National Jazz Museum in Harlem Finds a Permanent Home

A rendering of the new retail and residential complex planned for 125th Street in Harlem. (Image: Empire State Development Corporation)

After years of delay and political squabbling, state officials have selected Danforth Development Partners to redevelop the long-vacant Victoria Theater on 125th Street, once Harlem's largest and most elegant theater. Danforth plans to transform the Victoria, which sits a couple doors east of its more well-known sister, the Apollo Theater, into a cultural center, with two live theaters and space for the Jazz Museum of Harlem, along with a hotel and 91 condominium apartments.

The new space would include a 199-seat Classical Theater of Harlem and a 99-seat theater for the Harlem Arts Alliance. Danforth, a Harlem-based developer that owns the commercial building on 125th Street that houses the offices of former President Bill Clinton, said it would preserve and restore the Victoria's Ionic columns, terra cotta rosettes and other historic elements.

The Harlem Community Development Corporation gave preliminary approval to the deal last month, and is scheduled to finalize the agreement on Monday.

The Victoria is to become a 317,570-square-foot mixed-use complex and underground parking garage. The development would include 40,500-square-foot cultural arts center, a 170- to 200-room hotel and a 91-unit residential condominium. In addition to the two theaters, the cultural center will also include 10,150-square-feet for the primary use of the Jazz Museum in Harlem, and 4,000 square feet of office space for the Apollo Theater.

The selection of Danforth follows a three-year process, much of which involved getting reassurances from the developer that the project would include minority subcontractors, jobs for Harlem residents and housing for low- and moderate-income tenants.

Several politicians, including Representative Charles B. Rangel, Assemblyman Keith L. T. Wright and the Manhattan borough president, Scott M. Stringer, praised the announcement in a statement issued by the Empire State Development Corporation, the Harlem Community Development Corporation's parent agency. The Harlem subsidiary was created in 1995.