Illustrated Lecture | Lafayette Place/Lafayette Street: A Topographical History

• Design & Architecture
• History

Illustrated Lecture: Lafayette Place/Lafayette Street: A Topographical History
by Francis Morrone

When and how did fashionable and tranquil Lafayette Place — 100-feet wide, 3-blocks long, with no cross streets — come into being in the 19th century? By what stages did it evolve? How and when did Lafayette Place become Lafayette Street, and how did the new, much longer, street develop? This lecture will cover, among other things, the conditions that both brought the Merchant’s House into being — and its preservation and survival defied. Not least, this will be a lecture on New York maps and their use in research.

Francis Morrone is a renowned architectural historian and writer. The author of eleven books, including, most recently, “Guide to New York City Urban Landscapes” (W.W. Norton, 2013). Morrone has also written highly-regarded architectural guidebooks to Philadelphia, and Brooklyn. His writings have appeared in many publications, including the Wall Street Journal, the New Criterion, City Journal, Humanities and the New York Sun, where he was an art and architecture critic. He teaches architectural and urban history at New York University, and is the recipient of the university’s Excellence in Teaching Award. Travel + Leisure magazine named him as one of the 13 best tour guides in the world. Other awards include the Arthur Ross Award of the Institute of Classical Architecture and Art.