These Beautiful, Historic Bronx Homes Look Even Better In The Snow

Photographer Nate Dorr wandered around lovely Fieldston in the Bronx this weekend during the snowfall, capturing the idyllic scene. In other parts of NYC, the snow rapidly mutates into blackened filth and slush, but here the city seems more like a rural winter wonderland, with grandiose homes preserved in a pristine shroud of white. (It's probably all blackened slush now there too, but let's just imagine it stays like this all winter.)

The New York City neighborhood is a privately owned section of Riverdale, and in 2006 was designated by the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission as the Fieldston Historic District. Time for fast facts about the area:

• Carly Simon grew up there.
  
• It was once home to Mayor La Guardia. According to an old NY Times article, "Fiorello H. La Guardia lived and died at 5020 Goodridge Avenue. When he read the comics over the radio so no children would be disappointed during the citywide newspaper strike of 1945, the microphone was in his Fieldston library."
  
• It is still home to the Horace Mann School.
  
• The streets privately owned, though remain publicly accessible—"Once a year, the streets are closed to non-residents to legally qualify the streets as privately owned; parking is restricted to residents and their guests."
  
• Architect Dwight James Baum designed many of the homes, and lived in the neighborhood himself.
  
• It has its own skating pond (open to the public, apparently)
  
• The land was originally part of Major Joseph Delafield's estate, circa 1829.
  
• The Delafield family laid out lots in 1909, according to Wikipedia, "the year after the New York City Subway's Broadway-Seventh Avenue line was extended to Van Cortlandt Park, intending to develop the land, which at first was called Delafield Woods."
  
• A decision was made to go off the NYC grid plan, and civil engineer Albert E. Wheeler "designed a street plan which followed the contours of the land and preserved as much of the wooded areas as possible."
  
• Architects were pre-approved to build homes in the area, and new residents were given their names.
  
• Because of that, the area still boasts high-quality architecture.
  
• You won't find multi-family homes, however, "the New York City Planning Commission approved a special zoning district in 1938, which would not allow the construction of any multiple-family buildings."

Miniature map of the property of Delafields Estate. Bounded by Riverdale Avenue, Mosholu Avenue, W. 53rd Street, Broadway, W. 238th Street, Spuyten Duyvil, W. 236th Street and Fieldston Road. (Courtesy of the NYPL)

The NY Times visited the area a few years ago, noting that there are about 260 homes in the neighborhood, all single-family, and "mostly generations old, devoid of the uniformity in other parts of the city and in suburban subdivisions," and holding tight still to its "developers’ original vision."