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Posts & Stories(34)

 Leake and Watts Orphan House image

Leake and Watts Orphan House
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The Leake and Watts Orphan House was erected in 1843, and the massive Greek Revival structure is an unlikely survivor in an ever-changing city. Designed by architect Ithiel Town as a home for orphaned children with the funds from a wealthy New York lawyer, the building was the largest edifice in Morningside Heights until the construction of the neighboring St. John the Divine began in 1892. (The Cathedral is still officially unfinished more than 11 decades later.) The orphanage moved to Yonkers when the church purchased the building in 1887, and the asylum stands on land intended for the south transept of the cathedral. (See the above parenthetical for the reason this has not necessitated the demolition of the building.) The architectural writer, David Dunlap, described the scene as this: "The situation has yielded a happy architectural incongruity: two ample porticos with broad triangular pediments on giant Ionic colonnades, nestled at the base of an unfinished Romanesque-Gothic cathedral. From some vantages on the verdant grounds, it looks as if an ancient Greek temple stumbled into some medieval village." While the building was not demolished for construction, it was largely ignored by the church and might have been taken down due to safety concerns eventually. But in the early 2000s, the Cathedral reversed it hands-off plan for the asylum. With a massive restoration effort completed in 2006 and the building renamed the Town Building, for its architect, the once decaying structure has become home of the Cathedral’s Textile Conservation Lab, and the Cathedral’s social service and neighborhood outreach programming. A coop in the nearby parking lot is also the home base for the Cathedral's three peacocks, Phil, Jim, and Harry.
Franz Sigel Monument, Riverside Park image

Franz Sigel Monument, Riverside Park
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Karl Bitter’s equestrian statue of General Franz Sigel, Riverside Park, 1907. Bitter, a Viennese-born architectural sculptor, rose to prominence after winning a design contest for Trinity Church bronzework, and became a frequent collaborator of the prominent architect Richard Morris Hunt. Sadly, Bitter’s career came to a premature end in 1915, when he was struck and killed by an out-of-control car as he exited the Metropolitan Opera. This statue, completed in 1907, depicts General Franz Sigel, a German-born veteran of the Civil War, and later a civil servant in New York City.
Six to Celebrate: Morningside Heights image

Six to Celebrate: Morningside Heights
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Morningside Heights is graced with the highest concentration of institutional complexes built in a relatively short period at the turn of the 20th century, both in the city and anywhere in the United States. It is home to monumental places of worship, higher learning and healing, which accentuate its backdrop of rowhouses and apartment buildings, culminating in streetscapes that are both elegant and eye-filling. Topographically, it is situated on a plateau historically known as Harlem Heights, while geographically it is bounded by West 110th Street to the south, West 125th Street to the north, and two Frederick Law Olmsted–designed parks to the east (Morningside Park) and to the west (Riverside Park). The first institution to move into the area was New York Hospital, which began purchasing land in 1816 to establish the Bloomingdale Insane Asylum (on the present-day campus of Columbia University) and the Leake and Watts Orphan Asylum (on the present-day campus of St. John the Divine) in 1821 and 1834, respectively. The stigma of an insane asylum, compounded by inadequate transit access to the area, hindered other development until the late 19th century, when the hospital auctioned off its real estate holdings and relocated to White Plains in favor of more space and fresher air. The asylum’s relocation prompted a flurry of development by other institutions intent on expansion, starting with the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in 1887 and followed by St. Luke’s Hospital, Columbia College and Teacher’s College in 1892. The introduction of the subway into Morningside Heights in 1904, coupled with the neighborhood’s magnificent parks and prestigious institutions, led to a frenzy of speculative apartment house construction, attracting middle-class residents who could now commute directly downtown to work. Even before the advent of zoning regulations for land use, developers erected rowhouses and modest apartment buildings on the side streets and grand apartment houses on the avenues, with particularly monumental examples on Riverside Drive, Claremont Avenue and Cathedral Parkway, and mixed-use commercial buildings along Broadway, giving the neighborhood a heterogeneous yet cohesive character. Morningside Heights’ unorthodox yet distinctive sense of place comes from the coexistence of residential and institutional clusters, as exemplified by elegant rowhouses and apartment buildings just steps away from renowned academic institutions and houses of worship. Today the neighborhood still enjoys this singular sense of place. Its institutions are impressive examples of Beaux-Arts planning and design, including the graceful approach to Grant’s Tomb, the entrance façades of St. John the Divine and Riverside Church aligned with the axes of 112th Street and 122nd Street, and especially Charles McKim’s plan for Columbia University, whose symmetry and axial layout emphasize the monumentality and unity of the surrounding architecture. The residential architecture, though sometimes grand, offers a human scale and balance to the whole neighborhood.
Henrik Hudson Apartments image

Henrik Hudson Apartments
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Hendrik Hudson Apartments, ca. 1910. Completed in 1907, the Hendrik Hudson Apartments occupy the entire block between Riverside Drive and Broadway and 110th and 111th Streets. The building was modeled on Italian villa with a Spanish tile roof. Of the two tall towers seen in this circa 1910 photograph, once one remains today. The units were spectacularly upscale (unsurprising in this neighborhood of early 20th century luxury apartments). Decorating the 7-9 room apartments was walnut paneling, wood-beamed ceilings, mahogany doors with glass knobs, and the newest technology in porcelain bathroom features. The building itself also boasted a billiard parlor, a cafe, a barber shop, and a ladies hairdressing salon for the exclusive use of tenants and their guests. The original costs for the apartments ranged from $1500 to $3000 a year.
Cathedral of St. John the Divine image

Cathedral of St. John the Divine
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Open-Air Pulpit: Howells & Stokes, 1913
Alimar Apartments image

Alimar Apartments
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The Alimar entrance detail, ca. 1975. Designed in 1899 as a set with four row houses along West 105th Street, the Alimar Apartments were the ambitious project of builder Hamilton M. Weed. The Alimar was constructed to attract wealthy new-comers to the expanding neighborhood at a time when apartment living (seriously luxury apartment living) was becoming acceptable among well-to-do New Yorkers. The Jane & Leo-designed building has a facade like an explosion of Beaux-Arts features from the ornate two-story rusticated limestone base to the copper mansard roof to the dormers, described by one architectural historian as "frothy." (Jane & Leo also created the equally, if not more, frothy Dorilton at 71st Street for Hamilton Weed.) The interiors were also lavishly designed. The eleven-room apartments included a library, parlor, servant room, and numerous bedrooms. Residents and visitors tread on hardwood parquet floors and sat in dinning rooms and libraries paneled in mahogany. The building suffered in the second half of the 20th century, with its mansard and much of its facade ornamentation removed. A renovation in the late 1990s re-fabricated new facade features and added a flat cornice roof, a convincing recreation.
Manhasset Apartments image

Manhasset Apartments
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Manhasset Apartments ARCHITECT: Joseph Wolf DATE: 1899-1901 STYLE: Beaux-Arts Erected at the turn of the century, when the Upper West Side of Manhattan became the center of apartment house construction in the city, the Manhasset is one of the city’s most imposing apartment houses. The building was designed and constructed in two phases. The lower eight stories of 1899- 1901 were designed by Joseph Wolf. The second phase, consisting of grand entrance pavilions and three additional stories incorporating a two-story slate-covered mansard, was added in 1901-05 by a new owner to the designs of Janes & Leo, a firm responsible for several of the Upper West Side’s most prominent apartment buildings. The handsome limestone, brick, and terra-cotta Beaux-Arts style facades of the Manhasset continue to attract attention, creating an important anchor at the northern edge of the Upper West Side.
Public School 165 image

Public School 165
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P.S. 165, ca. 1897. This C.B.J. Snyder-designed public school was the first to make use of the H-plan, a floorplan designed to maximize light and airflow by incorporating recessed courtyards partially surrounded by “wings.” Since 1936, the school has been named for Robert E. Simon, the philanthropist and real estate developer who was president of Carnegie Hall from 1925-35.
Hotel Marseilles image

Hotel Marseilles
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Marseilles Hotel ARCHITECT: Harry Allan Jacobs DATE: 1902-05 STYLE: Modern French The Hotel Marseilles, clad in brick with limestone, wrought-iron, and terra-cotta trim and crowned with a sloping mansard roof, illustrates the rise of the “Modern French” style in commercial and hotel architecture. The appearance of this style in the United States was the result of a sharp increase in the number of American architects attending the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris and the concomitant ascent of France as the dominant influence in American architecture in the late nineteenth century.
Palaces for the People: Guastavino Tile in New York Buildings image

Palaces for the People: Guastavino Tile in New York Buildings
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In the closing decades of the 19th century, New York underwent a profound physical and cultural transformation. Fueled by the wealth of the exploding financial and manufacturing sectors, the city rapidly evolved into a world-class metropolis. The bold ambitions of civic and business leaders, architects, and engineers of the era manifested in landmarks such as the vast Cathedral of St. John the Divine, the stately U.S. Custom House, the towering Municipal Building, and the original terminus of New York City’s first official subway line—the ornate City Hall stop. The sweeping interior spaces common to all of these structures, and hundreds of others, depended upon a venerable Mediterranean building technology adapted to contemporary American construction: arched tile ceilings—or vaults—that were not only self-supporting but could also bear the weight of floors or roofs above them. These vaults were designed and built by a single New York firm, founded by Spanish immigrant Rafael Guastavino (1842-1908) and later headed by his son Rafael Jr. (1872-1950). The Guastavinos’ patented system for building domes and vaults involved multiple layers of thin ceramic tiles bonded with quick-drying mortar. The resulting structures were not only exceptionally strong, but also lightweight, easy to build, and inherently beautiful, thanks to intricate patterns of exposed tile that formed finished, decorative surfaces. Guastavino vaults figured prominently in more than 1,000 projects across the nation, including 200 in Manhattan alone. During its 73-year history, the Guastavino Company helped build some of the most impressive interior spaces in America—veritable palaces for the people. This list based on MCNY's exhibition Palaces for the People, contains many of Guastavino's masterpieces in the five boroughs, both those that remain and those that have been lost to the wrecking ball.
Master Apartments image

Master Apartments
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Master Building STATUS Designated Individual Landmark 310-312 Riverside Drive ARCHITECT: Harvey Wiley Corbett; Helmle, Corbett & Harrison; Sugarman & Burger DATE: 1928-29 STYLE: Art Deco, Skyscraper The Master Building, erected in 1928-29 to house an apartment hotel and museum, is an innovative and significant example of the work of Harvey Wiley Corbett, an architect influential in skyscraper design, and expresses his successful employment of sculptural massing, vertical emphasis, and the minimal, yet elegant, use of surface ornamentation and historically-inspired detailing. The design of the building includes many strong and well-integrated features representative of the best of New York City’s Art Deco style skyscrapers, including patterned brickwork which varies in color from dark at the base to light at the tower, setbacks, irregular and faceted massing of the upper stories, and an ornamental cap.
The Strathmore image

The Strathmore
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"Riverside Drive at the S.E. corner of West 113th Street. Apartment house, ca. 1910." The Strathmore is an apartment house built in 1909 for the Akron Building Company, and designed by Schwartz & Gross. The facade of the 12-story building is broken up into three bands. The four-story base is rusticated limestone, while floors five through ten are a dark red brick, and the top of the building is a three-story limestone and terra cotta capital and cornice. The building was designed to house two 10-room apartments on each floor and the apartments were to be of the highest luxury with high ceilings, elaborately parquet floors, and huge bathtubs.
Essential New York: Morningside Heights image

Essential New York: Morningside Heights
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Morningside Heights holds a very different ground than the Upper West Side - probably because it is home to Columbia University, Barnard College, the Manhattan School of Music, and other smaller schools. 🏫📚✍️ Explore the area between the Hudson and the Manhattan Schist…
Schinasi Mansion image

Schinasi Mansion
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Schinasi Mansion, ca. 1909. Built in 1909 for the Turkish-born tobacco magnate Morris Schinasi, this mansion is the largest single-family residence on Riverside Drive. Schinasi enlisted William Tuthill, the architect of Carnegie Hall, to produce a heavily ornamented, French Renaissance style residence in white marble. Some sources claim the home included a Prohibition-era trap door leading to the Hudson River below, but these claims do not appear in Landmarks Preservation Commission documents. After Schinasi’s death, the home was a finishing school, before being acquired by Columbia University. The house was bought privately by a Columbia law professor in 1979 and sold again in 2013.
100 Years in the Making: the Cathedral of St. John the Divine image

100 Years in the Making: the Cathedral of St. John the Divine
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How did New York build one of the largest Cathedrals in the world? Not quickly, using traditional craftsmen, the Cathedral of St. John the Divine took a century to reach its current state. As the seat of the Episcopal Diocese of New York St. John The Divine remains in active use to this day. This blog is adapted from Historic District Council's Six to Celebrate, which can be viewed here.
Straus Park image

Straus Park
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Bronze statue by Augustus Lukeman, in memory of Isidor and Ida Straus, ca. 1975. Lukeman’s statue depicts a nymph gazing into water, representing “memory.” The statue is situated in Straus Park, where it was dedicated in April, 1915.
Straus Park image

Straus Park
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View west from 2760 Broadway, at 106th Street, 1928. In the foreground is Straus Park, named for Isidor and Ida Straus, Upper West Side residents who perished aboard the Titanic. Isidor Straus and his brother Nathan were partners in Abraham & Straus department store, and later Macy’s, where the brothers became co-owners and opened the flagship Herald Square store. Isidor Straus also held office as a United States Representative for New York. The park, previously known as Schulyer Square and Bloomingdale Square, features a bronze statue in memory of the Strauses by the sculptor Augustus Lukeman. In the background, Riverside Park and the Hudson River are visible. At the foot of 106th Street is a bronze equestrian sculpture by Karl Bitter, depicted General Franz Sigel, a German-born Civil War veteran.
Master Apartments image

Master Apartments
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Master Apartments, 1930. The Master, a 27-story Art Deco skyscraper — the tallest on Riverside Drive — was commissioned by financier Louis Horch to house the Master Institute of United Arts, a school founded by the Russian artist, explorer and theosophist Nicholas Roerich. The new building included 24 stories of residential apartments, intended to generate rental income to support the Master Institute and Roerich Museum of the building’s lower floors. Roerich, a painter, set designer (best known for Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring”), philosopher, and mystic who traveled extensively through East Asia, immigrated to the United States in 1920, having left Russia shortly after the October Revolution of 1917. In New York, he found an audience for his theories about the relationship between art and daily life — as well as benefactors, including Horch, whose Riverside Drive townhouse previously occupied the site of the Master building. For the Master, Horch and Roerich enlisted Harvey Wiley Corbett, a noted skyscraper architect. Corbett’s Art Deco design featured colored brick gradually shifting to lighter tones in the building’s upper stories, and the first instance of corner windows in a New York skyscraper. The Master was completed in October, 1929, shortly before the market crash, and immediately came under financial pressure. Horch spent much of the early 1930s attempting to sort out its various debts and liabilities, and was eventually able to wrest control of the building in 1935. Roerich, meanwhile, got out of town — he continued his Asian expeditions, and would eventually settle in India. In 1938, Horch closed the Roerich Museum (the patronage relationship had become strained), and opened the Riverside Museum in the same space. That museum operated until 1971, when its collection of contemporary American art was transferred to the Brandeis Museum. The Equity Library Theater hosted productions at the Master from 1961-1989. In 1988, as the surrounding Manhattan Valley neighborhood began to rebound from a period of blight, the Master was converted to a housing co-operative. During the mid-90s, this new ownership structure undertook a multi-year restoration project.
Cathedral of St. John the Divine image

Cathedral of St. John the Divine
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Cathedral of St. John the Divine interior ca. 1959 The Guastavino Company pushed the limits of traditional tile vaulting further than any previous builders. Guastavino Jr.’s building method for the dome of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine required no support during construction, yet created a highly stable shell only 4.5 inches thick at its crown. The 135-foot span was erected in a mere 15 weeks. Originally intended as a temporary, inexpensive cover for the crossing of the cathedral’s two main axes, the dome remains in place today—a testament to its solid construction.
Association for the Relief of Respectable Aged Indigent Females image

Association for the Relief of Respectable Aged Indigent Females
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891 Amsterdam Avenue, 1937. The Association for the Relief of Respectable Aged Indigent Females (ARRAIF) was conceived in 1813. During the "Second Great Awakening," a time when the church aimed to reassert itself, mostly through charity, a group of women established a society to help elderly women who "once enjoyed a good degree of affluence, but now reduced to poverty due to the vicissitudes of Providence." The ARRAIF aimed to aid widows of both the American Revolution and the War of 1812. The first years of the society consisted of raising donations and giving clothing, furniture, and other household items to elderly women in need. In 1837, they established their first brick-and-mortar asylum at 226 East 20th Street with the help of John Jacob Astor and Peter G. Stuyvesant. In the late 1870s, the group purchased new land at 891 Amsterdam Avenue to construct a larger building. The building here was completed in 1883. Architect Richard Morris Hunt created a Victorian Gothic style structure. The new building was open to “any respectable non-Roman Catholic gentlewoman over sixty years of age, on payment of $150 and the surrender of any property she possessed." The building operated as the ARRAIF until about 1968. In 1990, it became a branch of Hostelling International and is currently the largest hostel in North America.
Schinasi Mansion image

Schinasi Mansion
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Morris and Laurette Schinasi House ARCHITECT: William B. Tuthill DATE: 1907-09 This two and a half story building is basically rectangular in plan, accented by an interplay of projected and recessed wall sections. The flush entrance facade, facing Riverside Drive, is pierced by windows on each floor. The main doorway, located to the right, is approached by steps flanked by wing walls. These wing walls terminate in high, square, newel posts that, in turn, connect with the balustraded yard railing.
Seventh Church of Christ Scientist image

Seventh Church of Christ Scientist
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Seventh Church of Christ Scientist, August 22, 1929. Designed by Griffin & Wynkoop, this Greek Revival church was completed in 1919. Clad in white limestone, the facade boasted no windows. The building survived until the late 1980s when the church sold the deteriorating church and its brownstone neighbor (which housed administrative offices and the Sunday school). The purchasing developers constructed a modest, modern church facade with a large circular window (that the church owns outright) next to a 22-story condo building, both clad in red brick.
Hotel Marseilles image

Hotel Marseilles
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"Hotel Marseilles, ca. 1912. The Hotel Marseilles was part of a flurry of Upper West Side “apartment hotel” construction in the opening years of the 20th century, spurred by the extension of the IRT Broadway line, completed in 1904. Apartment hotels — essentially apartment buildings with centralized “hotel” kitchens on lower floors, rather than in each unit — took advantage of loopholes between the Tenement House Law of 1901 and city building codes, allowing developers to build larger, higher density, and less strictly regulated buildings. As building codes were adjusted, apartment hotels fell out of fashion and units in the Hotel Marseilles were converted to traditional apartments, equipped with in-unit kitchens. In 1979, the building was converted to subsidized housing for elderly New Yorkers."
Cathedral of St. John the Divine image

Cathedral of St. John the Divine
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Cathedral of St. John The Divine. Heins & LaFarge won the design competition for their Byzantine/Romanesque/Gothic cathedral conception. One of its most prominent features is the Guastavino tiled dome, constructed as a temporary roof during fundraising for the massive central crossing tower, which was never completed. The cathedral famously suffered many setbacks, including waning public interest to provide funds, significant design alterations, the replacement of Heins & LaFarge with Ralph Adams Cram, and building hiatuses during two world wars. Despite its uneven developmental history, the cathedral remains a fascinating juxtaposition of styles and construction technologies. Its subsidiary structures were built around the Close in Gothic variations. In spite of being an international icon, the complex remains unprotected by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission. In 2007, the cathedral leased the Close’s southeast parcel for the construction of a residential high-rise, and there is currently a proposal to build two residential high-rises next to the Cathedral’s north wall. The Greek Revival Leake and Watts Orphan Asylum, restored in 2006 and currently the home of the cathedral’s tapestry conservation studio, is Morningside Heights’ oldest extant structure.
Grace Methodist Episcopal Church  image

Grace Methodist Episcopal Church
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Grace Methodist Episcopal Church, ca. 1905. The original Grace Methodist Episcopal Church was a small wood-frame chapel on West 104th Street, constructed in 1870. As the once sparse population of the neighborhood boomed around the turn of the century, the need for a larger space became apparent. In 1894 the cornerstone for a new church was dedicated. The resulting structure was a Lombardic-Romanesque building and one of the first churches in the city erected with an iron frame skeleton. Its most defining feature was the 156-foot tower at the southwest corner of the building. Unfortunately the church was destroyed in a 1983 fire. It was replaced in 1990 with a contemporary complex that includes a small church and an apartment building for clergy and low-income families.
West End Presbyterian Church image

West End Presbyterian Church
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At the same time as architect Henry F Kilburn was completing work on West-Park Presbyterian Church on West 86th Street, he was building another masterpiece 20 blocks north. Both churches were built to accommodate the Upper West Side’s rapidly growing population. This church, with its light-yellow, speckled brick and detailed terra-cotta banding, once housed the largest Presbyterian congregation in New York City.
Sunnycrest Apartments image

Sunnycrest Apartments
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Sunnycrest Apartments, ca. 1905. The early advertising for the Sunnycrest Apartments noted its proximity to the Hudson River, St. John the Divine, and subway, street car, and elevated train stations. The 1907-completed Colonial style building in red brick and limestone decoration was designed by the neighborhood favorite firm of Schwartz and Gross. Though laid out originally as substantially sized apartments with servants space, the building became single occupancy residences by the mid century. At some point prior to 1965 Columbia University became the owner of this building, known then as York Studios. That year the evicted the tenants of the building for then unknown reasons. The structure was demolished at some point in the mid to late 20th century and today the site is used as a parking lot.
Cathedral of St. John the Divine image

Cathedral of St. John the Divine
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Cathedral of St. John the Devine, ca. 1913. The massive Cathedral of St. John, the principal church of the Episcopal diocese of New York, is the largest church in the United States and one of the largest in the world. Designed by the Heins & LaFarge firm in 1891, the Cathedral's construction began its long journey in 1892 when the first stone was laid. The design was transferred to the firm of Cram and Ferguson in 1911, when the crossing and eastern end of church was completed. The resulting change in architects caused the Cathedral's Nave to have a French Gothic influence while the sanctuary and choir taking a Romanesque Style. The initial length of the cathedral was completed in 1941 (in part due to a colossal fundraising campaign amongst New Yorkers) and the cathedral was opened, marking a pause its construction that would last until 1979. The Very Reverend James Parks then spurred another round of construction and renovation, employing masons to continue the work. However, the great Cathedral remains unfinished, the last additions having been made in 2007, as its stone on stone construction is both expensive and painstaking. Even in its unfinished state, it remains one of the most important Anglican churches in the world.
Alimar Apartments image

Alimar Apartments
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The Alimar Apartments, ca. 1905. A seven-story Beaux-Arts apartment building commissioned by developer Hamilton Weed and completed under the ownership of E.G. Thiery. The Alimar, which opened in late 1899, featured stylish and spacious Colonial Revival interiors and amenities including state-of-the-art refrigerated storage.
Cathedral of St. John the Divine image

Cathedral of St. John the Divine
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Cathedral of St. John the Divine ca. 1904 In competition among most of the leading architects of the day, the magnificent Romanesque Revival scheme of Heins and La Farge was selected for construction of an American cathedral. Only the choir and apse and a rough masonry shell at the crossing were completed when Ralph Adams Cram gained control of the design for the rest of the building, which then was carried out in French Gothic Style.
Peace Fountain image

Peace Fountain
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My Archive Spring 2019 "September 1989: Playing at the Peace Fountain sculpted by Greg Wyatt, and installed in 1985. The park was a great place to play in the 1980s and I’m very lucky that my grandmother marched me out nearly every day of her visits to watch ongoing construction at the cathedral, including getting to speak with sculptor Simon Verity and his assistants who were working at the Portal of Paradise at the west facade. This photo was taken during one of my Brooklyn-born grandmother’s visits during which she’d encourage me to be more interested in my city. She would have me stand and watch the construction of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine because as she’d say, it’s not every day that you witness the construction of a cathedral. Someone living in our building was from an area near Barcelona and had brought me a 1992 Summer Olympics T-shirt, which is what I’m wearing. Barcelona had been selected as the host city on October 17, 1986." —James Russiello
Cathedral of St. John the Divine image

Cathedral of St. John the Divine
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My Archive Spring 2019 "Back when my Brooklyn-born grandmother would revisit the city once a year in the ‘80s and early ‘90s, she’d berate for not being more interested in my city. She’d march me out to the Cathedral of St. John the Divine because as she’d say, it’s not every day that you witness the construction of a cathedral. I was there in a stroller, playing at the newly installed Peace Fountain sculpted by Greg Wyatt. The park was a great place to play in the 1980s and I’m very lucky for my grandmother for marching me out nearly every day to watch sculptor Simon Verity and his assistants first chalk out and then sculpt the jamb figures at the Portal of Paradise. There are a lot of photos of me looking very bored, but we stood there for long periods each day watching, during which time the sculptor spoke to us, and my grandmother inquired if there was a training program I could join. He politely explained that it was nice that I was local but I was too young to be part of the cathedral works (my first in a long line of rejections). I was fortunate to see his amazing Yorkminster west portal figures while living in the UK and his work at NYC’s Hanover Square. I remember we posed my dad under the New York Apocalypse featuring the World Trade Center carving because he was handling maintenance plans for one of the buildings depicted in that carving nearby the World Trade Center. Coincidentally, the photograph is dated September 11, 1991 only because the outing correlated to a family birthday. We had no idea at the time that that would be the exact date featured at the start of The Big Lebowski (1998)." —James Russiello
102 West 107th Street image

102 West 107th Street
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Atlas Motor Company Garage, ca. 1907.
Manhasset Apartments image

Manhasset Apartments
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The Manhasset is an 11-story apartment house located on Broadway between West 108th and 109th Streets on the Upper West Side. Apartment houses were a brand new building type imported from France. When they began appearing on the Upper West Side in the 1880s, families had to adjust to the idea of living in the same building as other families. Advantages of apartment living included not needing so many servants and having elevators, which were new technology then. Built in 1899, the Manhasset is colorful and grand. The top floor roofs have a special form called mansard. The building covers the entire block-front, and, because it is located where Broadway makes a curve, it can be seen from many blocks away. Originally, the Manhasset was an eight-story apartment house. A few years later it was redesigned by two famous architects, Janes and Leo. In addition to making it taller, they added many shops on the first floor after the opening of the subway in 1904. The original 77 apartments, planned for upper middle class families, contained six, seven, or nine rooms with one to three baths. In 1905, the New York Census records the presence of many professional and business people. Most of the renters were born in the United States, but there were also a number of adults who were immigrants from Germany as well as others from Ireland, France, and Canada. As would be expected on the diverse Upper West Side, the residents appear to have been from various ethnic groups and religions and included Catholics, Protestants, and Jews. Each apartment included a single servant’s room, and most residents had one or two live-in servants.

Photos(1,156)

Schrafft's, 2786 Broadway image

Schrafft's, 2786 Broadway

Schrafft's 2786 Broadway, Interior, Lunch Room from Front.
Schrafft's, 2786 Broadway image

Schrafft's, 2786 Broadway

Schrafft's 2786 Broadway, Interior, Candy Counter from Front of Store. Photographs, Prints & Drawings
Schrafft's, 2786 Broadway image

Schrafft's, 2786 Broadway

Schrafft's 2786 Broadway, Exterior, Store Front.
241 West 108th Street image

241 West 108th Street

241 West 108th Street. The Algeria.
School of the Ascension image

School of the Ascension

West 108th Street. School of the Ascension.
Straus Park image

Straus Park

West 106th Street and Broadway. View looking west from northeast corner
Straus Park image

Straus Park

Straus Park between Broadway and West End Avenue, south of 107th Street. Path and park benches, looking towards statue and 106th Street.
Straus Park image

Straus Park

\[Isidor and Ida Straus bronze memorial in Straus Park.]
Straus Park image

Straus Park

"Isador and Ida Straus" (1915) sculpted by Augustus Lukeman. Photograph, ca. 1920s.
Straus Park image

Straus Park

"Isador and Ida Straus" (1915) sculpted by Augustus Lukeman. Photograph by De Will Clinton Ward, 1914.
Straus Park image

Straus Park

"Isador and Ida Straus" (1915) sculpted by Augustus Lukeman. Photograph by A.B. Bogart, 1913.
2799 Broadway image

2799 Broadway

2787 - 2797 Broadway, New York City, March 1916. Victrola store and billboards.
2799 Broadway image

2799 Broadway

Sign for Emanuel Blout, Victor Factory Distributor, 2799 Broadway, New York City, November 18, 1916. Photographed for Lawrence L. Strauss.
955 West End Avenue image

955 West End Avenue

West side of Broadway and W. 107th St., N.Y. Budweiser truck on street at left.
Public School 165 image

Public School 165

Public School 165 image

Public School 165

Manhattan 201.1, P.S. 165, 234 W. 109th St; Jerry Spearman, Photographer
Public School 165 image

Public School 165

Manhattan 201.2, P.S. 165, 234 W. 109th St; Jerry Spearman, Photographer
Public School 165 image

Public School 165

Manhattan: 109th Street (West) - Broadway 214-234 West 109th Street, south side, between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue showing P.S. 15. Board of EDucation, N.Y.9.
Bloomingdale Reformed Church image

Bloomingdale Reformed Church

Manhattan: West End Avenue - 106th Street (West) Bloomingdale (Dutch) Reformed Church, West End Avenue, west side, between 106th and 107th Streets, the northernmost block of West End Avenue. The view is across Straus Park, a little triangle formed by the intersection of Broadway, West End Avenue, and 106th Street. The church edifice and two apartment buildings are quite new as shown, erected since 1902: and the church will be demolished about 1915, to be replaced by another 12-story apartment building. 1906. Brown Brothers, Photographers.
Bloomingdale Reformed Church image

Bloomingdale Reformed Church

Lunatic Asylum, Manhattanville
Bloomingdale Reformed Church image

Bloomingdale Reformed Church

Unidentified girls in white with umbrellas in front of the Bloomingdale Reformed Church, West End Avenue and W. 106th Street, New York City, undated (ca. 1905-1913).
Bloomingdale Reformed Church image

Bloomingdale Reformed Church

Bloomingdale Reformed Church
945 West End Avenue image

945 West End Avenue

106th Street and West End Avenue. Stanley Court.
Manhasset Apartments image

Manhasset Apartments

The Manhasset, Bway & 108th St.
Manhasset Apartments image

Manhasset Apartments

West side of Broadway and W. 109th St., N.Y. Construction scaffolding/sidewalk shed, Indian Café.
The Manhassest image

The Manhassest

\[The Manhassest between 108th and 109th on Broadway.]
211 West 106th Street image

211 West 106th Street

211 West 106th Street. Looking N.E. at exterior of apartments.
2755 Broadway image

2755 Broadway

West side of Broadway and W. 106th St., Duke Ellington Boulevard, N.Y. City bus at stop.
211 West 106th Street image

211 West 106th Street

211 West 106th Street. Foyer to apartment 2-C before alteration.
211 West 106th Street image

211 West 106th Street

211 West 106th Street. Foyer lobby type C in apartment 3C, after remodeling.
211 West 106th Street image

211 West 106th Street

211 West 106th Street. Foyer lobby type C in apartment 3C, after remodeling.
211 West 106th Street image

211 West 106th Street

211 West 106th Street. Apartment 3 E, foyer to apartment, before alteration.
211 West 106th Street image

211 West 106th Street

211 West 106th Street. Foyer lobby type E in apartment 15E, after remodeling.
326 West 108th Street image

326 West 108th Street

Windham House Primary subject: Windham House Training Center for Episcopal Women
246 West 106th Street image

246 West 106th Street

Manhattan: 106th Street (West) - Broadway 252-244 West 106th Street, at and adjoining the S.E. corner of Broadway. No. 248 is a two-story frame house. 1932\. J. Clarence Davies Collection, Museum of the City of New York. Negative No. 325
320-322 West 107th Street image

320-322 West 107th Street

\[320-322 West 107th St. N.Y.] 320-322 West 107th Street.
207 West 106th Street image

207 West 106th Street

View looking N.W. at 207 West 106th Street.
320-322 West 107th Street image

320-322 West 107th Street

Buildings, 320-322 West 107th St. N.Y.
229 West 109th Street image

229 West 109th Street

229 West 109th Street. Apartments. Built by Paterno.
308 West 109th Street image

308 West 109th Street

Manhattan: 109th Street (West) - Riverside Drive 308 West 109th Street, south side, between Riverside Drive and Broadway. About 1911.
542 West 110th Street image

542 West 110th Street

Cathedral Parkway, no. 542; Changing New York Between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue.
221 West 109th Street image

221 West 109th Street

Manhattan: 109th Street (West) - Amsterdam Avenue 221 West 109th Street, north side, West of Amsterdam Avenue. This is a 1k-story and in the rear is a three-story frame house. 1932\. J. Clarence Davies Collection, Museum of the City of New York. Negative No. 352.
2745 Broadway image

2745 Broadway

105th Street at the N.W. corner of Broadway. The Cleburne.
The Cleburne image

The Cleburne

Chelburne Apts. W.E. Ave. & 105th St.
2740 Broadway image

2740 Broadway

Manhattan: Broadway - 105th Street Broadway, east side, from 105th to 106th Streets. This block will remain unchanged for the next ten years. June, 1935.
Schinasi Mansion image

Schinasi Mansion

West 107th Street and Riverside Drive. Schinasi residence
Schinasi Mansion image

Schinasi Mansion

West 107th Street and Riverside Drive. Schinasi residence
Schinasi Mansion image

Schinasi Mansion

West 107th Street and Riverside Drive. Schinasi residence
352 Riverside Drive image

352 Riverside Drive

Unidentified military parade, New York City, undated (ca. 1905-1909).
352 Riverside Drive image

352 Riverside Drive

Unidentified military parade, New York City, undated (ca. 1905-1909).
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