Principal Court 05 of 09

Hamilton Court

Seventy row houses and five apartment buildings combine three row-house gardens with a fourth courtyard enclosed by the Hamilton Court Apartments.

Accessible proportional rendering of the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission existing-conditions plan of Hamilton Court. Buildings, streets, paths, open space, fences, gates, and trees remain labeled as documented in the designation report.
LPC existing-conditions plan · not to scale and not a survey. Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission designation report.
Row houses70
Apartment buildings5
Garden spaces4
Block39th Ave · 47th St · Skillman Ave · 46th St

Plan and composition

How the Court Is Organized

Hamilton Court's row houses line the block perimeter with varied row lengths, setbacks, roof forms and heights. Through-block paths and rotated end facades interrupt the streetwall and draw attention toward the interior.

At the south end, the Hamilton Court Apartments form an almost enclosed U-shaped complex. Skillman Avenue storefronts and a passage through the building connect the commercial frontage to the private apartment garden.

Landscape and circulation

Gardens, Paths and Shared Space

Three paired house rows create three interior garden courts. The northern garden is separated from 39th Avenue by a brick wall and gates, and the LPC report notes that extended easements helped keep all three row-house gardens intact.

The apartment courtyard adds a fourth shared landscape, organized by diagonal and perimeter paths leading to building entrances.

What makes it distinctive. Hamilton Court is both residential court and mixed-use ensemble. The meeting of modest row houses, landscaped common space, apartments and Skillman Avenue storefronts gives it one of the district's most layered block plans.