The church on 96th and CPW.
A historic church on 96th Street and Central Park West could become a children’s museum, but first it will need a review from the city’s landmarks board. In a preview of that discussion, the Community Board 7 Preservation Committee will be looking at the changes on Thursday. The meeting will be at 250 West 87th Street at 6:30 p.m.
The Children’s Museum of Manhattan bought the church last year, and plans to move there from its current home at 212 West 83rd Street.
The church, built in 1903, has served multiple congregations — most recently the First Church of Christ, Scientist. Developers bought the structure, and received approval from the Landmarks Preservation Commission to turn it into condos. The building was gutted, but the Board of Standards and Appeals, a city board that hears zoning appeals, rejected its plans in 2016.
The children’s museum will present plans to remove stained glass windows, add a deck and make other changes. Preservationist group Landmark West sent around the mock-up below of how the deck might impact the building’s exterior.
Nasty idea! The deck looks awful. Wrecks the look of the exterior.
The museum on West 83 St. may be smaller than the proposed one, but it serves the community and visitors well.
I live 1 1/2 blocks away and I see happy kids coming and going. Why mess with that?
Take a step inside. It’s badly in need of updating.
Yeah, CMOM became pretty dilapidated in recent years. I guess they were saving their dough for this. I don’t think it looks nasty at all. It’s nasty when it’s vacant!
great idea
The best use of the building would have been as a community arts center, not as a free-for-all rodeo for the little brats to run around in.
So raise $100M to turn it into a community arts center, whatever that is. CMOM bought the building and will pay for its renovation. This is not a government project.
So you were a perfectly behaved child who never did anything wrong?
And your children (if you had any – by your tone I’m guessing no one would have ever wanted to pro-create with you) were also perfectly behaved?
Lighten up.
Geez, your kids must have run for cover when you got home from work!
Support the move. Hope architects are sensitive to the aesthetics
Enough already, let someone utilize the space to enhance the area.
These proposed alterations are far worse and more extreme than what was originally proposed by the condo developers.
These maimings degrade the historical significance and architectural integrity of the structure, and are totally out of context with the scale and existing aesthetic of the neighborhood
This is a wonderful idea in terms of allowing the CMOM to grow and serve more children each year. The museum will be able to expand the age group it is currently tailored to as well as offer more for the community. Using a space that is bigger and beautiful. I will learn more about deck and how that will affect the beauty of the church before I make a judgement. I space for children to play and learn is more important than more condos that are not affordable to the masses, I will be sad to see it move more uptown as it is so confident to my home but I hope that it is able to create a new space for children to be creative.
NYC should have a world class Children’s Museum. The space on 83rd was not that.
The mockups are totally misleading. The structures currently on the roof are incredibly high and go way up the spire and ruin the integrity of the building. The light and massive volume of visitors is also a huge concern for one block.
The meeting yesterday affirmed that the community is generally behind the Children’s Museum occupying the space, but equally clear is that the changes to the roof are totally inappropriate and dramatically change the appearance of the building. When renovated, the church will provide a multiple of the space the museum currently has so they certainly don’t need to add this monstrosity on top and ruin what is a beautiful 120 year old landmark!