"Colonial Revival: Then & Now" lecture & discussion at the Museum of the City of New York, July 19 at 6:30 PM AND "American Style: Colonial Revival and the Modern Metropolis" exhibition though Nov 6, 2011

Howard Johnson’s Restaurant, Queens Boulevard, Rego Park, New York. Joseph G. Morgan, with New York World’s Fair of 1939-40 Beyond.  Courtesy of the Queens Chamber of Commerce.

 Emerging more than a century ago, Colonial Revival architecture continues to influence present-day architecture and design. Join leading New York City architects Gil Schafer and Peter Pennoyer for an illustrated lecture and discussion as they explore historic examples of the Colonial Revival style and the lessons to be learned from them today. Mr. Schafer’s work is featured in the exhibition The American Style: Colonial Revival and the Modern Metropolis, which was designed by Peter Pennoyer Architects. Click here to read a 6/14/11 exhibition review by the NY Times, titled National Design That's Hidden In Plan Sight. 

"Colonial Revival: Then and Now" will take place on Tuesday, July 19th at 6:30 PM

Reservations required: (917) 492-3395 or e-mail programs@mcny.org

 $6 museum members; $8 seniors and students; $12 non-members

$6 when you mention the Rego-Forest Preservation Council
To qualify for the RFPC discount, please e-mail Michael Perlman at unlockthevault@hotmail.com 

 It is important to note that the American Style exhibition runs from June 14 - Nov 6, 2011, but Colonial Revival Then & Now lecture and discussion will only take place on July 19 at 6:30 PM.

Museum of the City of New York

1220 Fifth Avenue at 103rd Street

New York, NY 10029
www.mcny.org 

(212) 534-1672

Howard Johnson’s Restaurant, Northern Boulevard, Queens, New York, 1939.  Photograph by the Wurts Brothers Company.  Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York.

American Style exhibition, Courtesy of Museum of the City of New York

Residential Revivalism: Anne Morgan House, Sutton Place between E 57th & 58th Sts, Manhattan, Photo by Berenice Abbott, Courtesy of Museum of the City of New York

American Style exhibition, Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York

American Style exhibition, 116 East 55th St, NYC, Photo by Wurts Bros, NY, Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York

Landmark Support Letter from Peter Pennoyer Architects & Forest Hills Tennis Stadium's Placement In Literature

Below is one of numerous letters sent to the Landmarks Preservation Commission, calling on the LPC to calendar a public hearing ASAP for the iconic yet endangered Forest Hills Tennis Stadium, and for the Clubhouse of the West Side Tennis Club. It was built to serve the greater public, and that is who should have a role in its future. The more support letters, the greater the likelihood that the LPC will calendar a most democratic public hearing for a tennis, architectural, and music "landmark at heart." Please assist us in our Landmark letter campaign by composing a letter, which can be brief: http://regoforestpreservation.blogspot.com/2010/07/save-forest-hills-tennis-stadium.html  

Please have a look at a letter by Peter Pennoyer Architects, where Peter Pennoyer & Anne Walker are co-authors of a must-have new book, The Architecture of Grosvenor Atterbury:

 

September 9, 2010

Chairman Robert Tierney

Landmarks Preservation Commission

1 Centre Street

New York, NY 10007

Re: West Side Tennis Club and Stadium

Dear Chairman Tierney:

As co-authors of The Architecture of Grosvenor Atterbury, we are writing to request that the West Side Tennis Club and Stadium be placed on the calendar for September 14.

In addition to its important place in tennis history, the West Side Tennis Club was also integral to the development of Atterbury and Frederick Law Olmsted Jr.’s seminal design for the planned community of Forest Hills Gardens. In 1913, the development committee of the Russell Sage Foundation offered to negotiate its land purchase with the Cord Meyer Company and to provide its services free as added incentives for the club to move to Queens from the Upper West Side. The members were eager for their club to assume a prominent position in American tennis—as it did—and commissioned Grosvenor Atterbury and his partner (and Forest Hills Gardens resident) John Almy Tompkins to design “one of the finest [clubhouses] in the country” while Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. consulted on the layout of the club’s grounds and positioning of courts.

In addition to its prestige, for the Russell Sage Foundation and its designers, the most important aspect of the club’s relocation was the fact that it provided a buffer to any encroaching development from the west, enabling Forest Hills Gardens to exist as its own distinct architectural entity. The design of the clubhouse, its grounds and the later addition the Tennis Stadium (1923), designed by Kenneth M. Murchison, a Beaux-Arts-trained architect who designed railroad stations, apartment buildings and townhouses, was carefully considered to reinforce and maintain the character and integrity of the community and to prevent uncontextual development from detracting from the special place that Atterbury and Olmsted so meticulously created. As one of the first planned communities in this country, the Forest Hills Gardens model has been greatly influential, inspiring many similar communities in its wake.

We feel that it is important to uphold Atterbury and Olmsted’s design and write in hopes that the West Side Tennis Club and Stadium will be considered for calendaring in an effort to maintain what the designers of Forest Hills Gardens intended: to create an architecturally significant boundary to provide a sense of enclosure and community for Forest Hills Gardens.

Sincerely, 

Peter Pennoyer and Anne Walker

Peter Pennoyer Architects

ppac.com  

Below is a few of many books that the Forest Hills Tennis Stadium has been featured in, not to mention various media including records, magazines, ads, postcards, matchcovers, etc.

The Architecture of Grosvenor Atterbury by Peter Pennoyer & Anne Walker (2010), featuring Atterbury's Clubhouse & the famed Kenneth Murchison's Forest Hills Tennis Stadium.

An Illustrated History: Forest Hills by Robert Minton (1975): Note how the Forest Hills Tennis Stadium is the symbol of Forest Hills!

The Anatomy Of A Tennis Tournament, Carnival At Forest Hills, By Marty Bell (1975)