Brooklyn Heights: Brownstones, Bluffs & the Promenade

About This Tour

Perched on a bluff above the East River, Brooklyn Heights is New York's first landmarked historic district — a leafy enclave of Greek Revival and Italianate brownstones, steep old churches, and one of the most celebrated waterfront promenades in the world. This short walking tour traces the neighborhood's layered history, from the village of country estates that early Brooklynites built to escape Manhattan's crowds, through the abolitionist fervor and literary life of the nineteenth century, to the mid-century highway fight that produced the famous esplanade. Along the way you'll wander streets of breathtaking rowhouses, step into the sanctuaries where reformers and preachers helped shape a young nation, and stand on the bluff where residents once watched the Revolutionary-era shoreline and now take in the towers of Lower Manhattan. Brooklyn Heights is a neighborhood of firsts — among the city's earliest planned residential streets and its earliest preservation district — and of quiet beauty, where every cornice and doorway tells a story of the merchants, ministers, abolitionists, and writers who made these blocks their own. It is a walk through gorgeous architecture and deep American history, all within a few gentle, walkable blocks.

Tour Highlights

Tour Route & Stops