Isaac T. Hopper House

The Isaac T. Hopper House is a Greek Revival townhouse featuring a rusticated brownstone base at street level and brick-faced upper stories crowned with Ionic columns. The design follows the formal proportions typical of early 19th-century New York residential architecture.

Built from 1837 to 1838, the house was originally called the Ralph and Ann E. Van Wyck Mead House before subsequent ownership changes. It stands as one of the few townhouses that survived from that generation of residential development.

The house became home to the Women's Prison Association, which worked to support women reentering society after incarceration. Visitors can feel the legacy of this social mission reflected in how the building has been preserved as a reminder of charitable work.

The house is located on Second Avenue between East 6th and 7th Streets in the East Village Historic District. Walking through the neighborhood gives you the best sense of how it sits among other historic buildings from the same era.

This is the only surviving structure from a set of four rowhouses originally built by the Mead family on Second Avenue. This rarity makes it a valuable fragment of what was once a larger residential complex.