DESIGNATION REPORT The Caffe Cino Landmarks Preservation Designation Report Designation List 513 Commission The Caffe Cino LP-2635 June 18, 2019

DESIGNATION REPORT The Caffe Cino LOCATION Borough of Manhattan 31 Cornelia Street LANDMARK TYPE Individual SIGNIFICANCE No. 31 Cornelia Street in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Manhattan is culturally significant for its association with the Caffe Cino, which occupied the building’s ground floor commercial space from 1958 to 1968. During those ten years, the coffee shop served as an experimental theater venue, becoming the birthplace of Off-Off-Broadway and New York City’s first gay theater. Landmarks Preservation Designation Report Designation List 513 Commission The Caffe Cino LP-2635 June 18, 2019

Former location of the Caffe Cino, 31 Cornelia Street 2019 LANDMARKS PRESERVATION COMMISSION COMMISSIONERS Lisa Kersavage, Executive Director Sarah Carroll, Chair Mark Silberman, Counsel Frederick Bland, Vice Chair Kate Lemos McHale, Director of Research Diana Chapin Cory Herrala, Director of Preservation Wellington Chen Michael Devonshire Michael Goldblum REPORT BY John Gustafsson MaryNell Nolan-Wheatley, Research Department Anne Holford-Smith Jeanne Lutfy EDITED BY Adi Shamir-Baron Kate Lemos McHale and Margaret Herman PHOTOGRAPHS BY LPC Staff Landmarks Preservation Designation Report Designation List 513 Commission The Caffe Cino LP-2635 June 18, 2019 3 of 24

The Caffe Cino the National Parks Conservation Association, Village Preservation, Save Chelsea, and the Bowery Alliance 31 Cornelia Street, Manhattan of Neighbors, and 19 individuals. No one spoke in opposition to the proposed designation. The Commission also received 124 written submissions in favor of the proposed designation, including from Bronx Borough President Reuben Diaz, New York City Council Member Adrienne Adams, the Designation List 513 Preservation League of New York State, and 121 LP-2635 individuals. Built: 1877 Builder: Benjamin Warner Landmark Site: Borough of Manhattan, Tax Map Block 590, Lot 47 in part, consisting of the land beneath the building’s footprint, as shown on the attached map. Calendared: May 14, 2019 Public Hearing: June 4, 2019 On June 4, 2019, the Landmarks Preservation Commission held a public hearing on the proposed designation of the Caffe Cino as a New York City Landmark and the proposed designation of the related Landmark Site (Item No.1). The hearing was duly advertised in accordance with the provisions of the law. Forty people testified in favor of the proposed designation of Caffe Cino, including representatives of Assemblymember Richard N. Gottfried, City Council Speaker Corey Johnson, and City Councilmember Daniel Dromm. Speaker Johnson’s testimony was jointly signed by State Senator Brad Hoylman, Assemblymembers Deborah Glick and Daniel O’Donnell, and New York City Council Members Margaret Chin, Daniel Dromm, Carlos Menchaca, Debi Rose, Ritchie Torres, and Jimmy Van Bramer. Also speaking in favor of the designation were representatives of the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project, the Historic Districts Council, the New York Landmarks Conservancy, the Society for the Architecture of the City, the Victorian Society of New York, the Real Estate Board of New York, Landmarks Preservation Designation Report Designation List 513 Commission The Caffe Cino LP-2635 June 18, 2019 4 of 24

Summary cheap to attend: all that was required was a one dollar purchase at the cafe. As a result, the shows The Caffe Cino were available to a diverse audience. Playwrights and performers who presented their work at the Caffe Cino pioneered the Off-Off- Broadway, experimental, and gay theater movements. Theater at the Cino consistently acknowledged the existence and experiences of gay The building at 31 Cornelia Street, situated between people, without the prevailing homophobic Bleecker and West 4th streets in Manhattan, is stereotypes. While the Cino legitimized the value of culturally significant for its

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