Clinton Hill Historic District

Clinton Hill is a residential neighborhood in north-central Brooklyn, and its historic district takes in thirty-two blocks and 1120 buildings, of which 1063 are contributing. Development began in the 1840s with suburban villas and continued through about 1930. The result is a catalogue of American domestic architecture: Greek Revival pairs on Waverly Avenue, Italianate and Second Empire row houses and mansions, neo-Grec rows by Amzi Hill, Romanesque Revival houses by Montrose Morris and William Tubby, Queen Anne mansions, and Beaux-Arts and Colonial Revival designs. Apartment buildings appeared from the late 1880s. The district also contains five churches, including Emmanuel Baptist Church, the Adelphi Academy building on Clifton Place, and one of the city's largest concentrations of private carriage houses and stables. Construction nearly ceased after the 1930s Depression, so the streetscapes remain largely intact. That variety of building types and styles, together with its good preservation, is the basis for the listing.