Early Louis Bonert: 5th Street, 1891

Somehow this early "flat house" by Louis Bonert in 5th Street just below 6th Avenue escaped our notice. The new building notice appeared in an 1891 Brooklyn Eagle:

Brooklyn Eagle, October 10, 1891, p. 1 ("New Buildings and Real Estate")

393 5th Street - unprotected

The building, at three stories, is uncharacteristically small for Bonert. But it does exhibit the top-floor rounded windows, and terra cotta spandrel panels, with which we have become so familiar from his later "Green Man" style, Romanesque-inflected apartment buildings:

393 5th Street - detail

The building is located just around the corner from two complete blockfronts that we have linked to Bonert. We have not yet uncovered evidence to document Bonert's hand in the west side of 6th Avenue between 4th and 5th Streets, but we have linked Bonert to the east side of that block of 6th Avenue. In any case, the doorway of the 5th Street building is identical to doorways from the 6th Avenue rows.

393 5th Street - detail

348 6th Avenue - detail

355 6th Avenue - detail