The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission
May 29, 2006
Dear Commissioners,
I write to urge the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission to designate the
“Dakota” stables , also now known as the Pyramid Garage. This is a stellar exemplar of
the powerful brick wall aesthetic popular in the last decades of the 19th century. It is the
best stable block left on the West Side and is worthy of designation on several levels.
The horse car route north from lower Manhattan ran up Tenth Avenue, later Amsterdam
Avenue. Naturally enough, along the route the stable blocks for the City ended up being
placed on this street which was distant enough from the better runs of row houses then
being developed to keep the horse odors from reaching the fancier homes. Manhattan
tended towards livery blocks on specific streets where a person needing a carriage, horse
and the other items might find several establishments and negotiate a deal. For the West
Side, it became Amsterdam Avenue.
The earlier stable areas had smaller and squatter stable buildings. On Amsterdam
Avenue, the livery establishments began to spread out with full block buildings of several
storeys. The Dakota building was a big block.
There seem to be no manuals on building for urban horses in the 19th century in America.
The small livery building, often with a stepped gable for the hay loft seemed ubiquitous.
When the decision was made to build a new kind of commercial structure, the architect
and owner probably wondered how to style the building yet make it cheap to construct.
Bradford Lee Gilbert turned to the solution for utilitarian buildings of the recent past in
New York, The round arch designs borrowed from German buildings of the 1840’s.
Many commercial buildings built on a budget in the 1880’s were built in the round arch
style. One need only think of the run of brick buildings of a similar bulk and height
along modern Lafayette Street to understand Gilbert’s sources. Sturdy brick walls with
windows arranged in arcaded sets and surrounded in lovely, custom made bricks, can be
seen at the De Vinne Press or the Puck Magazine’s initial building. Gilbert here used two
colors of brick, one for the walls, the other for the window detail. As the building would
need to reassure the locals of its sturdy nature, the powerful brick wall with small
openings for windows gave everyone confidence in the stability of the structure.
The brick wall style with minimal zones for windows was appropriate for other modest
buildings beyond the commercial world. Institutions, riding academies and schools were
often built in this thick -walled manner. One need only think of the wonderful buildings
of the Brooklyn architect, William Tubby, to see the direct precedent for the stable here
on Amsterdam Avenue.
As is not always the case, we have here the opportunity to designate a major example of
the “big stable” style. It is distressing to save the “only’ one left, let us consider making a
point of keeping the best of the stable blocks!
Yours truly,
Mosette Broderick
Clinical Associate Professor, Department of Fine Arts
Director, Urban Design and Architecture Studies program,
New York University