Willoughby Square Park

Downtown Brooklyn’s Abolitionist Place park is now open

All photos courtesy of Downtown Brooklyn Partnership

May 8, 2024

Downtown Brooklyn’s Abolitionist Place park is now open

First promised 20 years ago, a Downtown Brooklyn park commemorating the borough's abolitionist history is finally open. City officials on Wednesday cut the ribbon on the 1.15-acre Abolitionist Place, located at 225 Duffield Street. Designed by landscape architecture firm Hargreaves Jones, the park offers a playground, a water play feature, a central lawn, a paved area with boulders, seating, and a dog run. The green space was part of the 2004 upzoning of Downtown Brooklyn and planning officially began in 2010. Financial issues and design changes delayed the project several times.
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Architecture And Design

Plans for abolitionist memorial in Downtown Brooklyn park delayed again

Renderings by Hargreaves Jones, courtesy of NYCEDC

January 26, 2021

Plans for abolitionist memorial in Downtown Brooklyn park delayed again

By Devin Gannon

After being in the works for nearly two decades, plans to build a public park in Downtown Brooklyn with a memorial to the neighborhood's abolitionist history are delayed once again. The Public Design Commission last week tabled a conceptual proposal from artist Kameelah Janan Rasheed after preservationists and community members during an intense public hearing criticized both the design for missing details and the city's lack of transparency.
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Events & Things To Do

Community board wants to rename Willoughby Square Park to honor area’s abolitionist ties

Renderings by Hargreaves Jones, courtesy of NYCEDC

September 27, 2019

Community board wants to rename Willoughby Square Park to honor area’s abolitionist ties

By Alexandra Alexa

During a Brooklyn Community Board 2 meeting on Wednesday, the group's Youth, Education, and Cultural Affairs Committee voted to rename Downtown Brooklyn's proposed Willoughby Square Park, as Curbed NY first reported. Jacob Morris, a historian and the head of the Harlem Historical Society and the New York City Freedom Trail, initially brought forward a resolution to co-name the square Abolitionist Place Park. By the end of the meeting, the board decided to recommend a full renaming to the city's Economic Development Corporation. The resolution will be voted on by CB2's full board on Oct. 7.
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Uncategorized

Updated design revealed for long-awaited Willoughby Square Park in Downtown Brooklyn

Rendering by Hargreaves Jones, courtesy of NYCEDC

August 28, 2019

Updated design revealed for long-awaited Willoughby Square Park in Downtown Brooklyn

By Devin Gannon

The city unveiled on Monday an updated design for its Willoughby Square Park project, which has been 15 years in the making. The city's Economic Development Corporation and Hargreaves Jones Landscape Architecture presented revised plans to Brooklyn's Community Board, which include lawn space, promenade, and seating near City Point's Dekalb Market, as Bklyner reported.
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Architecture And Design

Temporary “pop-up park” opens at future site of Willoughby Square Park

Images courtesy of EDC

July 10, 2019

Temporary “pop-up park” opens at future site of Willoughby Square Park

By Alexandra Alexa

As plans for a permanent park at Willoughby Square go forward, a temporary green space at the same site has opened to the public. The 15,000-square-foot "pop-up park" will provide a green escape for the local community until the end of the summer in 2020, at which point construction will commence on the permanent, 1.15-acre park scheduled for completion by 2022.
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Architecture And Design

A previous rendering; via EDC

May 24, 2019

City revives Downtown Brooklyn’s Willoughby Square Park project

By Devin Gannon

Downtown Brooklyn is finally getting a park that was promised to the neighborhood more than 15 years ago. The city's Economic Development Corporation announced on Friday it will take over construction of the green space at Willoughby Square. In January, the city abandoned the plan to add a new park on top of a high-tech parking facility because of the developer's inability to secure financing. But, as first reported by Crain's, the EDC said the agency's capital division will take on the work itself, without a private developer or the underground automated parking lot originally proposed. The city estimates the park will open sometime in 2022.
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Architecture And Design

Rendering: Economic Development Corporation.

January 31, 2019

Downtown Brooklyn’s Willoughby Square Park project is officially dead

By Michelle Cohen

It appears that residents at Downtown Brooklyn's new Brooklyn Point development won't be getting their "beautifully landscaped one-acre oasis" after all. Plans to add a new park atop a high-tech parking facility on Willoughby Street across from City Point in Downtown Brooklyn are officially off the table, Brooklyn Paper reports. The plan was set in motion a decade ago under the Bloomberg administration. City officials said Wednesday that a deal with the developer chosen for the job back in 2013 failed to close.
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Architecture And Design

December 31, 2014

REVEALED: 141 Willoughby, 30-Story Mixed-Use Tower to Replace Site Once Slated for Eminent Domain Takeover

By Ondel Hylton

A Downtown Brooklyn school once planned to be seized through eminent domain will sprout a 30-story mixed-use tower by Savanna Partners. Renderings posted on Savanna's website reveal a glass tower at 141 Willoughby Street with a retail base, student housing, and commercial or residential space above. The project will replace the three-story building that's home to the Institute of Design and Construction, a 77-year-old technical college.
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