Architect C.P.H. Gilbert went a bit wild with home designs in late 19th-century Brooklyn. Properly known as Charles Pierrepont Henry Gilbert, he swept in during the Gilded Age, a time when architectural freedom produced a fever dream of elaborate mansions and row houses in greater New York City.

Having a statement home was one way for the upper crust to put their considerable wealth on public display.

As if anyone needed to be reminded.

The Astors, the Vanderbilts, the Rockefellers—the tech-bro powerbrokers of their day—were already household names, synonymous with oil, steel, banking and railroad interests. The standard 19th-century millionaire playbook.

For some, the flamboyant mansions outlasted their fortunes. For others, generational wealth stayed the course. Millionaires’ Row on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan still showcases some of the era’s standout buildings. (Of course, Manhattan being ever-evolving Manhattan, there’s now a Billionaires’ Row along West 57th Street near Central Park, where nothing shouts conspicuous peacocking like sky-high penthouses at the top of sleek glass boxes.)

But back to our man Gilbert.

He could design “a mean Neo-Gothic mansion,” as one New York Times story put it. But he started out creating a series of brawny brownstones in addresses such as Carroll Street and Montgomery Place in Brooklyn, sticking close to Prospect Park, the green center of the onetime city-turned-borough.

Now one of Gilbert’s works, owned by........

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