Inside the Fight to Save Little Italy’s Most Romantic Garden

Elizabeth Street Garden was the perfect backdrop for Stella McCartneys cheeky striped dresses and superheroprinted suits...
Elizabeth Street Garden was the perfect backdrop for Stella McCartney’s Resort ’15 presentation.Photo: Rex Features

Elizabeth Street Garden, an unexpected patch of green nested between apartment buildings in Little Italy, does not resemble your run-of-the-mill community garden. Instead of utilitarian vegetable plots, the lot boasts half-dissembled neoclassical columns, gazebos wreathed in wrought iron flowers, and paper lanterns strung up in shade trees. Cement lions perch alongside clusters of overgrown rosebushes and beds of blackeyed Susans. The garden feels like a place that might be found on the other side of an enchanted wardrobe—full of mysterious characters, a natural home to secret pathways and hidden corners.

On a warm fall afternoon, when the garden is open to the public, it’s not uncommon to find glamorously appointed Nolita-ites Instagramming themselves in the bushes. The garden’s romantically cluttered pastiche of sculpture and untamed greenery makes an ideal site for a windswept photo-op. The garden has recently hosted a slate of high-profile designers and magazines: Lela Rose used the garden to premiere her Fall 2018 bridal collection, while U.K. Harper’s Bazaar shot Ashley Graham for the cover of their July 2017 issue there. In 2015 and 2014, Stella McCartney rented the garden to host “Garden Party”-themed fashion shows. In a 2014 interview, she told i-D that she chose the site because she “wanted to highlight these precious pockets in New York. They exist but they’re in danger, and they need to be supported, and they need to be recognized.”

McCartney was right—green spaces rarely exist without contest in downtown Manhattan, and Elizabeth Street Garden is no exception to the rule: In 2012, New York City Council member Margaret Chin helped slate the site for development into affordable senior housing as a part of a larger urban renewal plan. Formerly the location of a public school, the land that the garden sits on has been government-owned for many years, but leased month-to-month since 1991 by a neighboring gallerist and antiques-dealer, Allan Reiver. In the early 1990s, Reiver cleaned up the garbage-filled lot, planted trees, and adorned the garden with its menagerie of quirky sculptures. For decades, the garden served as a sort of half-park, half-private yard to Reiver’s business (though in recent years, Reiver has opened it to the public on a more regular basis). The city mostly overlooked the land until 2012, when Councilmember Chin’s decision quietly transferred oversight of the land to the Department of Housing Preservation and Development.

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For the past five years, advocates for Elizabeth Street Garden have fought the city’s plans to develop the land. A community group called Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden petitioned, fundraised, hosted movie nights, and held protests in an effort to garner support. Their hope, eventually, was to work with the Department of Parks and Recreation to turn the land into a city park.

The advocates’ progress was set back September of 2016, when the city issued a request for proposals from developers. It seemed as if hope might be lost. Then in April of this year, the board of the advocacy organization, Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden, fractured between those who wanted to seek legal action against the city and those who didn’t. A new organization, Elizabeth Street Garden Inc., (helmed, in part, by Allan Reiver’s son, Joseph Reiver, as well as Poppy King of Lipstick Queen) is currently raising money for a lawsuit. In September, Elizabeth Street Garden Inc. hosted their own fashion show, “Fall Fashion Fundraiser,” that included showcases by brands including Wendy Nichol and Ulla Johnson. Musician Andrew Wyatt played an intimate acoustic set. Earlier this month, they threw a Harvest Festival. Their stated goals are slightly different from the Friends organization, in that they hope to preserve the site as a space open to the public but keep the statuary (something that might not be possible in a city park).

“One of the main reasons why people are drawn to and build their own personal relationship with the Garden is its mystical quality,” Joseph Reiver says. “Sitting in the Garden will always better explain this than words. But these qualities stem from the balance of greenery and statuary. The statuary and architectural elements really make the space truly unique and intriguing. You forget that you’re standing in the center of New York City.”

Photo: Alamy

Margaret Chin, who is supported in her efforts by Mayor Bill de Blasio, maintains a hard-line on developing the garden into housing. A spokesperson for the council member, Marian Guerra, told Vogue that “Councilmember Chin has pledged to fight to make sure that every person has the right and the opportunity to age in New York City.” According to a report by New York City’s Department for the Aging, seniors are the fastest growing demographic in the city, and the need for affordable housing in New York is an ever-pressing one. Mayor de Blasio referred to the current plan for the development, which would preserve 5,000 square feet of green space, as a “Solomonic decision.”

Any solution seems poignant: There is need for both green space and affordable housing. Both constitute a city as livable, and neither is easily sacrificed.

Advocates also hold that there are alternate sites, including one near Hudson and Clarkson Streets, where the city could develop more affordable housing for seniors while preserving the garden. They point out that that area where the garden currently resides is underserved by green land, with only 3 square feet of park space per resident—the size of a subway seat.

Jeannine Kiely, a member of the board of directors of the original advocacy organization, Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden, says of the garden, “Life in New York can be very siloed. The garden is a beautiful space where people of all ages can hang out and relax. This is our living room, our backyard, and this is where you really meet your neighbors.”

For now, the fate of Elizabeth Street Garden remains uncertain. On a recent October afternoon, the area bustled with activity. A thin woman in tailored leather and stilettos paused to text while her small dog pulled at its leash. Two older men sat on a bench, engaged in hushed conversation. A young mom strolled with her baby on her hip. A couple united near the gate and greeted each other warmly. Hidden along one of the garden’s paths, a woman in leopard print and lace sketched flowers. The garden was utterly peaceful, so unassuming that it seemed like if you blinked, it might be gone.