Tag Archives: lower manhattan

Switch Building

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Switch Building is an attempt to be “cool” yet stay in character with the neighborhood. So while 109 Norfolk has the same building line and approximate height as 111 Norfolk, Switch Building has a steel facade as opposed to brick, with windows on alternating floors angled counter to each other like oversized rocker switches (hence the name).

Some time after plans were drawn and construction started, the “neighborhood” constraint seems to have disappeared – the towering Blue condominiums next door certainly shattered that concept. One wonders what nArchitects would have planned without that constraint.

Another requirement of the building permit was that there be ground floor “community access” space, so a two-story (ground floor and basement) art gallery was included in the plan.

Above the gallery are four floor-through apartments with rear balconies (staggered, so each balcony gets maximum sun); a duplex penthouse apartment is above that.

Switch Building Vital Statistics
  • Location: 109 Norfolk Street between Delancey and Rivington Streets
  • Year completed: 2007
  • Architect: nArchitects
  • Floors: 7
  • Style: Postmodern
Switch Building Recommended Reading

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Standard Hotel

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Standard Hotel, as they are fond of saying, is not your standard hotel. Perched 30 feet above the High Line park, it’s shaped like an open book – a book that’s also open in the sense that the facades are transparent (not mirrored or tinted) glass.

All that glass makes rooms seem larger than they are, but sometimes guests forget(?) to close the drapes, leading the NY Post to dub the Standard Hotel the “eyeful tower.”

The building’s design and location presented some unique engineering challenges. Engineers had to cope with the soil conditions (landfill), flood resistance, a high water table, and strict limits on how close to the existing High Line structure they could build. The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat case study describes how Ennead Architects met those challenges.

For all of the Standard Hotel’s non-standard features, the property did try to blend in at street level: The Standard Grill restaurant was constructed with salvaged brick, in a style that closely mimics the meatpacking warehouses of the neighborhood. You’d never guess that it was new construction.

Standard Hotel Vital Statistics
  • Location: 848 Washington Street at W 13th Street
  • Year completed: 2009
  • Architect: Ennead Architects (formerly Polshek Partnership)
  • Floors: 18
  • Style: Postmodern
Standard Hotel Recommended Reading

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Jane Hotel

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Jane Hotel, built in 1908 as the American Seamen’s Friend Society Sailors’ Home and Institute, once hosted Titanic survivors. It was designed by William A. Boring, who was also the architect for Ellis Island’s immigration station. Restored in 2008, the Jane Hotel now hosts financial survivors – in tiny rooms with shared bath priced as low as $79 per night.

The distinctive octagonal tower originally had a beacon, to welcome sailors. The beacon is gone, but other nautical connections remain. For starters, Jane Hotel rooms are called cabins. How tiny? A “remarkably cozy” 50 square feet. Some with bunk beds. The New York Times quipped, Popeye Slept Here and Now Olive Oyl Can, Too. the developers, Sean MacPherson and Eric Goode, also run the Maritime Hotel – a former sailor’s hostelry run by the National Maritime Union.

In 1931 the Home and Institute was downgraded to annex status, and in 1944 the YMCA took over the property, removing the beacon in 1946. Also in 1946, YMCA sold the building; it changed hands several more times over the years, finally becoming Riverview Hotel before MacPherson and Goode took over. (See the Corbin Plays portfolio for historic photos of the building with beacon. The PreservationNation Blog has current interior photos.)

In the 1970s and until 2005, the Jane Street Theater called this home.

The Greenwich Village waterfront now attracts joggers instead of sailors. The Jane Hotel is an architectural reminder of New York’s history as a seaport – and a haven (says the hotel) for travelers “with more dash than cash.”

Jane Hotel Vital Statistics
  • Location: 113 Jane Street at West Street (aka 505 West Street)
  • Year completed: 1908
  • Architect: William A. Boring
  • Floors: 6
  • Style: neo-Classical
  • New York City Landmark: 2000
Jane Hotel Recommended Reading

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One Jackson Square

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One Jackson Square is pretty slick – on two levels. As architecture, the building’s 11 floors of undulating ribbon windows, composed of random-width panes, are an arresting composition. As blatant modernism blessed by the NY Landmarks Preservation Commission, the building is a coup; its architects argued essentially that the building’s very quirkiness is a perfect match for a neighborhood synonymous with idiosyncrasy. Besides, the glass facades reflect the historic surroundings.

The Landmarks Preservation Commission had to approve the plans because the site is within the boundaries of the Greenwich Village Historic District. The One Jackson Square site had been a parking lot at the time that the district was designated.

The condo project faced a few design and engineering challenges: The site is an odd shape, so the curved facade masks the unusual angle formed by Greenwich Avenue with Eighth Avenue. The site also spans two building code zones, so the Eighth Avenue section rises to 11 floors, while the Greenwich Avenue section is limited to seven. One Jackson Square is also on top of subway tunnels, so piles had to be driven around the tunnels to bedrock; additionally, isolation springs and pads protect the tunnels while protecting the apartments from vibrations of passing trains. Last but not least, the free-form ribbon windows had to be assembled in small sections off-site, then connected to each other and to the concrete floor slabs.

I’m not quite sure if I should apologize or take a bow: The “Suggested Reading” section is exceptionally long, because of the variety of technical, artistic and social issues involved. The “Forgotten New York” virtual tour is for the benefit of those not familiar with the Greenwich Village context. – K.G.

One Jackson Square Vital Statistics
  • Location: 122 Greenwich Avenue at Eighth Avenue
  • Year completed: 2011
  • Architect: Kohn Pederson Fox Associates
  • Floors: 11
  • Style: Postmodern
One Jackson Square Recommended Reading

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Whitehall Building

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Whitehall Building is actually two buildings: the original 1904 20-story structure facing Battery Place, and a 1910 32-story annex directly behind that, facing West Street.

(A third building, added to the complex in 1972, is not included in this gallery. Now named One Western Union International Plaza, that 20-story office building was built in a completely different style and is now under different ownership.)

Whitehall Building was a little bit of a gamble – its location was two blocks off Broadway, the most desirable address. But the park across the street guaranteed unimpeded views; with lower-than-Broadway rents, the building was an immediate success. The owners, Robert and William Chesebrough, started buying up adjacent lots for an annex even before the first building was completed. (Robert Chesebrough was the inventor of Vaseline Petroleum Jelly.)

Henry J. Hardenbergh was the architect for the Whitehall Building. Among his prior commissions were the Dakota Apartments (1884), the original Waldorf (1895) and Astoria (1897) hotels, and the Western Union Telegraph Building (1884). His design for the Whitehall was quite colorful for the times and the location, including five different shades of brick and stone in the Battery Place facade.

The records don’t say why Hardenbergh wasn’t selected to design the annex – but it may have been because he was busy designing the Plaza Hotel. In any case, Clinton & Russell was selected for the job. Their annex, Greater Whitehall, was much larger than Whitehall Building; in fact, it was the largest office building in New York at the time.

The upper floors (14-31) of both buildings have now been converted to rental apartments – Ocean Luxury Residences.

Whitehall Building Vital Statistics
  • Location: 17 Battery Place
  • Year completed: 1904; 1910 (annex, aka Greater Whitehall)
  • Architect: Henry J. Hardenbergh; Clinton & Russell (annex)
  • Floors: 20; 31 (annex)
  • Style: neo-Renaissance
  • New York City Landmark: 2000
Whitehall Building Recommended Reading

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One Broadway

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One Broadway is a building within a building: Strip away the 1921 Neo-Classical white limestone skin and you’ll find a red brick and brownstone Queen Anne-style structure built in 1887.

(For a rare look at the “before,” take a look at Archiseek‘s article.)

Also beneath the facade, you’ll find layers of history – condensed here from the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission report:

The 1887 building, built on the site of a home reputedly used by General Washington, was named the Washington Building. It was built for Cyrus W. Field, whose Atlantic Telegraph Company laid the first transatlantic telegraph cable. The architect, Edward H. Kendall, also designed the Gorham Mfg. Building and the Methodist Book Concern.

J.P. Morgan’s International Mercantile Marine Company (IMMC) bought the building in 1919; Walter B. Chambers re-designed the structure inside and out. With competitor Cunard Line just a few doors up Broadway, the International Mercantile Marine Company Building became the anchor for “Steamship Row.” IMMC operated numerous subsidiaries, including Titanic‘s White Star Line. By 1940 internal mergers reduced the company to United States Lines, which took over the building from 1941 to 1979. Allstate Life Insurance Co. bought the building at a foreclosure sale in 1992 and financed a $2 million restoration in 1993-1994.

The building is now occupied by a branch of Citibank and Kenyon & Kenyon LLP – an intellectual property law firm.

One Broadway Vital Statistics
  • Location: One Broadway at Battery Place
  • Year completed: 1887; reclad, 1921
  • Architect: Edward Hale Kendall; Walter B. Chambers (remodeling)
  • Floors: 12
  • Style: Neo-Classical
  • New York City Landmark: 1995
  • National Register of Historic Places: 1991
One Broadway Recommended Reading

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Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House

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Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House is one of New York City’s most important landmarks, both for its history and for its architecture.

Historically, this is the site of New York’s first Custom House; the first building burned down. The choice of architect was the first major use of the 1893 Tarnsey Act, which allowed private architects to design public buildings. Cass Gilbert won the commission, after heated (and controversial) competition. The United States Custom House also served as a test of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission: In 1965 the then-new agency was designating a federal building as a city landmark, and the regional administrator for the General Services Administration (GSA) argued that the city had no authority to regulate federal property. (Nonetheless, the city returned in 1979 to declare the interior as a landmark!)

The building was hugely important to the nation: Import duties charged here and at other ports financed the government, in the days before an income tax. The Customs Service moved to the World Trade Center in 1971. The building was empty for a decade, and slated for demolition until Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D, NY) sponsored a bill to restore the Custom House. Additional legislation required the GSA to find new uses for unused federal buildings (they needed a law to figure that out?). Now, the building is shared by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court, the National Archives, and the National Museum of the American Indian (Smithsonian Institution).

You can’t tell it from these photos, but the Custom House is actually trapezoidal: The back of the building is wider than the front.

Cass Gilbert’s Beaux Arts design is filled with symbolism and references to classical architecture. The four monumental sculptures in front of the building, sculpted by Daniel Chester French, represent the continents Asia, Africa, America, and Europe. Statues representing 12 seafaring nations stand above the front facade’s columns; the Corinthian capitals of the columns include the head of Mercury (representing commerce); second-story windows are topped by heads representing the “eight races of mankind.”

How did Belgium wind up among the top 12 seafaring nations? According to “Secret New York, An Unusual Guide,” the statue was originally Germany, but ordered changed after the outbreak of World War I.

Interior details are equally rich (and also designated a New York City Landmark). New York artist Reginald Marsh painted the murals in the second floor rotunda, as part of a Treasury Relief Art Project (an offspring of the W.P.A.) in 1937.

(The GSA has an extensive photo gallery showing interior details.)

Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House Vital Statistics
  • Location: Bowling Green
  • Year completed: 1907
  • Architect: Cass Gilbert
  • Floors: 7
  • Style: Beaux Arts
  • New York City Landmark: 1965, 1979
  • National Register of Historic Places: 1972
Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House Recommended Reading

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21 West Street

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21 West Street (aka Le Rivage), a slender 31-story Art Deco landmark, was converted from offices to apartments in 1998. The building complements the adjoining Downtown Athletic Club, designed by the same architects but built five years earlier.

When built in 1931 (at the same time as the Empire State Building), 21 West Street was across the street from the waterfront. Upper-story tenants then had an unobstructed view of the Hudson. Battery Park City was built on landfill placed in 1980 from excavation for the World Trade Center.

The exposed corners of the building are cantilevered, allowing corner windows. The building was promoted as “An office building with glass corners.” The original red window frames have been replaced by a more neutral tan matching the brick surrounds.

Starrett & Van Vleck used different-colored bricks to create a “woven” texture and to accentuate the building’s vertical lines. The Washington Street facade has setbacks at the 10th and 16th floors; all three facades have setbacks above the 21st, 26th, 29th and 30th floors.

21 West Street Vital Statistics
  • Location: 21 West Street at Morris Street
  • Year completed: 1931
  • Architect: Starrett & Van Vleck; conversion: SLCE Architects
  • Floors: 31
  • Style: Art Deco
  • New York City Landmark: 1998
  • National Register of Historic Places: 1999
21 West Street Recommended Reading

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Bowling Green Offices

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Bowling Green Offices is New York’s only “Hellenic Renaissance” style building.* It’s an architectural style invented by brothers William and George Ardsley as “a free but pure treatment of ancient Greek architecture.”

Whatever the style, it has crisp, lively ornamentation that stands out from its neighbors on “Steamship Row.” (When Bowling Green Offices was built, One Broadway was still a Queen Anne-style red brick building, and the Cunard Building had not yet been built; the Hudson River was just three blocks to the west.)

In plan, the building is U-shaped, with the base at the north, next to the Cunard Building. The light court in the middle of the U is aligned with the light court of One Broadway, the neighbor to the south.

This was the site of high drama: White Star Line, an early tenant, was besieged by worried relatives and friends of passengers aboard The Republic, which had been rammed by the Italian ship Florida in 1909. All passengers were safe in that incident, but three years later the offices were jammed again as news of the Titanic spread. Drama of a different sort hit the building in 1915: Seven elevators simultaneously fell; and seven months later, four elevators repeated the performance.

In 1920, the owners added a 17th floor and, at the north end of the building, a four-story tower.

Architect George Ardsley is better known as an author of 25 books on decorative art, and as a designer of pipe organs – including the famed Wanamaker organ in Philadelphia.

* The only other building in this style was the Layton Art Gallery in Milwaukee, now demolished.

Bowling Green Offices Vital Statistics
  • Location: 3-11 Broadway between Battery Place and Morris Street
  • Year completed: 1898
  • Architect: William James Audsley and George Ashdown Audsley
  • Floors: 21
  • Style: “Hellenic Renaissance”
  • New York City Landmark: 1995
Bowling Green Offices Recommended Reading

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Keuffel & Esser Company Building

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Keuffel & Esser Company Building, a New York landmark designed by De Lemos & Cordes, is well-preserved Renaissance Revival architecture on Fulton Street.

Like many commercial buildings in lower Manhattan, this has been converted (2010) to residential use – Compass Points Condominiums. “Compass Points” refers to two of Keuffel & Esser’s lines of business: Drafting/drawing instruments and surveying instruments.

Unlike many commercial buildings in lower Manhattan, this facade has been well preserved and restored. The Fulton Street side is the building’s most impressive facade, although the back of the building (42 Ann Street) is actually one story taller.

Architects Theodore W. E. De Lemos and August W. Cordes were successful designers of commercial buildings. Among their accomplishments are the Macy’s department store (original Broadway building), the Siegel-Cooper Department Store (now occupied by Bed Bath & Beyond) on Sixth Avenue, and the original Empire State Building (named for the Empire State Bank), 640 Broadway at Bleecker Street.

Keuffel & Esser Company Building Vital Statistics
  • Location: 127 Fulton Street (block-through to Ann Street) between Nassau and William Streets
  • Year completed: 1893
  • Architect: De Lemos & Cordes
  • Floors: 8
  • Style: Renaissance Revival
  • New York City Landmark: 2005
Keuffel & Esser Company Building Recommended Reading

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