Central Avenue Historic District

Central Avenue Historic District in Ridgewood, Queens, is a ten-acre group of 104 three-story brick tenements lining 65th Place and 66th Street between 70th Avenue and Myrtle Avenue. All were built in 1916 by Henry W. Meyer, a Ridgewood land developer and businessman, and designed by Louis Berger and Co., the neighborhood's most prolific architectural firm. Each building holds two apartments per floor and features amber iron-spot brick in patterned designs, cast-stone lintels and sills, brownstone stoops with ironwork, and pressed metal cornices. Buildings on 66th Street north of Central Avenue have brick parapets instead, which the nomination reads as an early step toward simpler, more modern facades. The tenements imitate the well-known Mathews Flats model tenements, sharing wide lots, interior airshafts, large windows and private sanitary facilities in each apartment, though the facade treatment differs. The district was drawn to exclude surrounding frame houses and commercial or industrial buildings, and it remains largely intact.