Harlem preservationists just scored a major victory

By Virginia K. Smith | September 25, 2015 - 9:59AM

After a years-long back and forth, uptown preservationists scored a big win this week with the Landmarks Preservation Committee voting to extend Harlem's Mount Morris Park Historic District, as DNAinfo reported. The expansion includes six blocks between 118th and 123rd streets between Adam Clayton Powell and Lennox avenues, an area that includes over 250 rowhouses and around 12 apartment buildings:

The area's significant for its history in the Harlem Renaissance, as well as its architectural cred; per the Historic Districts Council, the area is chock-full of "Romanesque Revival, neo-Grec, Queen Anne and other styles inspired by the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago of 1893."

As we've written previously, designation as a historic district means that residents will have to check in with the Landmarks Preservation Commission before major renovations or alterations to the exteriors of their buildings, and will be restricted to original period detail when it comes to things like paint color and windows. As the LPC's chairwoman Meenakshi Srinivasan told DNAinfo, "I think the district and the extension speaks not only to Harlem’s rich architectural history, but also to its extraordinary cultural and social history."

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