Orchard Beach

Parks Commissioner Robert Moses announced the expansion on February 28, 1934, inspired by Jones Beach. The work filled approximately 110 acres of LeRoy's and Pelham Bays, connecting Hunter Island and the Twin Islands to Rodman's Neck, with sand brought from Sandy Hook, New Jersey and the Rockaway Peninsula; the deteriorated Hunter mansion was demolished during construction. The beach was dedicated, incomplete, in July 1936, officially opened on June 25, 1937 and was fully completed in 1938.

Aymar Embury II designed it with Gilmore David Clarke and Michael Rapuano. The bathhouse, designed by Embury, is composed of a raised plaza flanked by two pavilions to the north and south; there are blue and white tiles inside the pavilions, and the lowest 6 feet of each pavilion's walls are clad with blue tiles. A 50-foot-wide promenade of hexagonal gray tiles runs the beach's full length. At opening the complex held a pavilion with two bathhouses, as well as a cafeteria, a small-boat lagoon, a 5,400-person locker and dressing facility, and two parking lots with a collective 8,000 spots; after the 1980s renovation the pavilions held some shops and fast food, with a nature center and museum planned for the buildings. The bathhouse and promenade were designated a New York City Landmark on June 20, 2006.