Preservationists Much Happier With New Greenwich Village Mansion Design

WEST VILLAGE, NY — The preservationist group that fiercely opposed an architect's proposal to transform two historic Greenwich Village buildings on Jane Street into a tall, glass mansion told Patch Thursday that the architect's new, reformed proposal was a "vast improvement over the prior design."

"We believe it is a vast improvement over the prior design, and responds to many (if not all) of the concerns we and others had raised," Andrew Berman, executive director of the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation (GVSHP), wrote in an email statement to Patch on Thursday.

"This is a great victory for community efforts to stop what would have been a wholly inappropriate and precedent-setting intrusion into the Greenwich Village Historic District," Berman wrote. "While there are details on the new proposed design that we would and will argue should be changed, these are details, as opposed to fundamental elements that have no place in this neighborhood."

The first design by Steven Harris Architects, presented to the LPC in July, showed plans to transform 85 and 89 Jane Street into a tall mega-mansion with 80- to 90-foot concrete, glass towers. The GVSHP protested the mansion at the hearing in July and generated hundreds of opposition letters to the LPC, calling the design "completely out of place" in the neighborhood.

"The proposal would insert a highly visible 80-foot tall glass tower that would glow at night, and a 90-foot tall concrete tower behind it, each of which would be quite prominent from the street and down the block both east and west," GVHPS wrote in its testimony to the LPC on July 12. "There is absolutely no justification for these elements, and they should be eliminated entirely from the proposal."

The new design shows a significantly shorter glass tower and front-facing facade. The revisions will be presented at a Landmarks Preservation Hearing on Tuesday, Oct. 11 in a public meeting where public testimony will not be allowed. The public can submit corrections via email before the hearing to comments@lpc.nyc.gov.

The two brick buildings currently on the lot were built at the turn of the century and used to be an ice cream factory, a garage and a Steinway piano showroom.

Someone under anonymous LLCs bought 85 Jane for $20 million and 89 Jane for $12 million in 2012. The property listing put up in 2009 was promoted as "the last great mansion site available in Greenwich Village."

Here's what the lot looks like now, courtesy of GVSHP's public testimony:

Here is the original design:

Here is the revised design:

You can see the vast difference in these renderings by Steven Harris Architects:

Photo credit: Steven Harris Architects as presented to the LPC in public testimony; Top photo: Google Maps