Tag Archives: Manhattan

300 Madison Avenue

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300 Madison Avenue is the boxy glass and steel tower on 42nd Street whose mirrored facade is scored with steel fins. But it’s what’s under the skin that’s innovative.

Excavation was already under way when two events dictated radical design changes: 9/11, and the space requirements of Price Waterhouse Coopers (PWC), which leased two-thirds of the building from prime tenant Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) World Market.

The owners, Brookfield Financial Properties, decided to harden the design to withstand catastrophic damage, and at the same time create large trading floors in the eight-story base for PWC. Oh, and by the way, while making the building stronger, could you remove one of the columns? Adding to the challenge, the redesign and construction had to stay within the original schedule: Move-in dates were fixed.

Engineers added bracing, used stronger steel beams, replaced some sheetrock walls with concrete, and beefed up fireproofing. Firefighting systems got additional high-capacity water tanks and sprinkler lines. The owners strengthened the electrical system with addition of backup generators. (See the Recommended Reading for details – this building is unusually well documented.)

None of this is obvious from street level. Instead, the mirror glass facade is a pleasing surprise: It makes surrounding buildings more visible, by increasing their apparent distance from the viewer. The upper floors’ fins and alternating bands of glass and steel create interesting patterns, especially because the fins vary in size. The fins save it from being Just Another Glass Box.

300 Madison Avenue Vital Statistics
  • Location: 300 Madison Avenue between E 41st and E 42nd Streets
  • Year completed: 2003
  • Architect: Skidmore, Owings and Merrill (SOM)
  • Floors: 35
  • Style: Postmodern
300 Madison Avenue Recommended Reading

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Johnston Building

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Johnston Building, aka NoMad Hotel, was built in 1903 as a store and office building. It is notable for its limestone facade – an expensive finish for an office building – and for its corner tower and cupola. Last but not least, it is also notable (for 1903) that the owner was a woman: Caroline H. Johnston.

After a lengthy conversion (2008-2012) by Sydell Group, the building is now a Parisian-inspired boutique hotel with interiors designed by Jacques Garcia.

Sydell Group also operates the Ace Hotel – the former Breslin Hotel – located one block to the north.

Johnston Building Vital Statistics
  • Location: 1770 Broadway at W 28th Street
  • Year completed: 1903; 2012 (conversion)
  • Architect: Schickel & Ditmars; Stonehill & Taylor (conversion), Jacques Garcia (interiors)
  • Floors: 12
  • Style: Beaux Arts
  • New York City Landmark: 2001 (Madison Square North Historic District)
Johnston Building Recommended Reading

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St James Building

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St James Building was among the earliest highrise office buildings in the NoMad neighborhood, replacing the St. James Hotel. It is considered among Bruce Price’s most important designs, after Quebec City’s Château Frontenac Hotel.

The St James Building was a favorite home for architects, including Daniel Burnham, Henry Pelton and John Russell Pope – as well as Bruce Price. Remarkably, after more than 115 years the building is still home to dozens of architects.

The steel-framed building follows the traditional base-shaft-capital design; the base and capital are of limestone, with prominent arched windows and bays; the shaft is of brick indented to simulate the deep rusticated joints of stone. Elaborate and massive terra cotta decoration is used throughout.

Architect Bruce Price has another claim to fame: Price invented, patented, and built the parlor bay-window cars for the Pennsylvania Railroad and the Boston and Albany Railroad. (See Wikipedia.)

Historical Note: Washington didn’t sleep here, but Golda Meir worked here in the early ’30s according to “All Around the Town: Amazing Manhattan Facts and Curiosities, Second Edition (Empire State Editions).”

St James Building Vital Statistics
  • Location: 1133 Broadway at W 26th Street
  • Year completed: 1898
  • Architect: Bruce Price
  • Floors: 16
  • Style: Beaux Arts
  • New York City Landmark: 2001 (Madison Square North Historic District)
St James Building Recommended Reading

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McIntyre Building

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McIntyre Building is one of New York’s quirky oddities. For starters, people can’t agree on its architectural style, because architect Robert H. Robertson mixed several styles in the design. People don’t always agree on the building’s name – it was built by Ewen McIntyre, but the lobby mosaic spells it “Mac Intyre” – and the typo is how many refer to 874 Broadway. The owner was a druggist, but he never used the building – the ground floor was occupied by a now-defunct bank.

Over the years, occupants sometimes blurred the lines. In the ’60s, people started to live in the building – though it didn’t have a residential occupancy permit. A seventh-floor nightclub, Cobra Club, operated illegally in the ’70s. The club’s trademark snakes reportedly escaped the glass terrariums from time to time, and live snakes were reported on the loose for years after. It’s currently a co-op – and one that’s spent big bucks to preserve the McIntyre Building’s unique style. The residents even paid to restore century-old wooden windows rather than replace them with modern metal sashes.

McIntyre Building Vital Statistics
  • Location: 874 Broadway at E 18th Street
  • Year completed: 1892
  • Architect: Robert H. Robertson
  • Floors: 11
  • Style: Romanesque Revival
  • New York City Landmark: 1989 (Ladies Mile Historic District)
McIntyre Building Recommended Reading

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Engine Company 14

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Engine Company 14 is typical of early New York City firehouses – typically ornate, that is. The Department’s official architect, Napoleon Le Brun, made each house different.

The care given to firehouse design reflected the Fire Department’s campaign to raise the department’s professionalism, as it shifted from a volunteer to paid force.

Engine Company 14 Vital Statistics
  • Location: 14 E 18th Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues
  • Year completed: 1895
  • Architect: Napoleon Le Brun & Sons
  • Floors: 3
  • Style: Beaux Arts
  • New York City Landmark: 1989 (Ladies Mile Historic District)
Engine Company 14 Recommended Reading

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Hotel York

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Hotel York, converted to rental apartments in 1986, is now known as The York. The Beaux Arts limestone, brick, and terra cotta facade was grievously altered on the ground floor with a pale green glass skin framing storefronts.

On the second story and above, the original terra cotta and iron decoration is in bold relief against the limestone and red brick facade.

At least 18 of Harry B. Mulliken’s hotels and apartment houses, built in 1900-1915, still survive in Manhattan – including The Lucerne.

Hotel York Vital Statistics
  • Location: 488 Seventh Avenue at W 36th Street
  • Year completed: 1903
  • Architect: Harry B. Mulliken
  • Floors: 12
  • Style: Beaux Arts
  • National Register of Historic Places: 2009 (Garment Center Historic District)
Hotel York Recommended Reading

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Hotel Seville

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Hotel Seville – now known as The Carlton – was built in two sections. The first section was the 12-story limestone and brick building on the corner of Madison Avenue and E 29th Street; the second section was the 11-story western wing that extends from E 29th Street through to E 28th Street. The hotel’s main entrance was originally on E 29th Street, what is now the restaurant entrance; the new entry and lobby at 88 Madison Avenue is a modern addition. Gone is the rooftop sign.

Hotel Seville is just outside the Madison Square North Historic District (2001). The building did make it to the National Register of Historic Places, however, in 2005.

Harpo Marx reputedly worked as a bellhop at the Hotel Seville, and his experiences are said to have been incorporated in Marx Brothers skits.

Hotel Seville Vital Statistics
  • Location: 88 Madison Avenue at E 29th Street
  • Year completed: 1904
  • Architect: Harry Allen Jacobs
  • Floors: 12
  • Style: Beaux Arts
  • National Register of Historic Places: 2005
Hotel Seville Recommended Reading

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Chanin Building

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Chanin Building is among New York’s most prominent Art Deco towers (and cater-corner from the most prominent, the Chrysler Building). It was designed by Sloan & Robertson, who also designed the Art Deco Graybar Building, on the next block.

The Chanin Building’s base and its lobby are boldly decorated with terra cotta and bronze. The first story, dedicated to retail shops, is clad in Belgian black marble. That is topped by a bronze frieze depicting evolution from low marine life forms to fish and birds. Two floors of bronze-framed casement windows, set between limestone piers, come next. The fourth floor is clad in a floral patterned terra cotta band. Fourth floor windows align with the bays above, creating vertical lines to emphasize the structure’s height.

One critic – Carter B. Horsley writing in City Review – observed, “It is interesting to note that the Chrysler Building has the city’s greatest crown but a rather prosaic base. Imagine if it had the base of the Chanin Building, or vice versa?”

Above the base, the Chanin Building’s form was largely dictated by New York City’s 1916 zoning law, which required setbacks proportional to the width of the facing streets. From the 17th to the 29th floor the building tapers to a 22-story slab tower, capped by a four-story buttressed crown. The 50th and 51st floors originally held a theater (one line of Chanin’s businesses), and the 54th floor had an open-air observatory. The tower was once (briefly) the third-tallest in New York. Now, it is rarely appreciated.

Chanin the owner was every bit as impressive as Chanin the building – you can read more in the Landmarks Commission’s designation report and in The New York Times article.

Chanin Building Vital Statistics
  • Location: 122 E 42nd Street at Lexington Avenue
  • Year completed: 1929
  • Architect: Sloan & Robertson
  • Floors: 56
  • Style: Art Deco
  • New York City Landmark: 1978
  • National Register of Historic Places: 1980
Chanin Building Recommended Reading

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UN Plaza

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One UN Plaza and Two UN Plaza are the gleaming angular glass buildings opposite the United Nations on First Avenue, between E 44th and E 45th Streets. The towers are sculpture as much as they are buildings – their angled planes talk to each other and ignore the neighborhood. Their only connection, via color and material, is with the United Nations across First Avenue.

(A third building – Three UN Plaza – was built later in a different style and will be covered separately.)

Wrapped around the United States Mission to the UN and Uganda House, the buildings contain the One UN Plaza (formerly Millennium UN Plaza) hotel and United Nations offices space. The hotel occupies the top 11 floors of each tower and has a single entrance on E 44th Street. Offices occupy the lower floors (except for ground floor shops) and have separate entries in each tower.

One UN Plaza Vital Statistics
  • Location: First Avenue at E 44th Street
  • Year completed: 1975
  • Architect: Kevin Roche John Dinkeloo and Associates
  • Floors: 39
  • Style: Postmodern
Two UN Plaza Vital Statistics
  • Location: 329 E 44th Street (through to E 45th Street)
  • Year completed: 1981
  • Architect: Kevin Roche John Dinkeloo and Associates
  • Floors: 39
  • Style: Postmodern
UN Plaza Recommended Reading

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Century Building

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Century Building, since 1995 a Barnes & Noble store, was also associated with publishing when it was built in 1881. Century Publishing Company leased the fifth floor and hung its sign outside – which led to the name. Retailer Aaron Arnold (Arnold Constable Department Store) built the landmark as a speculative venture – no prime tenant was signed.

The NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission cited the structure as “a rare surviving Queen Anne style commercial building.” The Century Building was vacant at the time that the Commission designated it a New York City landmark. Barnes & Noble took it over in 1995, according to Daytonian in Manhattan.

The two-story oriel windows and gambrel roof are quite picturesque from Union Square Park. Although the Century Building extends through to E 18th Street, that facade is relatively plain.

Century Building Vital Statistics
  • Location: 33 E 17th Street between Broadway and Park Avenue South
  • Year completed: 1881
  • Architect: J. William Schickel
  • Floors: 7
  • Style: Queen Anne
  • New York City Landmark: 1986
  • National Register of Historic Places: 1997
Century Building Recommended Reading

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