Brooklyn’s Industrial Waterfront is the focus of a major designation day at the Landmarks Preservation Commission next week. On Tuesday, October 30, the Commission will hold a public hearing on the proposed DUMBO Historic District and vote on the designation of the Eberhard Pencil Factory Historic District. Both sites were highlighted in the MAS’s successful nomination of the Brooklyn industrial waterfront heritage to the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s 11 Most Endangered Places for 2007. The Commission’s action on DUMBO and Eberhard Faber follows the designation of the Domino Sugar Factory in September.

DUMBO is significant for its association with the rise of the city of Brooklyn as a major American industrial center and is unique to New York City for its nineteenth and early twentieth century industrial buildings, Belgian block streets, and its location on the East River by the imposing anchorage of the Manhattan Bridge.

The yellow stars and terra cotta pencils of the Eberhard Faber buildings are a fixture of Greenpoint’s landscape. The Eberhard Faber Pencil Company moved the Brooklyn in 1887, and over forty years built buildings over a two block area. And while today the Eberhard Faber buildings appear charming and modestly-scaled, this is where a pencil empire was born. Eberhard Faber was at one point the fifth largest employer in New York City.

DUMBO and Eberhard Faber are just 2 of the 19 items on Tuesday’s calendar. The commission will also consider Webster Hall, the Lord and Taylor Building, the Morris B. Sanders House, the 11th St. Public Bath, plus two other industrial sites: the designation of the Standard Varnish Works Factory in Staten Island and a public hearing for the Wheatsworth Factory on E. 10th Street in Manhattan. To view the full LPC Calendar for Tuesday, October 30 click here.

If you cannot attend the hearing please demonstrate your support by writing to the Landmarks Preservation Commission.

Click here to read our testimony regarding Eberhard Faber.

Visit www.saveindustrialbrooklyn.org for more information on Brooklyn’s industrial heritage.