Thomas Bennett for Louis Bonert in 3rd Street

Long ago we identified prolific Park Slope builder Louis Bonert as the developer of much of 3rd Street between 6th and 7th Avenues.

More recently we identified Pohlman and Patrick as the architects for 8 westermost of these apartment houses, 4 on each side of the street, toward 6th Avenue. Pohlman and Patrick's buildings were erected in 1903, and can be identified by the flat, foliate entablature surmounting the entrance:

458 3rd Street
Pohlman and Patrick, architects - 1903
Louis Bonert, builder

458 3rd Street - entrance detail

Bonert apparently felt he had found a winning formula with these spacious, 8-family, 38'-wide apartment houses, because he built seven more of them one year later, in 1904, just uphill from the first group. For reasons unknown, however, he chose to employ for the later group another prolific Brooklyn architect, Thomas Bennett, with whom he had collaborated on some other apartments in 3rd Street a few years earlier:

"Projected Buildings," RERBG v. 73, no. 1882 (April 9, 1904): p. 847.
-639- 3rd st, n s, 293 e 6th av, three 4-sty brk tenements, 38.3x68, 8 families, steam heat; total cost, $45,000; L Bonert, 6th av and 3rd st; ar't, T Bennett, 3rd av and 52d st.

The 1904 buildings are nearly identical to the earlier group, and are distinguished mainly by a peaked entablature surmounting the doorway. The 1904 group also has one less window illuminating the central staircase:

461 3rd Street
Thomas Bennett, architect - 1904
Louis Bonert, builder

461 3rd Street - entrance detail

The similarity between the buildings from two different architects is remarkable. Bonert certainly seems to have maintained no loyalty to a particular architect from one development to the next.

L Bonert & T Bennett in 3rd Street

Here's another new finding gleaned from the Real Estate Record and Builders' Guide. The RERBG issue of April 6, 1901 carries news of plans filed by prolific Park Slope builder Louis Bonert for four 4-story, 8-family "tenements" (i.e. multi-family housing), on the south side of 3rd Street between 5th & 6th Avenues. Bonert's architect here is Thomas Bennett, who designed a great many Park Slope apartment houses from around this same time:

"Projected Buildings," RERBG v. 67, no. 1725 (April 6, 1901): p. 634. -468- 3rd st, s s, 247.8 e 5th av, four 4-sty brk tenements, 32.2x90, 8 families; cost, $72,000; L Bonert, 6th av and 3rd st; ar't, T Bennett, 198 53rd st.

The first of the row, all of which still stand in virtually unchanged condition, is shown below:

392 3rd Street - erected 1901
Louis Bonert, builder
Thomas Bennett, architect

Louis Bonert is of course well-known to long-time readers of this blog; we suspect he built more housing in Park Slope than any other developer. We had a hunch these buildings were erected by Bonert, although we never had any concrete evidence before now. In part our suspicion was based on the unusual tripartite windows on the first floor; other examples from Bonert's buildings are found directly across the street.

392 3rd Street - window detail

392 3rd Street - cornice detail

Pohlman & Patrick in President Street

The American Architect and Building News yields the architects' names for Louis Bonert's 1902 row of four 3-story, 6-family apartment houses on the south side of President Street between 6th and 7th Avenues:

"Building Intelligence; Houses; Brooklyn, N. Y.," AABN vol. 76, no. 1394 (Sept. 13, 1902): p. xii.

– "President St., near 7^th Ave., 4 three-st’y brick dwells., 31' 9" x 83' 6"; $44,000; own., Louis Bonnert [sic - Bonert], 319 Sixth Ave., arch., Pohlman & Patrick, 322 Fifty-third St."

782-788 President Street
Louis Bonert, builder
Pohlman & Patrick, architects - 1902

We visited this row two years ago during our lengthy review of the great many Park Slope buildings constructed by prolific builder and local resident Louis Bonert.

At that time, however, we had not yet identified the architects of the row. It can now be credited to the firm of Pohlman and Patrick.

782 President Street
Louis Bonert, builder
Pohlman & Patrick, architects - 1902

7th Avenue, 10th to 11th Streets, West Side

By request, we turn our attention now to the west side of 7th Avenue between 10th & 11th Streets in the South Slope.

To the casual observer, the entire blockfront might appear to have been built as a single unit. Each building is of brick, brownstone-faced, 3 stories, flats over stores, 3 bays, flat front, with identical neo-Grec detailing around the windows:

350-358 7th Avenue (sw corner 10th Street)

(Our photos are from 2008-2009 and show the late, much lamented Tea Lounge!)

360-368 7th Avenue (nw corner 11th Street)

On closer inspection, certain subtle differences appear. The side facade of 350 7th Avenue, at the 10th Street end, is plainer than the side facade of 368 7th Avenue, at the 11th Street end, which features decorative sawtooth brick patterns and a slightly projecting chimney stack:

350 7th Avenue (sw corner 10th Street)

368 7th Avenue (nw corner 11th Street)

An even closer view of the corner buildings highlights the identical facade detailing of the window frames, but also reveals differences between the cornices:

350 7th Avenue - detail

368 7th Avenue - detail

So what do you think? Same builder/owner/architect, or not? It is indeed puzzling. Compounding the confusion is the fact that we have not yet found any supporting attributions in our usual sources (Brooklyn Eagle, American Architect & Building News, etc).

However, our researchers have actually pulled the Dept. of Buildings files for this stretch of 7th Avenue, so we do have findings at least for some of the row.

Regarding 350 7th Avenue, at the sw corner of 10th Street, the building files yield a surprise: the original permit, dated September 3, 1885, was for a row of two buildings at the northeast corner of the intersection, diagonally across the street! But pencilled in at the top of the permit, with a date of Sept. 12, are the words:

It is now proposed to erect the below buildings on the S.W. cor 7th Ave + 10th St - To front on 7th Ave Also to build 3 houses Two to be 20 ft. front Approved David Acker Depty Comm

Building permit, 350-354 7th Avenue
September 3, 1885
Revised September 12, 1885

Apparently the plans were changed at the last minute, to build a row of 3 buildings on the SW corner of the intersection, instead of a row of 2 on the NE corner. (One can see that the letters "N.E." in the original plan, above, are struck out.)

The next page of the permit reveals the names, quite familiar to us by now, of those responsible at least for this row of 3:

350-354 7th Avenue - 1885 building permit, showing:
C. Nickenig, owner
R. Dixon, architect
L. Bonert, builder

Charles Nickenig of course built Acme Hall and other 7th Avenue buildings; Robert Dixon was a prolific Park Slope builder; and Louis Bonert would go on to develop a vast amount of Park Slope property including some of the finest houses within the current historic district.

The plans also contain the original architect's drawing with R. Dixon's name stamped in the corner; the rendering shows the commercial space with two floors above, and the cellar floor below ground level with thick foundation walls:

350-354 7th Avenue, rendering
R. Dixon, architect, 1885

Our researcher also found DOB files for 368 7th Avenue, at the northwest corner of 11th Street, the building at the other end of the row. The plans, dated October 19, 1886, are for a single building, with Bonert now listed as owner as well as builder. The architect for 368 7th Avenue is listed as Frederick E. Lockwood:

368 7th Avenue - building permit dated Oct. 19, 1886

368 7th Avenue - building permit
Owner - Louis Bonert
Architect - Frederick E. Lockwood
Mason/Carpenter - Louis Bonert

No other original building files for this blockfront were found by our researcher. So what is one to make of this confusing situation? A row of highly similar buildings; plans extant only for the end buildings; different architects; Louis Bonert a constant in both.

Below is what our researcher, a professionally trained preservationist, has to say about the row, beyond what is revealed by the building files above:

All buildings in this block share distinct architectural elements including building height, brownstone facing, a unique wood cornice, and machined window entablature so while it is not reflected in the Buildings Department records these buildings were built within a short span of time. Records for the corner buildings, lots 41 and 50, show different owners, architects, and builders, but the same key elements, and were built in 1885 and 1886 respectively, providing a timeline for construction of the infill buildings.

10th Street: 1891 Flats from Louis Bonert

Once upon a time we devoted a huge amount of space on this blog to builder Louis Bonert, the man whose contributions to the physical appearance of Park Slope today cannot be understated. We haven't featured anything from Bonert in a while, but his attributions continue to pile up.

On the south side of 10th Street, between 7th & 8th Avenues, stands a row of 6 three-family "flat houses" (so named because they feature one "flat" or apartment per floor):

574-584 10th Street
Louis Bonert, Owner
Robert Dixon, Architect - 1890-91

According to an attribution from the American Architect & Building News, predecessor of today's American Architect magazine, the row was built in 1891 by Louis Bonert. Prolific Brooklyn architect Robert Dixon provided the plans:

"Building Intelligence; Apartment-Houses; Brooklyn, N. Y.," AABN vol. 30, no. 782 (Dec. 20, 1890): p. xvii.

– "Tenth St., s s, 285' 9" w Eighth Ave., 6 three-st’y brick flats, tin roofs; cost, $4,000 each; owner, L. Bonard [sic - Bonert], on premises; architect, Robert Dixon, 219 Montague St."

All 6 of the original "flat houses" still stand today. Unfortunately, all 6 have lost their original cornices, although in other respects they remain in near-original condition.

We sometimes wonder what term would have been used had people first been accustomed to living in "flats," and then someone invented the house with stairs. Would such an arrangement have been initially called an "upright"?

Mystery at 7th Avenue & Union Street

The northeast corner of 7th Avenue and Union Street is occupied by a handsome block of four mixed-use buildings (flats over stores) in a vaguely Neoclassical style:

83-87 7th Avenue (Park Slope Historic District); 89 7th Avenue (unprotected)

The row exemplifies the schizoid boundaries of the original Park Slope Historic District, designated July 17, 1973: the three buildings on the left (83-87 7th Ave.) are in the current historic district, while the building on the right, at the Union Street corner, was left out, even though all four buildings were clearly designed as a unit.

We know from our Documentary History of the Park Slope Historic District Expansion that the parcel of four building lots came into the hands of prolific Park Slope builder Louis Bonert in 1896. Bonert purchased the lots from the executor of the "Morrison estate" and immediately filed plans, prepared by architect Robert Dixon, for four mixed-use buildings, the interiors of which were to be "fitted up in the finest manner and have every modern improvement".

Brooklyn Daily Eagle, January 22, 1896, p.12 ("Real Estate Market")

New York Times, January 23, 1896, ("Brooklyn Realty Matters")

Brooklyn Daily Eagle, April 24, 1896, p. 13 ("New Buildings")

Building Intelligence; Houses; Brooklyn, N. Y.,

– "Seventh Ave., n e cor. Union St., 4 four-st’y brick dwells., one 27' 6" x 90', one 21' 8" x 62', two 20' 6" x 62', tin roofs; $42,000; own., Louis Bonert, 321 Tenth St.; arch., Robert Dixon, 213 Montague St."

American Architect & Building News, vol. 52, no. 1062 (May 2, 1896): p. 2

The buildings exhibit a number of characteristics similar to other buildings erected by Bonert, including the arched windows at the 4th floor and the decorative panels below some of the windows:

One of the most distinctive characteristics is the unusual tripartite windows at 85 7th Avenue. These windows are found on only a very few other buildings in Park Slope, all associated with Louis Bonert, standing in 3rd Street between 5th & 6th Avenues.

85 7th Avenue - detail

408 3rd Street - detail

Alas, the Bonert attribution appears to be incorrect. Since three of these buildings are within the current Historic District, we can consult the existing Designation Report, which maintains that the buildings were erected in 1901 by builder Leo W. Winkelman to plans by architect M. J. Morrill:

Park Slope Historic District Designation Report, p. 12: "83-87 7th Avenue"

We have been trained to consider the current Designation Report to be infallible (although we have identified at least one omission in it), so we can only assume that Bonert's plans for this parcel were quickly aborted for some reason; that the property was transferred from Bonert to Winkelman some time between 1896 and 1901; and that the similarities of the existing buildings to Bonert's other buildings are merely coincidental. We have found no information documenting the property transfer from Bonert to Winkelman, and no building permits issued to Winkelman for these lots.

The narrow entrances to the flats above, up three steps from the sidewalks, flank the original commercial spaces on the ground floor.

The corner building at Union Street is within the first phase of the proposed extension to the Park Slope Historic District, so one hopes that it will soon obtain the historic district protections enjoyed by its immediate neighbors to the north.

83-87 7th Avenue (Park Slope Historic District); 89 7th Avenue (unprotected)

Postscript: Louis Bonert

Our intrepid band of historic researchers has uncovered a wealth of new material regarding our favorite Park Slope builder, the prolific Louis Bonert, about whom we have written a great deal on this blog. We won't review the entire Bonert thread, but we want to clarify a couple of earlier tentative attributions.

Most of our latest material has been culled from the American Architect and Building News (AABN), a great resource for researchers of historic buildings. Some of the AABN is online, but we are lucky to have a researcher who has access to nearly the complete run in hardcopy, from which we have derived a wealth of new material for our ever-expanding "Documentary History of Park Slope" (which we hope to publish shortly on the web). Our Research Committee is winding up a chronological scan of the entire AABN run, extracting all of the "hits" for Park Slope. As the hits are obtained, we are logging them in the comments section of our comprehensive photo survey of Park Slope, and also compiling them in a master file we are calling the "Documentary History" of Park Slope, which we will be publishing in a few days.

At any rate, in our earlier Bonert series, we went out on a limb a few times and engaged in "interpretation" or "speculation", in contrast to simply publishing the documentary evidence.

One of these cases is the west side of Sixth Avenue between 4th and 5th Streets (the block from Puppetworks to the Park Slope Ale House):

6th Avenue and 5th Street, northwest corner - unprotected

6th Avenue and 4th Street, southwest corner - unprotected

Despite a complete lack of any evidence, we speculated earlier that this row was by Bonert, based on its similarities to buildings across the street for which we have a documented connection. And we are gratified that the AABN has now confirmed the connection. According to the AABN, Louis Bonert constructed this row in 1891 to the plans of prolific Brooklyn architect W. M. Coots:

"Building Intelligence; Apartment-Houses; Brooklyn, N. Y.," AABN vol. 34, no. 823 (Oct. 3, 1891): p. xvi.

– "Sixth Ave., n w cor. Fifth St., 5 four-st’y brick apartment-houses, tin roofs; cost, $35,000; owner and builder, L. Bonnert [sic - Bonert], 528 Tenth St.; architect, W. M. Coots, 26 Court St."

"Building Intelligence; Stores; Brooklyn, N. Y.," AABN vol. 34, no. 826 (Oct. 24, 1891): p. xviii.

– "Sixth Ave., s w cor. Fourth St., 5 four-st’y stores and apartment-houses, tin roofs; cost, $35,000; owner and builder, L. Bonnert, 528 Tenth St.; architect, W. M. Coots, 26 Court St."

We speculated elsewhere that the northeast corner of 6th Avenue and First street might also have been from Bonert, based on similarities to some of his other work:

6th Avenue and 1st Street, northeast corner - unprotected

However, the AABN confirms that these buildings were built in 1895 by M. S. Buckley to designs by architect Robert Dixon:

"Building Intelligence; Houses; Brooklyn, N. Y.," AABN vol. 49, no. 1019 (Jul. 6, 1895): p. 7.
– "Sixth Ave., e s, 22' 8" n 1^st St., 4 four-st’y brick dwells., 19' 4" x 62'; tin roofs; $19,000; own. and bld., M. S. Buckley, 287 Tenth St.; arch., Robt. Dixon, 219 Montague St."

– "Sixth Ave., , n e cor. 1^st St., four-st’y brick dwell., 22' 8" x 90'; tin roof; $8,000; own. and bld., M. S. Buckley, 287 Tenth St.; arch., Robt. Dixon, 219 Montague St."

In truth we harbored doubts about our earlier tentative attribution to Bonert. The buildings lack the distinctive "Green Man" panels beneath the windows, and also feature only single columns flanking the doorways, rather than Bonert's distinctive column clusters. Now the AABN confirms that they are in fact not by Bonert at all, although they do seem somewhat derivative of his buildings.

Watch for the upcoming publication of our "Documentary History" of Park Slope.

In Memoriam: Louis Bonert

We conclude our review of the work of prolific Park Slope builder Louis Bonert with a glimpse into his personal life.

Bonert maintained a country residence in Sayville, Long Island. In 1908 his 25-year-old daughter Lucille was driving a car that was struck by a Long Island Rail Road train at an unguarded Sayville crossing, and was permanently injured. Lucille sued the LIRR and was awarded $10,000 in damages in 1910:

New York Times, April 13, 1910, p. 4 ("$10,000 For Her Injuries")

Louis Bonert, toward the end of his life, and having done so much to create the built environment of Park Slope, actually moved into one of his own buildings, a fine townhouse at 625 Second Street in the park block:

625-627 2nd Street, Park Slope Historic District

Bonert built this house, designed by architects Eisenla and Carlson, in 1908, as part of a longer row. This house was Bonert's residence at the time of his death, at 74, on May 15, 1916:

New York Times, May 17, 1916, p. 11 ("Died")

Bonert's funeral observances occurred at what was then the Emanuel Lutheran Church, in 7th Street just above 6th Avenue. The building still stands today:

Park Congregational Church

- unprotected

The building, whose history we hope to recount in a later post, dates to 1870 and is now hemmed in closely by buildings on both sides.

It was Louis Bonert, careful readers will recall, who sold the land on which another Lutheran church, St. Matthews English, now stands at 6th Avenue and 2nd Street in Park Slope:

St. Matthews English Lutheran Church - unprotected

Louis Bonert died intestate, a situation that unfortunately precipitated a legal battle between his widow, Louisa, and his daughter Lucille, who was appointed "administratrix" of the estate. Although Bonert was deemed a wealthy man in life, apparently his estate was reduced to virtually nothing by the claims of creditors, taxes, and administrative fees, prompting Bonert's widow Louisa to mount a lawsuit against her own daughter Lucille:

The New York Supplement

, 1921

But let us draw the curtain on this unfortunate family squabble. We prefer to remember Bonert as the man who build so many fine buildings in Park Slope.

We recall our Greek philosophy professor, quoting Alfred North Whitehead, saying that all Western philosophy is a series of footnotes to Plato. In the same way, It can almost be said that the development of Park Slope, at least along 6th Avenue and side streets in the central Slope, is a series of "footnotes to Louis Bonert".

Louis Bonert: 8th Avenue Apartments, 1910

A New York Times search on "Bonnert", a common misspelling of Park Slope builder Louis Bonert's surname, yields a new "hit" from 1910:

New York Times, August 28, 1910, p. 10 ("Brooklyn's Apartment House Development Active on the Heights and Prospect Park")

As noted in the article, after focusing exclusively on apartment houses, Louis Bonert broke into single-family home construction in the first decade of the last century. And he did so in a characteristically big way: according to the Park Slope Historic District designation report, Bonert developed the entire south side of First Street between 8th Avenue and Prospect Park West:

1st Street, 8th/PPW, south side - Park Slope Historic District

He also built most of the north side of Second Street, also in the park block:

2nd Street, 8th/PPW, north side - Park Slope Historic District

These houses are perhaps some of the most luxurious, desirable, and costly residences in Park Slope today.

The article notes that about the same time, Bonert constructed an entire block of buildings on 8th Avenue, between 4th & 5th Streets:

404-420 8th Avenue - unprotected

We've followed the progression of Bonert's apartment houses through 4-family to 8-family configurations. We haven't counted the doorbells yet, but we suspect these 8th Avenue apartments must be 16-family buildings; they are truly colossal in scale.

Bonert's 4-family "single flat" apartment houses were usually about 20 feet in width. His "double flat" buildings (two apartments per floor) began at 30 feet in width, and progressed through 36 to 46 foot configurations. These buildings in 8th Avenue are a full 50 feet wide, and very deep as well:

420 8th Avenue - unprotected

After spending weeks with Mr. Bonert on the blog, we've quite nearly reached the end of the line. As far as we know right now, these were the final buildings constructed by Louis Bonert in Park Slope. It remains only to relate what little else we know about him in the next post.

Early Louis Bonert: 4th Avenue, 1884

A reader who is helping conduct research for a possible expansion of the Park Slope Historic District sends along a tip about some buildings by Louis Bonert on the west side of 4th Avenue, at the northwest corner of Bergen Street. They are outside our Study Area, and technically not even in Park Slope, but we thought we'd include them here anyway, along with all the other Bonerts, since we are "completists" to a degree.

They are a group of five three-story, mixed-use buildings (flats over stores). Our correspondent found the following listing in the American Architect & Building News from 1884:

"Building Intelligence; Brooklyn," AABN vol. 15, no. 437 (May 10, 1884): p. 227.

-- "Fourth Ave., n w cor. Bergen St., 5 three-st'y brick stores and tenements, tn roofs; cost for all, $25,750; owner, Albert Scales, 378 Van Brunt St.; architect and carpenter, Louis Bonert."

We didn't include the west side of Fourth Avenue in our comprehensive Park Slope photo archive, but it is possible to use Google's "street view" to examine the corner. And, apparently, all five buildings are still there today, in nearly original condition. We particularly like the quoins on the corner building:

70-62 Fourth Avenue

The upzoning of Fourth Avenue a few years ago unleashed a building frenzy that has seen many of the original, "first growth" buildings replaced by new, mid-rise apartment houses. The Great Recession has lessened development pressures somewhat. Even so, we suspect these 1884 buildings by Louis Bonert won't be around much longer.

Louis Bonert: Five 8-Family Double Flats in Sterling Place

In 1909 Louis Bonert traded five four story, 8-family "double flat" apartment houses in Sterling Place for a large parcel on the other side of Prospect Park, in a deal recounted in the New York Times:

New York Times, August 4, 1909, p. 10 ("In the Real Estate Field")

The apartments are still there today, on the south side of Sterling Place, just off Flatbush Avenue:

164-180 Sterling Place - unprotected

168 Sterling Place - unprotected

The buildings exhibit some of the stylized hoods over the central stairway windows that we have come to associate with Bonert from his apartment houses in 3rd Street and in 6th Avenue:

180 Sterling Place - detail

The doorways are a riot of classical detail. We can make out swags and egg-and-dart molding, but our limited architectural vocabulary cannot begin to describe everything here. What are those pointy things on the upper corners called?:

164 Sterling Place - detail

Bader's roadhouse, which occupied a large parcel at the corner of Ocean Parkway and Coney Island Avenue, just outside Prospect Park, was a popular destination for excursions, apparently as much for the outsized personality of its proprietor as for its convenient location and popular prices:

Brooklyn Daily Eagle, July 4, 1897, p. 20 ("Havens for Cyclists")