The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission designated 26 new landmarks in 2025, a figure consistent with recent years. The selections reflected an ongoing effort to expand the commission's historical scope beyond the canonical buildings of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries to include sites associated with communities and histories that earlier designation periods overlooked.
Among the most discussed approvals was the designation of several buildings associated with the Harlem Renaissance, a process that had been under review for several years. The designations came with detailed reports documenting the architectural and historical significance of each structure, adding to a body of scholarship that will remain useful independent of the immediate regulatory implications.
On the alteration side, the commission reviewed and approved modifications to a number of significant Midtown buildings. Several proposals for additions to landmarked buildings on the Upper East Side generated the kind of extended public testimony that has become characteristic of that district's engagement with the LPC process. The Upper East Side has the highest concentration of individual landmarks in the city, and its community boards and block associations are among the most active participants in the commission's public hearings.
The most significant regulatory development of the year was not a specific designation but a methodological shift in how the commission approaches environmental review of proposed landmarks. New guidelines, developed in consultation with the city's planning agencies, are intended to streamline the review process for straightforward alterations while preserving the full hearing process for more consequential proposals.