Sunnyside Gardens NY C’s First Garden City Story Meg Cotner 36 | BOROMAG.COM | NOVEMBER 2013 EXPLORE YOUR BORO In the neighborhood of Sunnyside lies the leafy, quiet community of Sunnyside Gardens, one of America’s first garden cities. This early planned community of one-, two-, and threefamily brick houses with the later addition of a few apartment buildings has become one of the neighborhood jewels of Queens. This is a beautiful part of New York City, serving as a calm oasis in urban NYC while being just a short subway ride from bustling Midtown Manhattan. The neighborhood winds its way through 16 blocks situated roughly between 43rd and 52nd Streets to the west and east, and Queens Boulevard and Barnett Avenue to the south and north, in a sort of abstract T shape. It’s made up of a series of “courts” consisting of more than 600 buildings built around courtyards with accompanying pathways. Sunnyside Gardens Park, three acres in size, lies on the north edge of Sunnyside Gardens and is one of two members-only parks in all of NYC (Gramercy Park is the other). Sunnyside Gardens was constructed between 1924 and 1928 (townhomes), and 1931- 1935 (apartments) by the New York City Housing Corporation (CHC), founded by developer Alexander Bing; the CHC was actually incorporated specifically to build a garden city, starting with Sunnyside Gardens. Clarence Stein and Henry Wright were the architects, and Marjorie Sewell Cautley was the landscape architect. The development is built on approximately 77 acres of land. The majority of it was originally owned by the LIRR—leftover land from the Sunnyside train yards project— and the rest was from private landowners, purchased for about 50 cents an acre. The development was built one “court” at a time, which was then sold off before the next section was built. The first court was Colonial Court, followed by Roosevelt, Hamilton, Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson, and Madison Courts. The community was created on the philosophical foundation that homeownership is “the basis of good citizenship.” The architects, aware of a housing crisis of the time and possessing a philanthropic streak, wanted to create something that would be within the economic grasp of those New Yorkers that perhaps didn’t consider themselves likely candidates for homeownership—low- and middle-income folks. Stein and Wright (continued on page 38)
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