Landmarked Brooklyn Lyceum Building Sells For $10M

PARK SLOPE, NY — The landmarked Brooklyn Lyceum building on Fourth Avenue sold to an unnamed buyer for $10 million, developers said.

Developer Greystone announced on Monday they sold the former bathhouse at 227 Fourth Ave., currently home to a Blink Fitness, to the buyer after they renovated it and used the air rights for a rental property next door.

Greystone bought the more than 100-year-old building at a foreclosure auction in 2014 for $7.6 million and spent nearly $5 million more to restore the derelict spot, Crain's New York reported.

The developer originally wanted to convert the former bathhouse into condominiums, but dropped the plans in 2015 because it's landmarked status made it too difficult, Crain's reported. Blink Fitness signed a nearly 18-year lease for the spot in 2015 and opened a location of their gym there last year.

Greystone also bought the vacant lot next door in 2015 for $13 million to build a 12-story rental building with 68-units using the Brooklyn Lyceum air rights, New York YIMBY reported.

The Brooklyn Lyceum opened its doors in 1910 as the Public Bath No. 7, according to the Landmarks Preservation Commission. It was the first public bathhouse in the borough to have a swimming pool.

It eventually turned into a gym in the 1930s but it was closed and abandoned in the 1950s, according to the LPC. The bathhouse was landmarked in 1984 while it was being used as a warehouse.

Eric Richmond bought the property in 1994 and resurrected it into a performance venue dubbed the Brooklyn Lyceum, DNAinfo reported. Richmond fell behind on the mortgage payments and the spot went into foreclosure in 2013, eventually being put up for auction the next year, the website reported.

Image: Blink Fitness