Incorporated in 1973, the New York Landmarks Conservancy provides financial and technical support to stewards of historic sites.

Mayor Robert F. Wagner signed the New York City Landmarks Law in 1965, creating the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) to designate and work towards the ongoing preservation of historically significant buildings and sites. In the beginning, LPC had limited powers and declined to get involved with efforts to save significant places such as the Singer Building (demolished 1968).^[1] New York needed a preservation fund to maintain landmarked buildings and place them in the hands of owners willing to preserve the landmarks. The New York Landmarks Conservancy would become this fund.

Architect Simon Breines first mentioned founding a Landmarks Conservancy Fund for New York in 1968. In a December 1968 letter to ANTIQUES magazine editor Barbara Delany, Breines wrote, “I see the effort to build a Landmarks Fund as an effective method of educating and rallying a large number of people.” Breines modeled his proposal on the Nature Conservancy, which could purchase land and receive gifts. After the National Trust for Historic Preservation rejected the proposed fund, Breines presented a proposal to the Municipal Art Society (MAS) in March 1970 arguing that the organization should “take the initiative in creating a New York Landmarks Conservancy as a private, tax-exempt organization able to accept gifts of buildings, land, historic objects and money”; “purchase, lease, and operate such properties”; and “engage in educational activities.”^[2]

Although initially conceived as an arm of the MAS, the New York Landmarks Conservancy emerged as a separate nonprofit organization in 1971. In a meeting about incorporating the Conservancy, acting secretary Kent Barwick laid out the reasons for founding the new organization: “1. Foundations and private donors are often reluctant to grant money to the municipal government; 2. The experience of the nature conservancy shows that a private trust can operate with more flexibility and greater speed than public bodies; 3. The [Municipal Art] Society, although confident in the motives and abilities of the present members and staff of the Commission, was apprehensive about the composition of the Commission under the administration of some future mayor who might be less sympathetic to the cause of preservation than Mayor Lindsay.”^[3] The Conservancy officially incorporated in 1973 but retained strong ties to its parent organization.^[4]

Maintaining the U.S. Custom House in Lower Manhattan, vacated after the agency’s move to the World Trade Center in 1973, became the Conservancy’s first major challenge. The Conservancy worked with the U.S. General Services Administration and the Custom House Institute for over 20 years, eventually repurposing the building as home to the Heye Center of the Museum of the American Indian in 1994.^[5] Since then, the New York Landmarks Conservancy has helped maintain over 1,000 historic buildings and provided more than $60 million in funding to buildings and neighborhoods.

For a full history of the New York Landmarks Conservancy, please see Anthony W. Robins’s online publication 50 Years: Preserving the City We Love.