 secrets of the People’s House.
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History

October 23, 2018

Where I Work: Paulie Gee’s Slice Shop is dishing out retro pizzeria vibes in Greenpoint

By James and Karla Murray

6sqft’s series “Where I Work” takes us into the studios, offices, and businesses of New Yorkers across the city. In this installment, we’re going inside Paulie Gee’s Slice Shop in Greenpoint. Want to see your business featured here? Get in touch! Long-time pizza enthusiast Paulie Giannone opened his first wood-fired pizza restaurant, Paulie Gee’s, in 2010 on Greenpoint Avenue in Brooklyn. Since then, he's opened locations in Miami, Columbus, Ohio, Chicago, and Baltimore. Most recently, though, he came back to his roots with Paulie Gee’s Slice Shop, just a few blocks away from his original spot in Greenpoint. While Paulie’s restaurants center around gourmet pizzas, including many vegan options, the Slice Shop specializes in classic New York City-style and Sicilian slices. In keeping with this classic pizza joint feel, the Slice Shop’s retro décor is inspired by the pizzerias Paulie Gee frequented while growing up in Kensington, Brooklyn. We had a chance to speak with Paulie at the newly opened Slice Shop and sample some of the delicious pizzas, including his classic cheese slice and his sauceless Mootz. He filled us in on how he got his start in the pizza business, where he found the '60s and '70s decor, and his reaction to the long lines New Yorkers are waiting on to get a slice of Paulie Gee's.
Get a slice of Paulie Gee's!

Meet Theodate Pope Riddle, New York’s first licensed female architect

The Hill-Stead Museum via Flickr cc

October 19, 2018

Meet Theodate Pope Riddle, New York’s first licensed female architect

Original Plans for Hill-Stead, from McKim, Mead and White papers 1901, designed by Theodate Pope Riddle, via Hill Stead Theodate Pope Riddle not only made history as New York’s first licensed female architect but also lived it as a passenger aboard the Lusitania, the British ocean liner torpedoed off the coast of Ireland in 1915. The sinking of the Lusitania helped draw the United States into World War One, but neither German torpedoes nor the social strictures of her time could sink Theodate’s indomitable, independent spirit. She would go on to collaborate with McKim, Mead & White on a Colonial Revival masterpiece in Connecticut, as well as reconstruct Theodore Roosevelt’s birthplace on East 20th Street.
The whole history

History

October 18, 2018

Where I Work: The Four Freedoms Park team talks Louis Kahn, FDR, and preserving a legacy

As a media sponsor of Archtober–NYC’s annual month-long architecture and design festival of tours, lectures, films, and exhibitions–6sqft has teamed up with the Center for Architecture to explore some of their 70+ partner organizations. In 2012, 40 years after it was conceived by late architect Louis Kahn, Four Freedoms Park opened on four acres on the southern tip of Roosevelt Island. Part park, part memorial to FDR (the first dedicated to the former president in his home state), the site was designed to celebrate the Four Freedoms that Roosevelt outlined in his 1941 State of the Union address--Freedom of speech, of worship, from want, and from fear. In addition to its unique social and cultural position, the Park is set apart architecturally--the memorial is constructed from 7,700 tons of raw granite, for example--and horticulturally--120 Little Leaf Linden trees are all perfectly aligned to form a unified sight line. And with these distinctions comes a special team working to upkeep the grounds and memorial, educate the public, and keep the legacy of both Kahn and Roosevelt at the forefront. To learn a bit more about what it's like to work for the Four Freedoms Park Conservancy, we recently toured the park with Park Director Angela Stangenberg and Director of Strategic Partnerships & Communications Madeline Grimes, who filled us in on their day-to-day tasks, some of their challenges, and several secrets of the beautiful site.
Take the tour!

October 10, 2018

Where I Work: Mendel Goldberg Fabrics has been outfitting the Lower East Side for 130 years

By James and Karla Murray

6sqft’s series “Where I Work” takes us into the studios, offices, and businesses of New Yorkers across the city. In this installment, we’re going inside 130-year-old Lower East Side shop Mendel Goldberg Fabrics. Want to see your business featured here? Get in touch! Mendel Goldberg Fabrics, a fourth-generation family-owned textile boutique, has been in business since 1890 and is located on a quiet side street on the Lower East Side. People who walk down Hester Street often take the time to notice the exquisite designer imported fabrics that hang in the window display as well as the huge range of brocades, silk, gabardine, lace, wool, novelty fabrics and boucle´ in a wide variety of colors and textures, which line the shops walls from floor to ceiling. Despite a devastating fire in the building in 2012 that destroyed the entire basement fabric stock and required substantial rebuilding, the business is thriving. On a recent visit to the fabric store, we had a chance to speak with Alice Goldberg, the great-granddaughter of Mendel Goldberg, about how the business went from a pushcart to a unique destination, the joys of running one of the oldest surviving shops in the neighborhood, and the secrets of some of their most high-end fabrics.
Get a fabric lesson from Alice

Where I Work

2018’s best NYC neighborhoods for Halloween trick-or-treating

Trick-or-treating in Brooklyn, via Flickr cc

October 8, 2018

2018’s best NYC neighborhoods for Halloween trick-or-treating

Once again this year, in addition to the annual Village Halloween Parade, October 31st promises to bring out a veritable parade of pint-sized, adorably costumed youngsters hell-bent on scoring treats and scaring parents and each other. While urban trick-or-treating is nothing like the suburban version, it has its perks (apartment buildings can be like hitting the jackpot)–and its fair share of friendly neighbors, stores, businesses and neighborhood events. Technology–local-social site Nextdoor has a trick-or-treat map that neighbors can add themselves to if they're handing out candy–makes things easier and safer. Like so many other topics, New Yorkers love to argue over which neighborhoods offer the best bounty. Below are a few picks among the least tricky with the best treats.
Where the treats are this Halloween

$80M in additional repairs planned for 109-year-old Manhattan Bridge

Photo via Flickr cc

October 5, 2018

$80M in additional repairs planned for 109-year-old Manhattan Bridge

The Manhattan Bridge is set to undergo another rehabilitation, Skanska announced. The city's Department of Transportation awarded the construction company a $75.9 million contract to perform structural and component rehabilitation on the bridge. Since 1982, the 109-year-old bridge, which crosses the East River connecting Lower Manhattan and Downtown Brooklyn, has been repaired 14 times, making this latest announcement the 15th construction contract.
Get the details

Transit

INTERVIEW: Take a ride with Concetta Anne Bencivenga, director of the New York Transit Museum

Photo by Marc Hermann, courtesy of the New York Transit Museum

October 5, 2018

INTERVIEW: Take a ride with Concetta Anne Bencivenga, director of the New York Transit Museum

By Emily Nonko

Concetta Anne Bencivenga wants you to visit the New York Transit Museum. After coming on as the museum's director early last year -- following Gabrielle Shubert's impressive 24-year run -- she's become "cheerleader in chief," in her own words, excited to promote the museum's exhibits and programming to a wide range of New Yorkers. With 6sqft she discusses how her diverse background brought her to the Transit Museum and what the past of New York's public transportation can teach us about moving forward. She also talks about the revamp of an existing exhibit, the introduction of new ones, and her goals moving forward as director. Do you know why the MTA subway system is featured so prominently in early comic books? Keep reading, as Concetta shares the reasons why public transit is so crucial to New Yorkers lives -- in both the obvious and more surprising ways.
Meet Concetta

October 4, 2018

10 of NYC’s most impressive Terra-cotta buildings

Terra-cotta, Latin for "fired earth," is an ancient building material, made of baked clay, first used throughout early civilizations in Greece, Egypt, China the Indus Valley. In more modern times, architects realized that "fired earth" actually acts as a fire-deterrent. In the age of the skyscraper, terra-cotta became a sought-after fire-proof skin for the steel skeletons of New York’s tallest buildings. In the early part of the 20th century, the City’s most iconic structures were decked out in terracotta. You’ll find terra-cotta on famous facades from the Flatiron to the Plaza, but the material often flies under the radar of pedestrians and architecture buffs alike because it can mimic other materials, like cast-iron or carved wood. Now, this long-underappreciated material is getting its due. On October 24th, the Historic Districts Council will present its annual Landmarks Lion Award to the terra-cotta firms Boston Valley Terra Cotta and Gladding, McBean, which work to keep terra-cotta alive worldwide, and to the preservation organization Friends of Terra Cotta, which has worked to preserve New York’s architectural terra-cotta since 1981. The ceremony will take place at Grand Central’s Oyster Bar, under the magnificent Guastavino terra-cotta ceiling recently restored by Boston Valley Terra Cotta. Fired up about finding “fired earth” around town? Here are 10 of the most impressive examples of New York terra-cotta!
Learn more about New York's Terra Cotta Treasures

September 28, 2018

Celebrate Oktoberfest 2018 at these 15 spots in and around NYC

With the temperature dropping and the foliage blooming, it's officially sweater weather. And what better way to welcome the fall season than drinking German beer from steins, eating giant pretzels and bratwurst, and listening to "oompah" bands. And don't worry if you can't make the trip to Germany for Oktoberfest this year--Munich comes to New York City with tons of fun festivities. Celebrate Bavarian culture with events like traditional pig roasts, ceremonial keg tappings, stein-holding competitions and more. Ahead, find the 15 best spots to grab authentic brews and brats with 6sqft's guide to Oktoberfest 2018.
Brats and brews this way

Events & Things To Do

How the East Village grew to have the most community gardens in the country

Community Gardeners at the Bowery Houston Community Farm and Garden, 1974 via Liz Christie Community Garden

September 19, 2018

How the East Village grew to have the most community gardens in the country

Awash in gray pavement and grayer steel, New York can be a metropolis of muted hues, but with 39 community gardens blooming between 14th Street and East Houston Street, the East Village is the Emerald City. The neighborhood boasts the highest concentration of community gardens in the country thanks to a proud history of grassroots activism that has helped transform once-abandoned lots into community oases. By the mid-1970s, as the city fought against a ferocious fiscal crisis, nearly 10,000 acres of land stood vacant throughout the five boroughs. In 1973, Lower East resident Liz Christie, who lived on Mott Street, refused to let the neglected lots in her neighborhood lie fallow. She established the urban garden group Green Guerillas, a rogue band of planters who lobbed “seed bombs” filled with fertilizer, seeds, and water into vacant, inaccessible lots, hoping they would flourish and fill the blighted spaces with greenery.
Get to the root of the story!

History

LPC designates former Carroll Gardens schoolhouse as New York City landmark

(on right) 236 and (on left) 238 President Street via LPC

September 18, 2018

LPC designates former Carroll Gardens schoolhouse as New York City landmark

The city's Landmarks Preservation Commission on Tuesday designated the Hans S. Christian Memorial Kindergarten at 236 President Street and the adjacent apartment building at 238 President Street as individual landmarks. The two Carroll Gardens buildings are associated with Elmira Christian, an advocate for early childhood education. "These two properties are distinguished by their architecture and share a great history of education and social reform in Brooklyn," LPC Vice Chair Frederick Bland said in a statement.
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September 14, 2018

Plans revealed to convert abandoned hospital in Greenpoint into affordable housing complex

Shuttered since 1982, the Greenpoint Hospital will soon be home to a new mixed-use development with roughly 500 units of affordable housing, as well as a shelter for 200 homeless New Yorkers. The city's Department of Housing Preservation and Development announced on Thursday it will work with St. Nicks Alliance, Hudson Companies Incorporated, and Project Renewal on the project, with the design led by Magnusson Architecture and Planning (MAP) and Architecture Outfit. The 3.4-acre site, located at 288 Jackson Street, will include two newly constructed buildings and two rehabilitated historic buildings.
see the renderings

Affordable Housing

September 12, 2018

102-year-old Orwasher’s Bakery is preserving NYC nostalgia while adapting to the times

There's a good chance that if you've walked into one of Orwasher's Bakery's Manhattan storefronts over the past decade you've assumed the 102-year-old business is still family owned. But the original Orwasher family sold it in 2007 to Keith Cohen. The likely confusion comes from Cohen's dedication to maintaining the mom-and-pop feel of his Upper East and West Side locations, along with the vintage recipes for New York staples such as rye bread, challah, and sourdough. But he's also used his business smarts to make some well-received updates, including a major expansion of the wholesale business, a new line of wine breads in collaboration with Long Island-based vineyard Channing Daughters, a formula for the perfect baguette (he even traveled to Paris to learn the art!), and, perhaps most impressively, the addition of the elusive New York bagel. 6sqft recently visited Cohen at the two-year-old Upper West Side location to learn a bit more about his journey as master baker and proprietor of one of NYC's most beloved old-school businesses and get a behind-the-scenes look at where the magic happens.
Start carbo-loading

September 10, 2018

NYC fall art roundup: highlights of the season’s new exhibitions, openings and events

29 Rooms Once the calendar flips to September, New York City’s fall arts season heats up with high-profile museum exhibits, important gallery openings, music, dance and film events and more. Here, we offer our top picks and suggestions for the best ways to get swept up in the season’s art whirl, from Warhol at the Whitney to goats in a gallery.
Add some great art to your fall calendar

Events & Things To Do

September 7, 2018

Archtober 2018: Top 10 NYC events and program highlights

Archtober is New York City’s annual month-long architecture and design festival of tours, lectures, films, and exhibitions taking place during October when a full calendar of events turns a focus on the importance of architecture and design. Organized by the Center for Architecture, in collaboration with over 70 partner organizations across the city, the festival raises awareness of the important role of design and the richness of New York’s built environment. Now in its eighth year, Archtober offers something for everyone—from the arch-intellectual who wants to talk about the relationship between architecture and power to the armchair landscape architect with a thing for waterways, parks or sustainable design—in the 100+ event roster. Below, we pick 10 don't-miss highlights in this year’s program.
Learn about the architecture of NYC at these cool events

September 5, 2018

How New York City’s female teachers led the charge for ‘Equal Pay for Equal Work’

With public schools back in session as of today, let’s remember that it was from the classrooms of New York City that the call for “Equal Pay for Equal Work” was sent thundering around the world. In 1893, Kate Hogan graduated from NYU Law School with the first class of women allowed to earn JDs. By 1906, she was working as a seventh-grade teacher in Manhattan. At the time, the starting salary for a male teacher in the New York City public schools was $900 per year, but a woman in the same position earned just $600. Seeing no justice in that situation, Hogan founded the Interborough Association of Women Teachers. The Association’s mission and cry: “Equal Pay for Equal Work.”
Learn more!

History

Our 1,100sqft: A move to the Bay Ridge waterfront gave this couple serenity and space

6sqft’s series “My sqft” checks out the homes of New Yorkers across all the boroughs. Our latest interior adventure brings us to Daniel and Kyle’s Bay Ridge co-op. Want to see your home featured here? Get in touch!

September 4, 2018

Our 1,100sqft: A move to the Bay Ridge waterfront gave this couple serenity and space

Bay Ridge may not be on your list of top Brooklyn 'nabes, and that's exactly why it's such a peaceful enclave for those in the know. After living in a cramped West Village apartment, Daniel Saponaro and Kyle Hutchison set four must-haves in a new place to live--a bright and spacious home, green streets, proximity to transit, and great nearby restaurants. They found all of this and more in a beautiful pre-war apartment building on Bay Ridge's waterfront Shore Road. When they rented their 1,000-square-foot home in 2008, the couple always had a renovation in their back of their minds, and two years ago, when they were given the opportunity to purchase, these makeover dreams became a reality. Daniel, a fashion designer and women's clothing company owner, knew that it would take some work to sell his husband, a VP at a higher education consulting firm, on some of his remodeling ideas, from knocking down walls to coming up with creative ways to display their contemporary art and pottery collections. With the help of online decorating service Modsy, Daniel and Kyle created their perfect slice of serenity and learned a bit about their styles on the way. Ahead, hear more about the process and take a tour of this fun and functional home.
Take the tour

Your Labor Day weekend subway guide: J’Ouvert diversions and station reopenings

Photo via Wikipedia

August 31, 2018

Your Labor Day weekend subway guide: J’Ouvert diversions and station reopenings

By Hannah Frishberg

This Labor Day weekend, there will be the usual slew of service changes in addition to some special ones just for the holiday. The 2 train will be skipping Church Avenue in the wee hours of Monday during the J'Ouvert Festival – an odd rerouting, seemingly in the name of obstruction, likely to limit attendance to the celebration, which has attracted controversy following past years' violence. The Eastern Parkway-Brooklyn Museum stop will be passed during the West Indian Day Parade. In good news, southbound service at the Cathedral Parkway-110th Street B and C stop – which has been closed for four months for structural repairs – will resume at noon on Sunday and northbound service at 5am on Tuesday. As well, regular A and Rockaway Park Shuttle service will resume on Tuesday following a disruptive summer of flood protection work. Plus, the LaGuardia Link Q70 bus will operate free of charge all weekend.
Here's what else is in store

Transit

Travel on a 1920s ocean liner in the historic Cunard Building’s new multimedia event

Photo courtesy of D.S. DestiNY

August 28, 2018

Travel on a 1920s ocean liner in the historic Cunard Building’s new multimedia event

By Emily Nonko

One of Lower Manhattan's most stunning interiors is getting a moment in the spotlight, thanks to a Montreal-based multimedia company. The building in question is 25 Broadway, also known as the Cunard Building or Standard & Poors Building. The 1920s office was designed with an extravagant great hall for Cunard Line and Anchor Lines. The nautical-themed space, where cruise-goers would purchase tickets, became an interior landmark in 1995. Moment Factory, a multimedia company known for creating immersive environments, felt the hall would be the perfect place to debut its work in New York City. The design team studied just about every inch of the elaborate room, boasting murals, domed ceilings and marble work, to transform it for visitors while remaining true to the original architecture. The result, as the company puts it, is a "massive 360-degree digital canvas, enveloping its audience in light, color and sound." 6sqft got a sneak peek of this unique show, which brings you aboard a classic ocean liner and reveals the hall in all its glory by the end of the show.
Check out the incredible space

August 27, 2018

Behind the scenes at Williamsburg’s abandoned Bayside Oil Depot, set to be NYC’s next public park

We first learned about the proposal to turn Williamsburg's former Bayside Oil Depot into a public park nearly two years ago. Since then, co-founders Karen Zabarsky and Stacey Anderson have been working tirelessly with a team of designers and environmentalists to refine their plans to be something both true to the site's history and representative of where the neighborhood is heading. Part of the larger Bushwick Inlet Park, a 28-acre open space along an unused waterfront industrial stretch, the plan is unique in that it plans to adaptively reuse the 10, 50-foot decommissioned fuel containers, transforming them into everything from performance spaces to greenhouses. With a fresh name--THE TANKS at Bushwick Inlet Park--Karen and Stacey recently took 6sqft on an exclusive, behind-the-scenes tour of the abandoned site, giving us a glimpse into how this incredible industrial relic is poised to become NYC's next anticipated park. Get a rare, up-close look at the tanks, hear what these powerhouse women have been up to, and learn what we can expect in the near future.
You won't believe these photos

August 23, 2018

100 things to do in NYC that are completely free

Despite being one of the most expensive cities to live in, New York City offers many free activities, events, and attractions all year round, letting you pinch pennies when the rent check is due. From free lectures at the Met to free group meditation classes, there are tons of activities that don't cost a dime. To help New York visitors and natives alike, we've put together a guide of the 100 best wallet-friendly things to do in the Big Apple.
See the full list

University in Exile: How refugees at the New School helped win WWII and transform American scholarship

L’Ecole Libre des Hautes Etudes at the New School in 1942, via France-Amerique

August 22, 2018

University in Exile: How refugees at the New School helped win WWII and transform American scholarship

In 1937, the great German writer Thomas Mann suggested “To the Living Spirit” as a motto for the New School’s University in Exile. Since the Nazis had removed the same motto from the great lecture hall at the University of Heidelberg, the phrase would “indicate that the living spirit, driven from Germany, has found a home in this country,” and that home was on West 12th Street. Between 1933 and 1945, The New School’s University in Exile offered asylum to more than 180 refugee scholars from fascist Europe. The exiled academics became the Graduate Faculty of The New School for Social Research and represented the largest contingent of refugee intellectuals in the United States. In the classroom, they made pioneering advances in the social sciences; in the war room, they advised the Roosevelt Administration on economic policy, war information, and espionage. Educating future Nobel Prize winners as well as future Oscar winners, they influenced American scholastic and cultural life to such a degree that even Marlon Brando remembered his émigré professors at the New School, “enriching the city's intellectual life with an intensity that has probably never been equaled anywhere during a comparable period of time."
More living and learning this way!

History

Organization honors 9/11 victims by giving away 500,000 daffodil bulbs

Image: Eden, Janine and Jim via Flickr.

August 21, 2018

Organization honors 9/11 victims by giving away 500,000 daffodil bulbs