Sunnyside Gardens

Architecture, History, and a Sense of Place in Queens

With William Gati, AIA, RA, MUP

Sunnyside Gardens was built from 1924 to 1928, and Phipps Garden Apartments in 1931-32 and 1935. The builders were inspired by the English Garden City movement of Ebenezer Howard and Raymond Unwin. Architects Clarence S. Stein, Henry Wright, and Frederick L. Ackerman worked with landscape architect Marjorie Sewell Cautley. Their philosophical colleague, the urban critic Lewis Mumford, became one of the first residents. The real estate developers were philanthropic idealists, too, and included Alexander M. Bing, William Sloane Coffin, Felix Adler, and Eleanor Roosevelt. Reserving unusually large areas for open space and minimizing construction costs, the designers created homes affordable to working people by combining rows of one- to three-family private houses with co-op and rental apartment buildings, arranging these around common gardens and parks, and placing stores and garages on the periphery of the neighborhood.
Tour leader and architect William Gati will compare this neighborhood with other garden communities in Queens with regard to transportation, housing stock, development needs, the green movement and creating a sense of place. (This tour provides 2 LU/HSW credits from AIA Queens.)

Saturday, November 24
11:00 AM — 1:00 PM

Tickets:
Member: $20
Non-member: $30