Parfitt Brothers in 4th Street

A close reading of the online Brooklyn Eagle yields many items of interest to the historian of Park Slope. The issue of October 19, 1885, notes that Edwin C. Litchfield's Brooklyn Improvement Company is offering for sale 11 recently completed houses of "peculiar design" in 4th Street between 5th and 6th Avenues. Litchfield of course owned much of present-day Park Slope in the mid-19th century; his villa still stands just inside Prospect Park at 4th Street.

Parfitt Brothers, the architects, were one of the most prominent firms in Brooklyn, designing among many other buildings the nearby St. Augustine's R.C. Church.

Brooklyn Eagle, October 19, 1885, p. 2 ("Busy Builders")

Amazingly, 10 of the original 11 houses are still standing in 4th Street: the original row of 6 on the south side, and 4 of the original row of 5 on the north side.

The 4 houses below are from the row to the south and appear largely unchanged since they were built in 1885:

320-326A 4th Street - unprotected

Unfortunately a few of these Queen Anne-style houses have lost their distinctive gables to the modern craze of "remuddling", including the house on the left below, from the row on the northern side of the street:

323-325 4th Street - unprotected

Mirror Images

These two buildings, one in Fifth Street and one in Seventh Street, are mirror images of each other. They are early apartment houses, with one apartment per floor (4-family "flats"). They are distinguished by the 3-sided bay window on the upper floors, above a recessed doorway behind a single pillar, and a very extravagant window enframement on the second floor. Neither building stands within the current Park Slope Historic District.

400 Fifth Street - unprotected

According to the 1897 Lain's Brooklyn directory, the residents of 400 Fifth Street included:

MOREY Edmund mer. h 400 5th
STAUDINGER Augustus L. salesman h 400 5th
WILLCOCK Mark C. salesman h 400 5th

397 Seventh Street - unprotected

The 1897 Lain's lists the following residents of 397 Seventh Street:

HITCHCOCK Nelson H. h 397 7th
MEHRTENS John H. police h 397 7th
MEHRTENS Martin h 397 7th
MUGFORD harry clk. h 397 7th
WAGNER Edw'd O. engraver h 397 7th


By 1902, one of the apartments at 397 Seventh Street had been vacated and was listed for rent in the Brooklyn Eagle newspaper. Rent was $24/month.

Brooklyn Eagle, April 20, 1902

St. Matthew's English Lutheran Church

A slight air of neglect surrounds the church at 6th Avenue and 2nd Street in Park Slope. The cornerstone has crumbled away and is no longer readable. However, it is possible to make out the words "Matthew's" and "Lutheran Church", carved on stone plaques mounted onto the tower.

From these clues, via a search in the online Brooklyn Eagle, we were able to determine that the original name for this church was St. Matthew's English Lutheran Church. Apparently there was also a German Lutheran Church elsewhere in Brooklyn.

St. Matthew's English Lutheran Church, 6th Ave. & 2nd Street - unprotected

A Brooklyn Eagle article from May 22, 1896, notes that the Church was nearing completion and would be dedicated in June of that year:

Brooklyn Eagle, May 22, 1896

Several churches already stand within the boundaries of the current Park Slope Historic District. Below is the Sixth Avenue Baptist Church, erected 1880. Its steeple was knocked down by the Hurricane of 1938:

Sixth Avenue Baptist Church - Park Slope Historic District

3rd Street Patterns

This is another of those odd patterns that leaps out at one, once one notices it. The first photo below is from 3rd Street between 6th & 7th Avenues, north side; most of the street is lined with these monumental 8-family apartment houses. The buildings are 4 stories high, two apartments per floor, walkups; the gently-bayed facades create a pleasing rhythm as the buildings march down the hill toward 6th Avenue:

3rd Street between 6th and 7th Avenues, north side; unprotected

Below is a closer view of one of these buildings from the south side of the same block. The doorway is protected by a flat entablature, flanked by columns. The central windows above the doorway light the interior staircase. First above the doorway is a rounded window with "Greek Ear" enframement; next up has a Gothic-style pointed arch; the window above that is a "flattened segmental" arch, rounded but flattened at the same time (there is probably a technical term for this, unknown to me):

458 3rd Street - unprotected

Meanwhile, just around the corner in 6th Avenue, toward 2nd Street, one finds nearly identical buildings... except 4-family, not 8-family, with windows that are "the same yet different". Note the identical doorways, flat entablature flanked by columns, and similarities in the window treatment above: Gothic-style pointed arch, with "flattened segmental" above that:

315-317 6th Avenue - unprotected

The similarities are so close as to suggest they might have come from the same hand.

4-Family Flats

Do you ever start to notice odd patterns, certain repeating motifs, in your surroundings?

Consider the early apartment buildings pictured below. These are "4-family flats", each built to house one family per floor. There are 4-family apartment houses all over Park Slope, often with full-height, 3-sided bays. These apartments were frequently built in series, several buildings in a row, with continuous facade banding and cornices.

But beyond the general similarities amongst 4-family apartment buildings, one finds virtually identical buildings in different parts of Park Slope. The apartment buildings shown here all have light-colored brick over a brownstone first floor, with brownstone detailing above; arched windows at the 4th floor only; terra-cotta panels featuring "Green Men" (foliate heads) or medallions; and clusters of narrow columns framing the doorway.

426-418 2nd Street - unprotected

361 4th Street - unprotected

299 6th Avenue - unprotected

799-803 Union St. - unprotected

There are probably more of these out there... let us know if you find any!

8-Family Flats

We have been looking at several common historic building styles in Park Slope (Italianate, Neo-Grec) both within and outside the boundaries of the current Park Slope Historic District. Most of the buildings we've seen are "rowhouses", originally single-family homes. However, many other historic buildings in Park Slope were originally built to house multiple families. One very common format is the "8-family", typically four stories, with two flats per floor, and no elevator.

Below is a view of 8th Street, park block (between 8th Avenue and Prospect Park West, north side, looking east). All of these buildings are within the current Park Slope Historic District, and all of them are "8-family flats". The Park Slope Historic District Designation Report reads:

"The north side...presents an almost solid wall of four-story apartment houses. Their materials consist of light-colored shades of brick, with limestone trim, which harmonizes with the houses across the street. Their height is visually minimized by the concentration of architectural elements and details at the ground floor level, while their full-height bays create a wavy undulation at the skyline."

Eighth Street, Park Slope Historic District

The report continues on to say that these apartment houses, "basically neo-Georgian in style", were begun in 1904 for John Wilson and were designed by Brooklyn architect Henry Pohlman. Below is a closer view of one of these apartment buildings:

537 8th Street, Park Slope Historic District

Meanwhile, in Carroll Street below 7th Avenue, one finds a very similar row of 8-family apartment houses. Below is the view looking east, toward 7th Avenue:

Carroll Street between 6th & 7th Avenues - unprotected

It is not unreasonable to assume that this row in Carroll Street, so similar in style to the row in 8th Street, must have been built within a few years of 1904, when the 8th Street buildings were erected. Yet, these buildings are not protected by Historic District designation.

Below is a closer view in Carroll Street:

717-719 Carroll Street - unprotected

A Historic District comprises buildings of many types and functions, including 8-family apartment houses like the ones shown here.

Brownstone-faced Neo-Grec

Row houses in the Neo-Grec style are extremely common in Park Slope. Frequently they feature a full-height, two-sided bay, and are faced in brownstone. Often one finds incised parallel lines flanking the doorways or windows, and the brackets supporting the rectangular door hood feature geometric carving/incising, in contrast to the more naturalistic carving on the brackets supporting the rounded door hoods in the earlier Italianate style.

The houses below, in Berkeley Place between 7th and 8th Avenues, were erected between 1883-84 and are within the boundaries of the current Park Slope Historic District:

Berkeley Place, Park Slope Historic District

One finds brownstone-faced, two-sided bay Neo-Grec houses all over Park Slope. The houses below are in Garfield Place, between 6th and 7th Avenues, outside the current Park Slope Historic District, but are nearly identical to the ones above:

175-177-179-181-183 Garfield Place - unprotected

Below is another very similar group, from 3rd Street between 5th and 6th Avenues, outside the current historic district. These houses feature another very common characteristic of the Neo-Grec style: pointed "ears" on each end of the door hood. Several of the houses below retain the original, heavy, Neo-Grec cast-ironwork on the stoop:

426-424-422-420-418-416 3rd St. - unprotected

Yet another very similar group, from Berkeley Place between 5th and 6th Avenues, outside the current historic district. The houses below appear to be just two floors over a basement floor, but actually have a full 3rd floor on top, with small windows set into the cornice. Although generally Neo-Grec, the slightly rounded arch above the doorway betrays a slight influence of the lingering Italianate style:

62-60 Berkeley Place - unprotected