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Queens

Forest Hills

A planned Tudor village, an old tennis stadium turned concert bowl, and a century-old ice cream counter.

In 1908 Margaret Sage, founder of the Russell Sage Foundation, bought 142 acres beside the new Long Island Rail Road line and set out to build a model garden suburb. The architect Grosvenor Atterbury designed it and Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. planned the landscape, and Forest Hills Gardens rose mostly between 1910 and 1917: Tudor Revival houses, curving private streets, and Station Square, a brick-paved plaza under a clock tower where commuters still step off the train.

The West Side Tennis Club moved here from Manhattan in 1914, and in 1923 it built a horseshoe-shaped concrete stadium of about 13,000 seats. The U.S. national championships — later the U.S. Open — were played in Forest Hills until they moved to Flushing Meadows in 1978. The Beatles played the stadium in 1964, Simon & Garfunkel came back again and again, and today it is one of the city's best outdoor concert venues, all summer long.

Beyond the Gardens, Forest Hills is apartment towers along Queens Boulevard and the long shopping run of Austin Street. Bukharan Jewish families from Central Asia have shaped the blocks around 108th Street since the 1970s, and the Ramones grew up a few streets from the Gardens. Eat on Austin Street, walk the Gardens slowly, and finish with a sundae at a marble counter on Metropolitan Avenue.

Tudor Revival houses and private streets in Forest Hills Gardens

Station Square's clock tower above the LIRR platform

Summer concerts in the 1923 tennis stadium

Austin Street's mile of shops and restaurants

Local notes

Forest Hills Gardens

The Gardens is a private community: its streets are owned and maintained by the residents' corporation, and parking is restricted, but walking through is the way most visitors see it. Start at Station Square and follow Greenway North and Greenway South.

Forest Hills Stadium

The West Side Tennis Club's 1923 stadium hosted the national tennis championships for decades, then fell quiet after the Open left in 1978. Restored as a concert venue, it now runs a summer season — check the stadium's official schedule.

Ramones Way

The corner of 67th Avenue and 110th Street was co-named Ramones Way in 2017,. It is a street sign, not a shrine, but a fine detour for anyone who knows the words to 'Blitzkrieg Bop.'

Through the lens

Station Square is the frame: arrive in the late afternoon, when the sun drops behind the station and warms the brick and half-timbering. In the Gardens, autumn is the season — copper beeches and red maples against the slate roofs. Respect that the streets are private and residential.

Editorial draft — core details last reviewed October 13, 2026. Confirm practical details with the official site before you go.

Where to eat & drink