Thursday, June 21, 2001
Madison Square North Historic District proposal - a walking tour
LOOKING AHEAD by Wally Dobelis
We do not have to visit London or Paris, there are sleeping architectural beauties right here in old New York that enthusiastic students and preservationists periodically discover and trot out for our view. There's now a proposal for a Madison Square North Historic District, for the area between 24th to 29th Streets, reaching East to Madison Avenue and West to midway between Broadway and 6th Avenue. It was a project at Columbia University's Historic Preservation Studio, 1998-99; then it reached receptive ears at the Landmarks Commission. There have been hearings, and sympathetic testimony has been given by the Historic Districts Council, the Ladies Mile crowd, Land Conservancy and the Municipal Arts people.
I joined small guided tour with Joyce Matz, George Kewin and Jack Taylor of CB#5's Landmark's Committee, given by one of the Columbia project leaders, Kate Wood.
First, about the neighborhood. As the wealth and society of Manhattan moved uptown, it passed through Madison Square and its park in the late 19th Century. Hotels, theatres, offices and restaurants were built. Fine tall buildings were designed on the classical orders, with a base, a shaft and an entablature, the latter made up of an architrave (like a lintel atop a door), a freeze (think of the flat fascia below the eaves of homes) and a cornice (or eaves) The gingerbread - turrets, dormers - reach out through the entablature, Pediments, the triangular Greek temple gable-end, can be found atop the entablature.Multitudes of styles mix here, since this was also the notorious Tenderloin..
The tour was easy, we walked from 24th Street, along 5th Avenue - stopping at corners to admire the side streets - to 29th, then West to Broadway and back to our starting point. First stop was the neat No. 204 (5th Ave, that is), the former Lincoln Bank and Trust building, designed by C.P.H.Gilbert, 1913 (not to be confused with Cass Gilbert). Next, No.210 (arch. John B. Snook & Son, 1908), former Mark Cross store, with a good bay window and balcony. At the NE corner of 26th Street, the 12-story Brunswick (No. 225) , a Beaux Arts office building by F.H.Kimball & H.E. Donnell 1904, is the baby successor to the ornate 15-story hotel of the same name, once extending nearly the length of the block, practically all the way to the former ASPCA building (50 Madison, by Renwick, Aspinall and Owen, 1897 - look into its dainty lobby).. Diagonally across, at the SE corner, was the Jerome Mansion, where Jenny Jerome, Winston Churchill's mother, spent her youth. Landmarked in 1965, it was torn down for want of owners willing to maintain it, and replaced by the black glass NY Merchandise Mart.
At 27th Street, looking East, on the West side the Chinese- looking cinnabar red Gershwin Hotel has peculiar .white fiberglass protruding lintels, called "flaming tongues" (so named by their Finnish sculptor, Stephen Lindfors) that light up at night. Hotels abound, in the tradition of the district, including the extension of Prince George (see 28th) and the Trapeze..
Continuing on 5th Ave to 28th Street, we stop at the NW corner, to look at the 1908 Broadway National Bank (No. 250), built as the 2nd National Bank, by W. Richardson of McKim Mead (White was shot in 1906).Tall No 245, under renovation, is an Art Deco design by Eli Jacques Kahn, as is No.261, also being redone. The latter has memorable interiors. An interesting structure is No 251, a small yellow building with four cornices. It seems to have three stories added at different times. No 256, a Moorish article with a terracota facade featuring foliated columns is an Alfred Zucker fantasy (1893; we know him from Union Square's Decker Building)
East, around the SE corner, is the venerable Latham, long a welfare hotel. Its neighbor, the huge Prince George (No. 14 E. 28th, by Howard Greenley, 1904), has had a costly restoration, with the cavernous lobbies looking quite princely. It is a sorely needed quality SRO hotel. On corner Madison the elegant Carleton, formerly the Seville Hotel (Harley Allen Jacobs, 1901) is still under renovation. Across, at 29 E. 28th Street, is another Renwick, a 1879 survivor.
Looking up to 29th Street we wave at the late Norman Vincent Peale's Marble Collegiate Church on the NW corner (of limestone, by Samuel A. Warney, 1851-54), a clean Gothic Revival. It is not on our District plan, don't ask me why; neither is the other 29th St sweetie, the Little Church Around the Corner, nor the Gilsey House at 1200 Broadway, All three are landmarked.
We now turn West, on 28th Street, walking towards 1181 Broadway, where Alfred Zucker's 1895 Baudouine (Boduin) Building with its little temple on top is practically signalling at us. Baudouine was a cabinet maker who turned to investing in real estate. Nearing the corner we note, in the sidewalk of 1170Broadway, just before the wagon of the schwarma and couscous seller, a brass plaque identifying the 5th to 6th Ave blocks as the original Tin Pan Alley (although Broadway to 6th Ave would be more accurate). It was thus, in the 1890s, when M. Willmark was the top publisher. In the 1930s it had moved uptown, to Times Square's Brill building, at 1619 Broadway.
Walking South on Broadway, past the shouting Arab and Korean merchants of perfumes, jewelry and electronic goods, we note that the upper floors beneath the 1950s store fronts conceal some treasures. At 1165-75, the former Coleman House aka Metropolitan Hotel (1900) the upper stories have vertically organized bay windows. The Johnston Building (at 1166-70, 1902) has a turret and a belvedere, all it lacks is a beautiful maiden. At No. 1149 (DeLemos & Cordes, 1886) the name of Walla ce & Co looks exotic, until we note that a keystone has been lost in the center space. Wallace, is the name.
The St James, at 1129, has a three-story decorated arcade, designed by Bruce Price, 1896. He designed the Tuxedo Park community, and his daughter Emily positively identified avoidable social faux-pas, such eating peas with a knife, for generations of Americans.. The Townsend Building (at 1123, by Eidlitz and Eidlitz, 1897, we know them from St George's on Stuyvesant Square) has high decorated architraves, and chamfered (meaning beveled or sliced -off) building edge. Stone-trimmed brick abounds. Returning to 24th Street, we note, at 1122 Broadway, the corner Commodore Criterion building, as a slightly Art Decco 1918 Buchman and Kahn design
This trip is stimulating. Someday soon we will do a complete Madison Square area tour, covering the big-time treasures around the park.
We do not have to visit London or Paris, there are sleeping architectural beauties right here in old New York that enthusiastic students and preservationists periodically discover and trot out for our view. There's now a proposal for a Madison Square North Historic District, for the area between 24th to 29th Streets, reaching East to Madison Avenue and West to midway between Broadway and 6th Avenue. It was a project at Columbia University's Historic Preservation Studio, 1998-99; then it reached receptive ears at the Landmarks Commission. There have been hearings, and sympathetic testimony has been given by the Historic Districts Council, the Ladies Mile crowd, Land Conservancy and the Municipal Arts people.
I joined small guided tour with Joyce Matz, George Kewin and Jack Taylor of CB#5's Landmark's Committee, given by one of the Columbia project leaders, Kate Wood.
First, about the neighborhood. As the wealth and society of Manhattan moved uptown, it passed through Madison Square and its park in the late 19th Century. Hotels, theatres, offices and restaurants were built. Fine tall buildings were designed on the classical orders, with a base, a shaft and an entablature, the latter made up of an architrave (like a lintel atop a door), a freeze (think of the flat fascia below the eaves of homes) and a cornice (or eaves) The gingerbread - turrets, dormers - reach out through the entablature, Pediments, the triangular Greek temple gable-end, can be found atop the entablature.Multitudes of styles mix here, since this was also the notorious Tenderloin..
The tour was easy, we walked from 24th Street, along 5th Avenue - stopping at corners to admire the side streets - to 29th, then West to Broadway and back to our starting point. First stop was the neat No. 204 (5th Ave, that is), the former Lincoln Bank and Trust building, designed by C.P.H.Gilbert, 1913 (not to be confused with Cass Gilbert). Next, No.210 (arch. John B. Snook & Son, 1908), former Mark Cross store, with a good bay window and balcony. At the NE corner of 26th Street, the 12-story Brunswick (No. 225) , a Beaux Arts office building by F.H.Kimball & H.E. Donnell 1904, is the baby successor to the ornate 15-story hotel of the same name, once extending nearly the length of the block, practically all the way to the former ASPCA building (50 Madison, by Renwick, Aspinall and Owen, 1897 - look into its dainty lobby).. Diagonally across, at the SE corner, was the Jerome Mansion, where Jenny Jerome, Winston Churchill's mother, spent her youth. Landmarked in 1965, it was torn down for want of owners willing to maintain it, and replaced by the black glass NY Merchandise Mart.
At 27th Street, looking East, on the West side the Chinese- looking cinnabar red Gershwin Hotel has peculiar .white fiberglass protruding lintels, called "flaming tongues" (so named by their Finnish sculptor, Stephen Lindfors) that light up at night. Hotels abound, in the tradition of the district, including the extension of Prince George (see 28th) and the Trapeze..
Continuing on 5th Ave to 28th Street, we stop at the NW corner, to look at the 1908 Broadway National Bank (No. 250), built as the 2nd National Bank, by W. Richardson of McKim Mead (White was shot in 1906).Tall No 245, under renovation, is an Art Deco design by Eli Jacques Kahn, as is No.261, also being redone. The latter has memorable interiors. An interesting structure is No 251, a small yellow building with four cornices. It seems to have three stories added at different times. No 256, a Moorish article with a terracota facade featuring foliated columns is an Alfred Zucker fantasy (1893; we know him from Union Square's Decker Building)
East, around the SE corner, is the venerable Latham, long a welfare hotel. Its neighbor, the huge Prince George (No. 14 E. 28th, by Howard Greenley, 1904), has had a costly restoration, with the cavernous lobbies looking quite princely. It is a sorely needed quality SRO hotel. On corner Madison the elegant Carleton, formerly the Seville Hotel (Harley Allen Jacobs, 1901) is still under renovation. Across, at 29 E. 28th Street, is another Renwick, a 1879 survivor.
Looking up to 29th Street we wave at the late Norman Vincent Peale's Marble Collegiate Church on the NW corner (of limestone, by Samuel A. Warney, 1851-54), a clean Gothic Revival. It is not on our District plan, don't ask me why; neither is the other 29th St sweetie, the Little Church Around the Corner, nor the Gilsey House at 1200 Broadway, All three are landmarked.
We now turn West, on 28th Street, walking towards 1181 Broadway, where Alfred Zucker's 1895 Baudouine (Boduin) Building with its little temple on top is practically signalling at us. Baudouine was a cabinet maker who turned to investing in real estate. Nearing the corner we note, in the sidewalk of 1170Broadway, just before the wagon of the schwarma and couscous seller, a brass plaque identifying the 5th to 6th Ave blocks as the original Tin Pan Alley (although Broadway to 6th Ave would be more accurate). It was thus, in the 1890s, when M. Willmark was the top publisher. In the 1930s it had moved uptown, to Times Square's Brill building, at 1619 Broadway.
Walking South on Broadway, past the shouting Arab and Korean merchants of perfumes, jewelry and electronic goods, we note that the upper floors beneath the 1950s store fronts conceal some treasures. At 1165-75, the former Coleman House aka Metropolitan Hotel (1900) the upper stories have vertically organized bay windows. The Johnston Building (at 1166-70, 1902) has a turret and a belvedere, all it lacks is a beautiful maiden. At No. 1149 (DeLemos & Cordes, 1886) the name of Walla ce & Co looks exotic, until we note that a keystone has been lost in the center space. Wallace, is the name.
The St James, at 1129, has a three-story decorated arcade, designed by Bruce Price, 1896. He designed the Tuxedo Park community, and his daughter Emily positively identified avoidable social faux-pas, such eating peas with a knife, for generations of Americans.. The Townsend Building (at 1123, by Eidlitz and Eidlitz, 1897, we know them from St George's on Stuyvesant Square) has high decorated architraves, and chamfered (meaning beveled or sliced -off) building edge. Stone-trimmed brick abounds. Returning to 24th Street, we note, at 1122 Broadway, the corner Commodore Criterion building, as a slightly Art Decco 1918 Buchman and Kahn design
This trip is stimulating. Someday soon we will do a complete Madison Square area tour, covering the big-time treasures around the park.
# posted by Wally Dobelis @ 3:59 AM 
