Madison Belmont Building, First Floor Interior ARCHITECT: Warren & Wetmore DATE: 1924-25 STYLE: Eclectic Revival

The Madison Belmont Building was constructed for the Cheney Brothers Silk Company, the country’s largest silk mill at the time, when this area was briefly known as the Silk District. Its overall Renaissance Revival style is accented by prominent Art Deco elements, and was one of the first buildings in the United States to incorporate such motifs. Its elegant iron and bronze framing at the lower three floors and entrances was designed by Edgar Brandt, a pioneer of the Art Deco style in Paris. The building was designated both an Individual and Interior Landmark in 2011.

This interior was designed in the Eclectic Revival style. The exterior of the building combines traditional, classically inspired designs with modernist elements, and the interior lobby was designed using traditional motifs inspired by ancient Greece, Rome, and Egypt that include figures of gods and goddesses, mythological beasts and wall frames with lotus leaves suggesting Egyptian antecedents. The lobby has a large amount of metalwork, including applied ornamental figures, wall frames, light fixtures, doors and mail and fireboxes, and it has a very strong sense of luxury and elegance, contributed by the richness of the marble walls, the travertine floors, the decorative bronze figures and doors and the painted, vaulted ceiling.