We work on Brooklyn’s brownstones and rowhouses: facades, stoops, cornices, brickwork and waterproofing, from the Heights and Park Slope out to Bay Ridge. Sardar Restoration Corp is licensed, insured and files with the Department of Buildings.
Attached houses, soft stone and shared walls. Almost nothing here works the way it does on an apartment building.
Brownstone is a soft sandstone that delaminates, shedding in sheets parallel to the face rather than crumbling at the joints. Patching it needs a matched mix and the right profile, not a mortar repair.
Your side wall is also your neighbor’s. Repairs there need coordination on access, scope and who pays, and that conversation is easier before the scaffold goes up than after.
The stoop and the sunken areaway below it sit where runoff collects, so cracked treads and blocked drains are common. The cornice is a separate problem: most are wood or pressed metal, not stone, so they rot or rust rather than spall.
Designated in 1965, and much of brownstone Brooklyn followed. Park Slope, Fort Greene, Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens and Stuyvesant Heights all sit in historic districts where Landmarks approval comes before any permit.
Sardar Restoration Corp is a licensed and insured contractor working throughout Brooklyn, carrying general liability and workers' compensation on every project. We file directly with the Department of Buildings, so permits, sidewalk shed applications and violation corrections all sit with one company. Our permit history is public record: 33 filings representing approximately $1.67 million in permitted construction. The company is led by Muhammad Ali.
Exterior repair, restoration and compliance work for Brooklyn rowhouses, brownstones and commercial buildings.
Brooklyn changes character block by block. Brownstone rows in the Heights, Park Slope and Fort Greene, frame and brick two-families through Flatbush and Midwood, and warehouse conversions in DUMBO and Gowanus.
Brownstone, rowhouse and masonry work completed across the borough.
Usually repaired. Brownstone delaminates, meaning it sheds in layers parallel to the face, so the damage is often shallower than it looks. The standard approach is to cut back to sound stone and patch with a matched cementitious mix tinted and textured to the original, then re-profile any moldings. Full stone replacement is reserved for structural failure or badly deteriorated lintels and sills.
Party walls are shared, so responsibility usually is too, though the details depend on the deeds and any agreement between the properties. Practically, the work often needs access from the neighbor’s side, which means a license agreement and sometimes a written cost split. Sorting that out before the scaffold goes up is far easier than after, and we can scope the work in a way that makes the conversation straightforward.
If the house sits in a historic district, yes. Brooklyn Heights was designated in 1965 as New York City’s first historic district, and Park Slope, Fort Greene, Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens, Boerum Hill and Stuyvesant Heights followed. In those districts the Landmarks Preservation Commission reviews exterior work before the Department of Buildings will issue a permit, and repairs have to match original material and detail.
Yes, and they are among the most common jobs on a Brooklyn rowhouse. Stoops take direct weather and foot traffic, and the areaway below sits at grade where water collects. Failed treads, cracked cheek walls, loose railings and blocked areaway drains all follow from the same cause, which is water sitting where it should be running off.
Almost certainly not. The Facade Inspection Safety Program applies to buildings over six stories, and rowhouses are typically three or four. That said, sidewalk condition is separately enforceable, and Local Law 126 parapet requirements reach a much wider range of buildings than FISP does, so an obligation can still exist even without a facade filing.
The whole borough. Brooklyn Heights, DUMBO, Downtown Brooklyn, Fort Greene, Boerum Hill, Carroll Gardens, Red Hook, Park Slope, Prospect Heights, Crown Heights, Bed-Stuy, Bushwick, Williamsburg and Greenpoint in the north and west, and Flatbush, Kensington, Midwood, Borough Park, Sunset Park, Bay Ridge, Bensonhurst, Sheepshead Bay, Canarsie, Flatlands, Brownsville, East New York and Coney Island through the rest.
