The Astral Apartments is an

apartment An apartment (American English), or flat (British English, Indian English, South African English), is a self-contained housing unit (a type of residential real estate) that occupies part of a building, generally on a single story. There are ma ...

building located at 184 Franklin Street in

Greenpoint, Brooklyn Greenpoint is the northernmost neighborhood in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, in the U.S. state of New York. It is bordered on the southwest by Williamsburg at Bushwick Inlet Park and McCarren Park; on the southeast by the Brooklyn� ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. The Astral was built in 1885–1886 as affordable housing for employees of

Charles Pratt Charles Pratt (October 2, 1830 – May 4, 1891) was an American businessman. Pratt was a pioneer of the U.S. petroleum industry, and he established his kerosene refinery Astral Oil Works in Brooklyn, New York. He then lived with his growing fam ...

Astral Oil Works Astral Oil Works was an American oil company specializing in illuminating oil, and based in Brooklyn, New York. Astral Oil was a high-quality kerosene used in lamps and noted for being relatively safe. It was founded by Charles Pratt. Charles Pra ...

. It is a block-long brick and

terra cotta Terracotta, terra cotta, or terra-cotta (; ; ), in its material sense as an earthenware substrate, is a clay-based unglazed or glazed ceramic where the fired body is porous. In applied art, craft, construction, and architecture, terracotta ...

building in the Queen Anne style. It features a central projecting section with a deep, three-story-high round arch recess. ''See also:'' The roof features inward-looking decorative grotesques. Original amenities of the building included a settlement house, library, and kindergarten. Originally, a branch of the

Pratt Institute Pratt Institute is a private university with its main campus in Brooklyn, New York (state), New York. It has a satellite campus in Manhattan and an extension campus in Utica, New York at the Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute. The school was ...

Free Library operated from the ground floor of the Astral.Ostrander, Stephen M. (1894).
''A History of the City of Brooklyn and Kings County'', Volume II
Brooklyn, NY: Subscription. The building was designed to echo red-brick apartments built for workers by

George Peabody George Peabody ( ; February 18, 1795 – November 4, 1869) was an American financier and philanthropist. He is widely regarded as the father of modern philanthropy. Born into a poor family in Massachusetts, Peabody went into business in dry go ...

in London. It was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

in 1982 and designated a

New York City landmark The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) is the New York City agency charged with administering the city's Landmarks Preservation Law. The LPC is responsible for protecting New York City's architecturally, historically, and cu ...

in 1983.

In popular culture

The building is the fictional setting for

Kate Christensen Kate Christensen (born August 22, 1962) is an American novelist. She won the 2008 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction for her fourth novel, '' The Great Man'', about a painter and the three women in his life. Her previous novels are ''In the Drink'' ...

's 2011 novel '' The Astral: A Novel''.

References

Residential buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in New York City Residential buildings in Brooklyn Apartment buildings in New York City Residential buildings completed in 1886 Queen Anne architecture in New York City Greenpoint, Brooklyn National Register of Historic Places in Brooklyn 1886 establishments in New York (state) New York City Designated Landmarks in Brooklyn {{Brooklyn-struct-stub