Structural Engineering Bureau of Con Edison | Honorable Mention | Extant | Douglaston | Other | 1952 | This honorable mention is mostly a minimally landscaped plot. Con Edison used evergreen trees and shrubs to shield the substation equipment from the surrounding residential neighborhood. Today the evergreens have grown substantially with no branches at the bottom, making the equipment considerably more visible behind smaller shrubbery. In addition, the neighborhood has continued to expand, with houses and a later mid-century Jewish Center directly abutting the Con Ed property. This makes the need to hide this equipment possibly less of a necessity than when the area was more remote and bucolic.
Morris Rothstein and Sons | Honorable Mention | Extant | Jamaica | Retail or Shopping Center | 1950 | Jamkay Realty is named for the developer and not the actual structure which is in effect, a large indoor mall taking up several blocks in downtown Jamaica. The building is mostly of a uniform height and frontage all the way around, using limestone and granite as cladding, which gives it a solid appearance. All parking is on the roof level so that there are store windows fronting onto the street. Even some signage and minimal detailing still exists on the exterior, which is surprising given Jamaica’s ongoing downtown redevelopment.
John O'Malley and Associates | Bronze Plaque for Residences | Extant | Corona | Religious Building | 1971 | St. Leo’s Rectory is more traditional than most of the O’Malley firm’s other work. The building is a long rectangle of buff brick topped by a streamlined mansard roof, originally complete with shingles.The dark shingles have now been replaced by light colored aluminum siding and the green shutters original to the ground floor have been replaced with red shutters on both the upper and lower floors. The building does its job in fitting in well with the heterogeneous residential architecture of this part of Corona.
S. J. Kessler and Sons | Bronze Plaque for Schools and Colleges | Extant | Flushing | Social Services Facility | 1970 | This nonprofit complex shows the increasing stripped down design of the late 1960s and early 1970s with very little decoration to speak of. The building is two stories and clad in pale brick and granite. There was a simple grillwork of cast stone screening a balcony to the right of the entrance that has been removed, making the structure even more spare.
Levine and Blumberg | Bronze Plaque for Artistic and Community Improvements | Extant | Forest Hills | Park | 1968 | Yellowstone Park is built on a sloping hillside amidst the apartment buildings of Forest Hills. At the base of the hill is the playground and larger recreational areas, while more passive spaces rise above. The design of the park uses curving ramps and retaining walls throughout to break up the steep slope into more informal areas. According to Ann Butter, who worked on the park, one lawn area was designed around a singular existing tree, now gone. However many of the existing plantings such as birch and hemlock trees still remain an integral part of the park, In addition, Ms. Butter noted the involvement of prominent landscape architect Clara Coffey in the design of Yellowstone Park.
