Tag Archives: upper west side

370 Central Park West

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370 Central Park West, a 1918 example of half-timbered Tudor architecture that’s unusual for New York, was designed and built by Fred F. French Company. The firm in 1927-1932 developed Tudor City – though some sources dispute that those buildings are in Tudor style.

The building has considerable frontage of W 97th Street, broken up by wide and deep light courts. The effect is of five separate row houses – a micro community instead of a single apartment building. The light courts were originally walled in at street level, to create private gardens. The walls have since been replaced by iron fences. The building was converted to a cooperative in 1982.

370 Central Park West is just outside NYC’s Upper West Side / Central Park West Historic District, but just inside the National Register of Historic Places’ Central Park Historic District.

The Fred F. French Company also designed Gardens Apartment (now Tennis View Apartments) in Forest Hills – a smaller version of 370 Central Park West “more adapted to country use” according to Architecture (October, 1918).

370 Central Park West Vital Statistics
  • Location: 370 Central Park West at W 97th Street
  • Year completed: 1918
  • Architect: Fred F. French Company
  • Floors: 6
  • Style: Tudor
  • National Register of Historic Places: 1982
370 Central Park West Recommended Reading

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780 West End Avenue

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780 West End Avenue was ahead of its time, New York apartment house architecture that emphasized its height by omitting the horizontal banding common among “classical” buildings. Also, the perforated cornice seems to add a 14th floor.

The building is also notable for its mix of granite, white brick, and terra cotta, and for the curved balconies at the second, third, 12th, and 13th floors.

The architects, George & Edward Blum, were prolific designers. They have more than 120 apartment houses to their credit, plus many office and loft buildings; many of their structures are New York City landmarks.

780 West End Avenue Vital Statistics
  • Location: 780 West End Avenue at W 98th Street
  • Year completed: 1914
  • Architect: George & Edward Blum
  • Floors: 13
  • Style: Art Nouveau
780 West End Avenue Recommended Reading

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381-389 West End Avenue

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381-389 West End Avenue and 303-307 W 78th Street are a row of eight Flemish Renaissance houses, Frederick B. White’s only known New York City works.

The little-known architect had a brief but incandescent career: He died at 24, but from 1883 to 1886 built more than 200 homes and cottages, and had another 50 under construction.

The original tile roofs have been replaced with asphalt, and many of the windows and doors have been replaced with modern aluminum units. One of the W 78th Street houses – 303 – was remodeled in the 1920s to a white stucco neo-Tudor design. Sadly, this breaks the harmony that was intended.

381-389 West End Avenue Vital Statistics
  • Location: 381-389 West End Avenue at W 78th Street
  • Year completed: 1886
  • Architect: Frederick B. White
  • Floors: 3
  • Style: Flemish Renaissance
  • New York City Landmark: 1984
381-389 West End Avenue Recommended Reading

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Langham

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The Langham is an elegant bookmark separating the more famous Dakota (to the south) and San Remo. The building is a restrained Beaux Arts / French Second Empire; the lower 10 floors are dignified rusticated limestone and brick, with restrained decoration and Juliette balconies. The 11th floor is more heavily decorated, and the 12 and 13th floors – in the mansard roof – are the most elaborate.

Originally, the building had just four apartments per floor: Each a luxury home that included three or four bedrooms, two servant’s rooms, library, living room, and dining room. All were entered via an elegant foyer (or if you were a servant or tradesman, via a back service elevator). The Langham touted a central refrigeration system to provide ice to each apartment (before mechanical refrigerators), mail delivery via conveyor belt, and a central vacuum cleaning system. A carriageway on W 73rd Street provided access via a back lobby. More importantly, in the days before air conditioning, each apartment had windows facing in four directions, thanks to three light courts along the back (west) side.

The building now has 64 units. But the apartments now range from two to eight bedrooms (a combination of a five-bedroom and a three-bedroom), with rents ranging from $4,250 to $60,000 per month. In 2008, The Gawker listed The Langham as one of the 20 most expensive rentals in New York City.

The Langham has had more than its share of celebrity tenants: Irving Bloomingdale, vice president (and son of the founder) of Bloomingdale’s; Isadore Saks, with his son, Joseph. Isadore Saks founded Saks & Company; Martin Beck, head of the Orpheum theater chain, who built the Palace Theater; Edward F. Albee, head of the Keith and Keith-Albee-Orpheum theater chains and grandfather of the playwright Edward Albee; Lee Strasberg, the actor and teacher. Last, but not least, actress Mia Farrow had an 11-room apartment in The Langham, which was used in the filming of Woody Allen’s “Hannah and Her Sisters.”

The Langham Vital Statistics
  • Location: 135 Central Park West from W 73rd to W 74th Street
  • Year completed: 1907
  • Architect: Charles W. Clinton & William Hamilton Russell
  • Floors: 13
  • Style: Beaux Arts / Second Empire
  • New York City Landmark: 1990
  • National Register of Historic Places: 1982
The Langham Recommended Reading

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55 Central Park West

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55 Central Park West, among the first Art Deco apartment houses on the avenue, has become known as the “Ghostbusters Building.” In the 1984 movie, the building is attributed to insane architect Ivo Shandor.

Schwartz & Gross, the real architects, must be spinning in their graves. They designed an innovative brick, stone and terra cotta structure that changes color as it rises, from dark red to white. Massive fluted projections in the base and as finials at the setbacks emphasize the building’s vertical lines.

Inside, 55 CPW was fairly modest: apartments ranged from three to six rooms on lower floors. But all apartments had the innovation of a sunken living room.

Upper floors have larger apartments – including a massive 12-room duplex penthouse that sold for $35 million in 2013.

55 Central Park West Vital Statistics
  • Location: 55 Central Park West at W 66th Street
  • Year completed: 1930
  • Architect: Schwartz & Gross
  • Floors: 19
  • Style: Art Deco
  • New York City Landmark: 1990
  • National Register of Historic Places: 1982
55 Central Park West Recommended Reading

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Schinasi Mansion

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Schinasi Mansion, the last privately owned freestanding mansion in Manhattan, has history and quirks as rich as its French Renaissance architecture.

The mansion was commissioned by Morris (originally Mussa) Schinasi, a Turkish immigrant who became wealthy from his invention of a cigarette rolling machine – and use of strong Turkish tobacco. The architect was none other than William Tuthill, known for his design of Carnegie Hall (1891). Despite his wealth, Schinasi refused to pay Tuthill – who sued.

Why Schinasi wouldn’t pay is a mystery – as is the secret tunnel (now sealed) from the mansion’s basement to the Hudson River.

Morris Schinasi lived in the house until he died in 1928; his family sold the mansion in 1930 and it became the Semple School for Girls, a finishing school.

Rosa Semple, the school’s founder, herself died in the mansion in 1956. Columbia University bought the property in 1960 and established “Children’s Mansion Day Care Center.”

Columbia decided to sell in 1979 – to Hans Smit, one of its own law professors, who wanted to restore and resell the home.

After nearly three decades of slow interior restoration, Hans Smit (who never lived in the house) tried to sell – but he died in 2012. His son succeeded in selling Schinasi Mansion in late 2013.

Schinasi Mansion Vital Statistics
  • Location: 351 Riverside Drive at W 107th Street
  • Year completed: 1909
  • Architect: William Tuthill
  • Floors: 5
  • Style: French Renaissance
  • New York City Landmark: 1974
  • National Register of Historic Places: 1980
Schinasi Mansion Recommended Reading

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Clebourne

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The Clebourne (Cleburne) stands out, even on an avenue of standout architecture; its ornate facade and porte-cochere give the building an elegant presence. (Alas, stanchions block what was once a drive-through entrance.)

Each floor has five apartments of six to nine rooms; layouts are old-fashioned, with some very long hallways, galleries, maid’s rooms and servant’s entrances.

Of historical note, Clebourne is on the site of a former mansion owned by Isador and Ida Straus. Isador Straus was a co-owner of Macy’s; he and his wife perished with the Titanic. A memorial to the couple is in Straus Park, one block north.

Clebourne Vital Statistics
  • Location: 924 West End Avenue / 2745 Broadway at W 105th Street
  • Year completed: 1913
  • Architect: Schwartz & Gross
  • Floors: 13
  • Style: Arts and Crafts
Clebourne Recommended Reading

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Hotel Belleclaire

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Hotel Belleclaire was one of the first residences designed by Emery Roth, who went on to become one of New York’s most important apartment house architects.

Although Roth’s later work was primarily in Beaux Arts and Art Deco styles, Belleclaire was designed in Art Nouveau. The original design included a domed turret on the corner, which was removed in the ’50s. The ground floor restaurant and hotel office windows have been replaced with storefronts, and the original Broadway entrance was moved to the W 77th Street courtyard.

Belleclaire began life as an upper class apartment hotel – families lived there more or less permanently, relying on hotel services for housekeeping and meals. Over the years the hotel’s clientele – and facilities – changed. Transients were accepted; kitchenettes were added; for a time it was among New York’s “welfare hotels” for indigent families.

Fast forward to 2008: owners embarked on a total renovation and upgrade, now (May 2014) nearly complete. Later this year they plan to open a rooftop restaurant.

Hotel Belleclaire Vital Statistics
  • Location: 2171 Broadway at W 77th Street
  • Year completed: 1903
  • Architect: Emery Roth
  • Floors: 10
  • Style: Art Nouveau
  • New York City Landmark: 1987
Hotel Belleclaire Recommended Reading

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Random: April 2014

Brooklyn, Collections, Manhattan, , , , , , , , , , , ,

Highlights from photos shot in April, 2014 – but not yet added to a New York neighborhood or specific building gallery.

In this album:
  • Metro theater, Broadway at W 99th Street – go there, see how the neighboring tower facade mimics the theater accent lines.
  • Saint Michael’s R. C. Church, Sunset Park, Brooklyn. I was drawn to the church’s unusual steeple, but on closer examination the doors were more interesting.
  • Belvedere Castle, Central Park. For a change, I decided to frame the shot.
  • The Alexandria apartments, 201 W 72nd Street at Broadway. The cascade of ladders reveals facade repairs in progress.
  • 171 E 77th Street – terra cotta grill detail.
  • French Embassy Cultural Services – the doors of adjoining buildings on Fifth Avenue (975 and 972) next to the Ukrainian Institute.
  • Guggenheim Museum detail.
  • The Capitol Apartments, 12 E 87th Street. The top half of the cornice was removed; the remaining brackets give the roofline a toothed appearance.
  • Park Avenue Synagogue. Beautiful detailing.
  • 67 and 65 E 93rd Street. Notice the “65” in the transom grille.
  • Essex House: the iconic sign on Central Park South is now reflected in One57, the apartment tower two blocks behind (south).
  • The Dorilton: I usually shoot the maidens head on. This time I shot from the side, to bring them closer together – conversational distance.

194 Riverside Drive

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194 Riverside Drive is relatively small, and well-screened by the trees of Joan of Arc Island – it would be easy to miss. But the building’s bold features are well worth seeing close up.

According to the Street Easy real estate website, the seven-story building originally had three 13-room apartments per floor; now there are 42 units.

The architect, Ralph S. Townsend, also designed neighboring 190 Riverside Drive as well as the much showier Kenilworth on Central Park West. In one of his Streetscapes columns, The New York Times’ architectural historian, Christopher Gray, provides some background on the architect.

(A wonderful collection of Gray’s columns was published in 2003 under the title New York Streetscapes. Although it is now out of print, you can still get copies at Amazon.com – both new and used: New York Streetscapes: Tales of Manhattan’s Significant Buildings and Landmarks)

194 Riverside Drive Vital Statistics
  • Location: 194 Riverside Drive at W 92nd Street
  • Year completed: 1902
  • Architect: Ralph S. Townsend
  • Floors: 7
  • Style: neo-Renaissance
  • New York City Landmark: 1989
194 Riverside Drive Recommended Reading

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