Sag Harbor, NY Neighborhoods: The Village's Two Sides and the Historic SANS Community

One Village Government -- Not Separate Neighborhoods with Separate Services

Before getting into specific areas, it's worth being clear about what does and doesn't change from one part of Sag Harbor to another. The Village of Sag Harbor is a single, unified municipal government -- one mayor, one Board of Trustees elected village-wide, one village police department -- with exclusive land-use authority across the entire village. That's true whether a property sits on the Southampton side, the East Hampton side, or within the SANS district.

The one place a real administrative split does exist is property tax assessment: the village's land falls under two different towns, Southampton and East Hampton, and each runs its own assessor's office for parcels within its boundary. That split, along with some waterfront permitting, is a town-level matter layered on top of the village -- it does not mean two sides of Sag Harbor get different village services, different policing, or different day-to-day governance. SANS itself sits within this same single village government as well; it is not a separate municipality.

The Southampton-Side Historic Core

Roughly three-fifths of the village lies on the Southampton side, and this is the part of Sag Harbor most visitors picture first: Main Street, the village's historic commercial spine, along with the Old Whalers' Church, a Presbyterian church built in 1843-44 whose original 185-foot steeple was, at the time, the tallest structure on Long Island -- until it collapsed in the 1938 hurricane. The John Jermain Memorial Library is also on this side of the village.

The Whaling Museum -- formally the Sag Harbor Whaling & Historical Museum -- occupies the 1845 Benjamin Huntting II House, a Greek Revival mansion designed by architect Minard Lafever. The house later became the home of philanthropist Margaret Olivia Slocum, known as "Mrs. Russell Sage," from 1907 to 1918, then became a Masonic Temple in 1920. It opened as a whaling museum in 1945, and its upper floor is still a working Masonic lodge today. Nearby, the Custom House was built around 1770 and expanded under Henry Packer Dering, appointed the village's first customs master in 1790; it now operates as a museum run by Preservation Long Island. Rounding out this side of the village are the Old Burying Ground, Oakland Cemetery, Mashashimuet Park, and Otter Pond.

The East Hampton-Side: Bay Street, Pierson High School, and Eastville

The remaining roughly two-fifths of the village falls on the East Hampton side, anchored by Bay Street and its marina complex and yacht clubs -- the center of Sag Harbor's boating culture. This side of the village is also home to Pierson High School and the Sag Harbor State Golf Course.

It's also home to the historic Eastville community, the oldest documented African-American community in Sag Harbor -- a freedmen's settlement dating to the early 1800s. Eastville predates the 20th-century SANS beach communities described below by well over a century, and its history stands on its own as part of Sag Harbor's East Hampton-side landmarks.

The SANS District: Azurest, Sag Harbor Hills, and Ninevah Beach

Azurest, Sag Harbor Hills, and Ninevah Beach -- collectively known as SANS -- are historically Black beach communities developed after World War II as a refuge for middle-class Black families who were excluded from other beachfront resorts under Jim Crow-era discrimination. Azurest came first, conceived in the late 1940s by Brooklyn schoolteacher Maude Terry (1887-1968) on a 20-acre parcel; the subdivision plan itself was designed by her sister, architect Amaza Lee Meredith (1895-1984). More than 300 Black families went on to purchase properties across the three subdivisions.

Documented owners and visitors across SANS's history include Lena Horne, Harry Belafonte, restaurateur B. Smith, NBA player Allan Houston, writer Colson Whitehead, illustrator Reynold Ruffins, and NAACP official Edward R. Dudley, along with Langston Hughes, a frequent 1950s visitor who stayed with historian William Pickens. By the 1950s and 1960s, SANS was being compared to Oak Bluffs on Martha's Vineyard as a premier Black vacation destination, with summer populations swelling to roughly 1,000 -- providing important support to the local economy after both the Bulova watch factory and a Grumman plant closed.

National Register Listing and an Ongoing Local Debate

The Sag Harbor Hills, Azurest, and Ninevah Beach Subdivisions Historic District was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on July 10, 2019, formally recognizing the area's history at the federal level.

Since then, there has been genuine, documented local debate -- in 2018 and again in 2022-2023 -- over whether to add an additional local historic designation on top of that National Register listing. Supporters of a local designation generally point to teardown and redevelopment pressure as property values rise; others raise property-rights concerns about additional local restrictions on what owners can do with their own homes. This page presents that debate as genuinely unresolved rather than taking a side, and it does not have a current outcome to report -- confirm the current status directly with the Village of Sag Harbor.

Architectural Character Across the Whole Village

One thing is consistent village-wide, regardless of which side or district a property sits in: Sag Harbor's housing stock leans heavily on Greek Revival and Victorian-era houses originally built for sea captains, along with smaller whaling-era cottages, a legacy of the mid-1800s whaling wealth that built the village. The village's business district itself carries its own National Register of Historic Places listing, as the Sag Harbor Village District.

What This Means If You're Weighing Neighborhoods Here

Sag Harbor's neighborhood identity comes from real landmark clusters, not from separate municipal governments: a Southampton-side historic core built around Main Street, the Whaling Museum, and the Custom House; an East Hampton-side anchored by Bay Street's marina culture, Pierson High School, and the historic Eastville community; and the SANS district -- Azurest, Sag Harbor Hills, and Ninevah Beach -- a historically Black beach community with a documented, nationally recognized history and its own ongoing local conversation about further historic protection. All of it sits under one village government.

A few things are deliberately left open here rather than invented. This page does not have a street-by-street boundary map for any of these areas, current home-price data by neighborhood, or precise population figures for individual neighborhoods or subdivisions -- only the village-wide figure of roughly 2,750 to 2,770 residents, per the 2020 Census, is confirmed. For boundary specifics, current pricing, and the current status of the SANS historic-designation discussion, talk to a local agent and check directly with the Village of Sag Harbor.