In addition to the blueprints, your file may contain building permits. In this case, chemosphere discovered the builders, Larsen and Anderson, were based at 336 Rutland Road in a wood frame house that still stands. The blueprints also indicate the architect and the builders. If your house’s exterior has been altered and you would like to restore it, the blueprints are the best guide.
Blueprint brooklyn windows#
(Check out the details in this long thread.)Īlso given in the blueprints are all the details of the facade, including windows and doors. Chemosphere’s indicated what kind of wood was used in the various rooms: oak in the entry and “w wood,” most likely “white wood” or poplar stained or painted to look like a more expensive species, in the parlor. In addition to showing the original floor plan, the blueprints have a remarkable amount of other information.
This is very typical of multi-family apartments of the era, although it would not be allowed today, since legal bedrooms must have windows (or a skylight). Interestingly, the two interior rooms were identified as bedrooms, whereas the large room next to the kitchen was intended to be a dining room. The house is very typical of row houses of the era one finds throughout neighborhoods booming with construction at the time, such as parts of Crown Heights, Bushwick, Prospect Lefferts Gardens and, of course, Flatbush. That is exactly what happened to chemosphere, who said: “There was one file for my row of six houses.” He came up empty-handed on his own address but when the clerk checked under the other houses in the row, he struck gold.Ĭhemosphere found his two-story house was designed in 1909 and was originally a two-family house with two nearly identical floor-through flats. If the building records still exist, they will often be grouped in one folder under one address in the row. Many records have been destroyed in fires over the years, so original paperwork is not available for every address. After about 15 minutes, you will exchange your ID for any files available. On the 8th Floor, fill out the form requesting any files available for every house in the row, using the block and lot numbers you have researched. The next thing you do is head to the Building Department at 210 Joralemon Street in Downtown Brooklyn. You can do that by going to the City’s Department of Finance website, known as the Automated City Register Information System, or ACRIS, where property records such as deeds are kept.Ĭlick on the second menu item on the home page, “Find Addresses and Parcels.” Type in your address address, then select “find BBL,” and the system will tell you the block and lot number. The first thing you need to do is to find out the block and lot number of your property and every property in your row.
He has kindly allowed us to use those posts and the pictures of the blueprints he found to discuss in more detail how to find and read your original blueprints. He posted about the process, what he found and questions about the 100-year-old shorthand he was trying to decipher in a few separate posts in the forum. You may want to know because you are renovating, you have a passion for old houses, you are a new owner or you’re just curious.įinding your original blueprints requires some legwork, ingenuity and persistence, as Brownstoner reader chemosphere recently discovered when researching his house in Flatbush. What did your Brooklyn row house look like originally? What year was it built? Who was the architect? Was it a two-family, one-family or something else? These are all questions original blueprints can answer.
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