By Michael Kevin Williams
The “winningest, greenest”
block in Brooklyn is seeking
landmark preservation with
being designated a historic district.
According to Julia Charles,
chair of the Landmark Committee,
if granted, the 300 East
25th St. Block would be the
first historic district block in
the East Flatbush community.
Charles – a Caribbean-American,
who was born and raised
in Far Rockaway, Queens to a
Barbadian mother and a Jamaican
father – told Caribbean
Life that the 300 East 25th
St. Block, often referred to as
the “Greenest Block”, “serves
as a beacon of tranquility in the
East Flatbush community.”
She said the proposed historic
district includes a total of
56 neo-renaissance limestone
and brownstone row houses on
East 25th St., between Clarendon
Road and Avenue D.
“This block has remained
intact with century-old facades
and creative front gardens,
which provides a strong ‘sense
of place’”, Charles said, adding
that “this uniformity of East
25th St. is due to the buildings’
construction by one developer,
Henry Meyer Building Company,
in 1909.
Charles said Meyer’s vision
of Meyer was to build beautiful,
“high grade” one-family homes,
“which, at the time, as it is now,
(was) an attractive and rapidly
growing neighborhood.”
“The block’s distinction of
the ‘Greenest Block’ is due to
being the most decorated contestants
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of the Brooklyn Botanic
Gardens’ Greenest Block in
Brooklyn contest,” she said.
“This unique identity for being
the Greenest Block in Brooklyn
has been by virtue of winning
1st place in 2004, 2006, 2011
and 2016.”
In 2014, Charles said the
block won the 1st place prize
for the first ever Best Children’s
Garden Project.
Four years later, the block
won the 1st inaugural Garden
Mentor Award, Charles said.
In August 2019, she said the
block also won the 2019 National
Grid’s Leadership in Sustainable
Practices Award.
Charles said the Brooklyn
Botanic Gardens commemorated
the 25th Anniversary of
the Greenest Block in Brooklyn
contest with a Special Insider’s
Tour, September 2019, on East
25th Street to close out the gardening
season.
“This celebration was affectionately
coined the 25th on
25th,” she said.
Charles said Meyer’s development
on the east side of Flatbush
included the sister block,
East 26th St.
But, unfortunately, she said
the rise of over-development
has now affected East 26th St,
“in which a permit has been
placed to build in height on
their block, which changes
their landscape.”
Charles lamented that rapid
over-development has “plagued
the East Flatbush community,
with either the demolition of
century-old Victorian homes,
Founding members of the 300 East 25th St Block Association
- Hazel and Vernon Deane of Barbados. Julia Charles
with boxy buildings in its place,
or ‘finger’ extensions placed on
top of row-homes.”
“For this, it is crucial to preserve
the architectural vision
of Henry Meyer and the cultural
landscape the 300 East
25th St. Block residents have
nurtured and protected with
tremendous care to culminate
to a historic district,” she said,
disclosing that East Flatbush,
featuring the 300 East 25th St.
Block, has been selected in the
Historic District Council’s 2020
Six to Celebrate.”
Preserve East 25th St. in East
Flatbush as historic district
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