As expected, the Landmarks Preservation Commission made 70 Pine Street a city landmark today, and the long-awaited designation didn’t come without the requisite celebrations. In the words of Commissioner Margery Perlmutter, the Art Deco Financial District tower that most recently served as the headquarters of the American International Group is “our other Chrysler and Empire State building.” Or, as Robert Tierney, chairman of the LPC, put it: “This building defies words.” The 66-story building, now mostly vacant, was originally built as the headquarters of the Cities Service Company (now Citgo). It is among Lower Manhanttan’s tallest skyscrapers. – Sarabeth Sanders

The city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission may bestow an historic designation on nearly 300 tenement buildings and rowhouses in the East Village, DNAinfo reported. The blocks under consideration are bounded by East 2nd and East 7th streets, between First Avenue and the Bowery, plus 10th Street on the northern edge of Tompkins Square Park. Many of the buildings there are 19th-century residences or institutional buildings that had played significant roles in the lives of immigrants during that time period. [more]

70 Pine St, Young Woo of Youngwoo & Associates

As 70 Pine Street heads to the Landmarks Preservation Commission for recognition of its historic past, the future of the 66-story Art Deco skyscraper is up in the air. According to the Post, a plan to convert the former American International Group building’s upper portion into high-end condominiums while keeping the lower portion of the building as offices has been scrapped by the new owners of the tower, who purchased it, along with the adjacent 72 Wall Street, for $150 million from American International Group in 2009. Those owners are a group led by Korea’s Kumho Investment Bank — not, as previously reported, New York developer Young Woo, of Youngwoo & Associates, who was previously believed to have bought the properties with some equity from KIB. In fact, KIB now says its group owns 100 percent of 70 Pine Street and that Woo is “just part of the [group of] advisers” created to manage the building. Comments

70 Pine St, Young Woo of Youngwoo & Associates

The 66-story Art Deco tower at 70 Pine Street, the former American International Group tower where developer Youngwoo & Associates is planning a partial condominium conversion, is going up for landmarking. According to the Post, the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission will hold a public hearing next month on the skyscraper, which was built by Clinton & Russel, Holton & George in 1932 and is currently the tallest building in Lower Manhattan. Peers of 70 Pine, like the Empire State Building, the Chrysler Building and Donald Trump’s 40 Wall Street, all enjoy protection as landmarks, meaning any changes to their structures must be first approved by the LPC. [more]

The city’s Landmark Preservation Commission has asked Steven Roth’s Vornado Realty Trust to try again with its proposed renovation plans for the newly-landmarked interior of the Manufacturers Hanover Trust Building at 510 Fifth Avenue, at 43rd Street. According to the New York Times, preservationists argued during a hearing yesterday that Vornado’s planned redesign, by original building architects Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, would involve too many changes to the five-story, 1950s-era property, which Vornado bought for $58 million last year. [more]

Andre Balazs isn’t the only big-name hotelier with his eye on the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey’s boutique hotel project at John F. Kennedy International Airport. The Wall Street Journal dropped a few more hints today as to who might soon be jockeying for the opportunity to build a 150-room hotel adjacent to Eero Saarinen’s Trans World Airlines Flight Center, among them: Donald Trump, Starwood Hotels & Resorts and pod hotel owner-operator Yotel. Comments

Click image to see full map of proposed historic districts

The Landmarks Preservation Commission and Brooklyn Community Board 3 will convene tomorrow night to host an open forum on four new proposed historic districts within Bedford-Stuyvesant and one expansion of an existing landmarked district in the neighborhood, according to neighborhood organization Bedford-Stuyvesant Society for Historic Preservation. If the plan were to go through, a combined 75 blocks in Bedford-Stuyvesant would be encompassed in the landmarking. TRD [more]

The famed Trans World Airlines Flight Center at John F. Kennedy International Airport could become part of a new boutique hotel under a plan by the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey, according to the Wall Street Journal. The agency, which has already poured $20 million into asbestos removal and restoration work at the vacant, Eero Saarinen-designed terminal, is now seeking developers to help recoup some of that money by converting the space into a lobby for a small hotel that would sit adjacent to the new JetBlue building. The lobby would have restaurants and shops, while the hotel would have around 150 rooms, said Port Authority Executive Director Chris Ward. [more]

An expected City Council vote against landmarking a Queens church that doesn’t want the historic designation could set a dangerous precedent, preservationists told the Daily News. In October, the Landmarks Preservation Commission voted to designate Jamaica’s Grace Episcopal Church Memorial Hall as a historic site, prompting a battle with the church’s leadership, which is concerned that it will not be able to meet the financial demands of maintaining a landmark property. City Council member Jim Gennaro of Fresh Meadows has since set to overturn the designation, arguing that in the future the commission should be required to engage with property owners and seek their consent before bestowing landmark status on their buildings. [more]

From the December issue: The city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission proposed making Greenwich Village a historic district 45 years ago this month. The commission proposed a 65-block area with about 2,000 buildings roughly bounded by 12th and 13th streets to the north, University Place on the east, Washington Square South and West Fourth Street on the south and Washington Street to the west. The move came just eight months after the city council approved the creation of the commission, founded to preserve the architecture of the city following the destruction of Pennsylvania Station. Click here for more highlights in real estate history.