167-Year-Old Bed-Stuy Church Set For Demolition

BED-STUY, NY — A Bed-Stuy church built in 1856 is set for demolition to make way for a residential development, according to property records and reports.

The city approved this month a full demolition permit for Church of St. Patrick-St. Lucy on Willoughby Avenue and Taaffe Place — just a couple blocks away from the devastating demolition of 441 Willoughby, property records show.

Owners at Watermark Capital Group plan to replace the church with a residential project, according to Brownstoner, which first reported on the demolition.

The demolition, expected to cost $88,000, will completely raze the 11,592-square-foot property, building records show. It was not clear when demolition was scheduled to begin.

Watermark Capital Group's Wolfe Landau bought the property in July for $12.25 million — seven months after appraisers estimated the property was worth about $10.5 million, property records show.

Watermark Capital Group and The Church of St. Patrick-St. Lucy did not respond to Patch's requests for comment.

Little remained known about the developers' plans for the new property — but it is not Watermark's first stab at a historical property. Watermark also redeveloped a 1919 school building in Greenpoint into a luxury apartment complex, according to its website.

In Downtown Brooklyn, the developer is responsible for the Bridge Building — a 70,000 square foot apartment complex on a former community center near the Manhattan Bridge.

The Willoughby Avenue church is just the latest in a long series of redevelopments in a neighborhood desperately trying to get ahead of developers.

Locals in June set their sights on a group of about 150 buildings, nearly all brownstones, between Nostrand and Marcy avenues for landmarking.

Nearby, Saint Mary's Episcopal Church on 230 Classon Avenue, built in 1858, secured landmark status in 1981, as did a block of Willoughby Avenue on Pratt Institute property.