Prospect Park South Historic District

Prospect Park South is a planned residential district in the center of Brooklyn, covering all or part of fifteen blocks and the whole of the original real estate development. It holds 203 large single-family houses set in gardens, along landscaped streets, with central garden malls on Albemarle and Buckingham Roads. The houses were built in many styles, reflecting the eclecticism of the period. Colonial Revival dominates, but Queen Anne, neo-Tudor, Italian Villa, French Gothic, Swiss Chalet and Spanish Mission designs also appear. Architect John J. Petit designed many of them, including the grandest Colonial Revival mansion on Albemarle Road and the well-known Japanese style house at 131 Buckingham Road, created in 1902 with the help of Japanese artisans and used by developer Dean Alvord to advertise the development. The district's houses are larger and more distinguished than those nearby. Only nine intrusions, mostly apartment buildings and mid-century houses, break its character. Its boundaries match those of the city landmark district.