About this Event
Join us at Kingsland Homestead on Friday October 16th at 7pm
In his second book exploring the urban vernacular of Queens, Rafael Herrin-Ferri shifts
his focus to the green spaces that accompany the houses and small multi-family
buildings of the "World’s Borough." As varied and colorful as the façades featured in All the Queens Houses, these spaces introduce an organic, botanical element to the streetscape. Semi-formal lawns in the French and Italian traditions sit cheek by jowl with the improvised arbors of Chinese vegetable gardens, Caribbean-inspired flower gardens, brightly colored Hindu courtyards, elaborate handcrafted water features, life-size replicas of fauna, and countless other displays of idiosyncrasy and cultural diversity. Through its photographs and text, this book paints another portrait—softer and greener this time—of the dynamic and multicultural landscape that is Queens, New York.
Rafael Herrin-Ferri is an architect, artist, and author residing in Jackson Heights, Queens. He was born in Barcelona in 1972, grew up in Ithaca, NY—with intermittent schooling in Spain—and studied architecture and art at Cornell University. As an architect, he has worked both independently and in award-winning studios since 1996. As an artist, he has exhibited abstract collages in various group shows in the cities of San Francisco and New York.
In 2013, he began to study the Queens urban vernacular via photography. He exhibited a large selection of house portraits at The Architectural League of New York in 2017. Four years later, he published All the Queens Houses (Jovis, 2021), to critical acclaim. In the Fall of 2025, he published All the Queens Gardens (Jovis, 2025), and was featured in a short documentary titled
All the Queens Houses, by Astoria filmmaker Sean Mowry. Currently, Rafael is documenting the commercial vernacular of Queens.
Admission is $10 for non-members and $5 for members.
Limited on-site parking is available.
Event venue & nearby stays
Queens Historical Society, 143-35 37th Avenue, Flushing, United States
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