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From the
Queens Courier:
A $20 million annex expansion of the landmarked Louis Armstrong House Museum, named for the famed jazz musician, is on the way after meeting zoning regulations.
Plans have been filed with the Buildings Department on Friday to construct the proposed educational visitors center on vacant land near the museum at 34-49 107th St. in Corona.
Design work on the new center dates as far back as 2007, but construction on the project was stalled due to a necessary variance application from the Board of Standards and Appeals (BSA).
The new two-story project needed approval for a waiver to be built closer to neighboring property lines than zoning laws allow.
The BSA gave the project the green light last year, following support from Community Board 3 and the borough president’s office. Now the project is in the construction phase, according to a representative.
The museum is hoping to build the new 8,737-square-foot annex, which is designed by architecture firm Caples Jefferson, for more exhibit space and a store to better accommodate the more than 12,000 visitors who come to the museum each year.
From the
Daily News:
A Corona museum dedicated to celebrating the life of a jazz pioneer is proposing to build a $20 million educational annex across the street.
Louis Armstrong House Museum officials asked Queens Borough President Helen Marshall to throw her support behind granting the center a building variance at a Thursday land-use hearing at Borough Hall.
The variance would enable the two-story center to be built closer to the property lines than is permitted under the area’s new zoning. The land for the project, as well as the museum, are under the umbrella of Queens College.
Community Board 3 District Manager Giovanna Reid said the variance was overwhelmingly approved at the board’s March 21 meeting. “We support this application,” she said.
The project must ultimately be approved by the city Board of Standards and Appeals.
From the
Wall Street Journal:
The man known to millions as "Satchmo" is in the news again this week thanks to a pair of announcements by the Louis Armstrong House Museum in Corona, Queens. The Armstrong collection was opened in 1994, and the 107th Street house itself, where the trumpeter lived from 1943 until his death in 1971, was opened to the public in 2003. Up to now, the archive has been housed at Queens College, and has been described as the largest collection devoted to a single jazz musician anywhere in the world.
At a press conference at the Armstrong house last week, the museum's director, Michael Cogswell, announced that ground will be broken in the Spring of 2011 on a new visitor's center to be located on the other side of 107th Street. The building, which will be completed in 2013, will house the entire Armstrong library and include an 80-seat space for musical performances and educational purposes.
Said Mr. Cogswell, "The world is more interested than ever in Louis Armstrong."
The library includes material not only from Armstrong and his wife, Lucille Armstrong, but also from Phoebe Jacobs, who helped found the Armstrong Educational Foundation (the organization that supports the museum) in 1969, and Jack Bradley, an avid jazz researcher and photographer who gathered and took thousands of photos of the Armstrongs through the decades.
