Table Of Contents
Introduction|2-5 History|6-19 Ornamentation and Decoration|10-11 Decline of Ornamentation|12-13 Architects and Owners|14-15 Artisans: Foundries|16-17 Artisans: Sculptors|18-19
Neighborhoods|20-111 Financial District|22-57 One Bowling Green|24-31 Twenty Exchange Place|32-43 Seventy-Four Wall Street|44-51 Seventy Pine Street|52-57
City Hall District|58-91 533 Broadway — Woolworth Building|60-67 Thirty-One Chambers Street — Surrogate Courthouse|68-77 One Centre Street — Municipal Building|78-85 125 Worth Street —Health Building|86-91
Flatiron District|92-111 620 Broadway — Siegel -Cooper|94-97 655 Broadway — Hugh O’Neill’s Dry Goods Store|98-99 675 Broadway — Adams Dry Goods Store|100-103 175 Fifth Avenue — Flatiron Building|104-111
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INTRODUCTION True beauty results from that repose which the mind feels when the eye, the intellect, and the affections, are satisified from the absence of any want. — The Grammar of Ornament —General Principles Proposition 4
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Introduction
This book is intended as an exploration of the ornamentation, statues and imagery that adorns some of Manhattan’s finest architecture. It is intended to surprise and excite the eye, present a bit of history and invite poetic reflection on the important role New York City played, and still plays, as a city of firsts and bests. There are so many fabulous books written on the topic of New York City Architecture. The focus of this book is to treat the reader, the viewer, to a glimpse of the visual beauty, and oddities, that look back at us from up high. Perhaps, it will induce a moment of reflection as we admire the significance of the architecture, the historical necessity of the built environment to tell a story, and the importance of imagery to sustain, nurture and remind us of the ideals of the past, the grandeur of the living, and the legacy we leave behind.
A preplexing consequence of fixing our eyes on an ideal is that it may make us sad.....Our Sadness won’t be of the searing kind but more like a blend of joy and melancholy: joy at the perfection we see before us, melancholy at an awareness of how seldom we are sufficiently blessed to encounter anything of its kind. — Excerpt from the Architecture of Happiness
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HISTORY The Decorative Arts arise from, and should properly be attendant upon, Architecture. — The Grammar of Ornament General Principles Proposition 1
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History
During the 19th and early 20th century New York was the most influential port city in America. With the opening of the Erie Canal in the early 19th century New York became the most important eastern port city with direct access beyond the east coast. In New York it seemed everything was in close proximity and access to the world, especially Europe, and banks, insurance companies, and industries considered it a hub for finance, manufacturing, commerce and wealth. Additionally, New York played an important role as the banking center during the Civil War and as the country changed its course from agricultural to industrial to finance New York City maintained its importance during each advancement. Thus, providing Wall Street with the opportunity to stake its claim as “the money capital of America”. New York City experienced some of the most influential growth in the history of any great metropolis. With the rise and supplanting of the Industrial age and the financial epicenter situated in lower manhattan, wealth, manufacturing and commerce rose to the forefront. The influx of many immigrants, the movement of mining wealth from west to east, and the “old” and the “new” rich gathered and commingled each day. Not much different from today, it was also a place of great contradictions, conflicts and conquering sometimes within mere city blocks.
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Ornamentation and decorations
“The conformation of an ornament should be in keeping with the form and structure of the object which it adorns, should be in complete subordination to it, and should never stifle or conceal it. As varied and as many-sided as it may be, still, the Art of ornamentation is never an arbitrary one; besides depending on the form of the object, it is influenced also by the nature of the material of which the same is made, as well as by the style or manner in which natural objects are reproduced in ornamentation by different peoples at different times. The art of ornamentation, therefore, stands in intimate relationship with material, purpose, form and style.” — Excerpt taken from Styles of Ornament, by Alexander Spletz
Much ornamentation, while striving for elegance and beauty, also served, or concealed, important functions, from providing needed structural support and deflecting rain water. Capitals, cornices, keystones, corbels, brackets and anchors all serve a purpose and delight the eye.
“As Architecture, so all works of Decorative Arts, should possess fitness, proportion, harmony, the results of all which is repose.” — The Grammar of Ornament, General Principles propositon 3
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the decline of ornamentation “Ornament is crime.” — Adolf Loos, early modernist architect Several factors played a role in the decline of ornamentation and decoration in Architecture. First we must look toward the very real technological breakthroughs in construction: with the advent of reinforced concrete, large expanses of glass, high-rise construction and steel cage construction. Secondly, sociologically, There was a greater sense of academic/scientific freedom. Modern architecture, The International Style, conceived of as the elimination of ornament in favor of purely functional structures, but left architects with the problem of how to properly adorn modern structures. There were two available routes from this perceived crisis. One was to attempt to devise an ornamental vocabulary that was new and essentially contemporary, another was a more radical route that abandoned the use of ornament altogether. This latter approach was described by architect Adolf Loos in his 1908 manifesto, translated into English in 1913 and polemically titled Ornament and Crime, in which he declared that lack of decoration is the sign of an advanced society. His argument was that ornament is economically inefficient and “morally degenerate”, and that reducing ornament was a sign of progress. With the work of Le Corbusier and the Bauhaus through the 1920s and 1930s, lack of decorative detail became a hallmark of modern architecture and equated with the moral virtues of honesty, simplicity, and purity. In 1932 Philip Johnson and Henry-Russell Hitchcock dubbed this the “International Style”. 12 — The Decline of Ornamentation
“Architecture has, with some difficulty, liberated itself from ornament, but it has not liberated itself from the fear of ornament,” — Summerson observed in 1941.
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architects and owners
Egos, wealth, monuments and idealism, might sum up the character traits involved in Manhattan’s architectural achievements. Whether it was the impressive late 19th century structures of the Ladies Mile, the grandiose statements of commerce in lower Manhattan, or the City Beautiful movement, the most renowned architects were commissioned by the most wealthy and influential men to build the greatest symbols of progress and power. Cass Gilbert, one of the most notable architects of the early 20th century, was the architect for two of the most elaborate buildings in lower Manhattan, The Alexander Hamilton Custom House at 1 Bowling Green and the famed Woolworth building at 233 Broadway.
“Remember that New York is a constantly growing city, and that it has an architectural theme all its own. Rather than concede that it was hodgepodge, I would call it a patchwork of beauty.”
Whomever the client, one thing above all else was true, their desire to create something monumental. A statement of the values the owners wanted to portray to the world was manifested in the architecture. This can be seen played out in the McKim Meade and White’s, Municipal Building, their first skyscraper, as well as with Henry L. Doherty, a self made man, who founded the precursor to Citgo and who was the owner of 70 Pine Street.
— Fiorello La Guardia, 1939
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ARTISANS: FOUNDRIES
Most of the cast iron ornamentations were prefabricated in foundries in New York City. A godsend for architects, cast iron was much more pliable and moldable than bronze, the metal they’d previously used on facades. Iron’s pliability drastically reduced the time and effort required in order to produce the Classical French and Italian architectural designs popular on facades at the time. While cast iron remained popular in the late 19th century, American architects also became enamored with bronze for its strength and the ease with which it can be cast. They used the metal increasingly for the decorative detail of large neoclassical public buildings, museums, libraries, banks, stores and universities. Many residential buildings in the early 20th century designed in the Beaux Arts and Neoclassical styles featured brass ornamentation. The U.S. based Hecla company was a renowned metalwork producer in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The company provided ornamentation for such famous architects as Henry Hardenbergh and McKim Mead & White. Hecla not only produced a vast amount of bronze and other types of ornamental metalwork, but operated a school for training metalworkers.
“Without design there can be no craftsmanship.”—
Oscar Bach
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ARTISANS: SCULPTORS
The influence from greek, roman, renaissance and baroque periods in Architecture makes it clear the grandiose nature that culminated in the Beaux Arts style. A significant style during the late 19th and early 20th century in America. As part of the City Beautiful movement, many buildings in the early 20th century were adorned with statues and sculptures depicting imagery of significant moral pride. One of the most famous sculptors of the early 20th century, Daniel Chester French (April 20, 1850 – October 7, 1931), was chosen by Cass Gilbert, to create the four main sculptures that adorn the front of 1 Bowling Green. French is best known for his sculpture of a seated Abraham Lincoln (1920) at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. Another notable sculptor of the times, Philip Martiny (1858 – 1927), created the sculptures, representing figures in New York City history, onn the front of 31 Chambers Street, The Surrogate Courthouse.
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We depend on our surroundings obliquely to embody the moods and ideas we respect and then to remind us of them. — Excerpt from the Archtiecture of Happiness
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NEIGHBORHOODS What we seek, at the deepset level, is inwardly to resemble, rather than physically possess, the objects and places that touch us through their beauty. — Excerpt from the Archtiecture of Happiness
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FINANCIAL DISTRICT
A feeling of beauty is a sign that we have come upon a material articulation of certain of our ideas of a good life. — Excerpt from the Archtiecture of Happiness
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One Bowling Green Alexander Hamilton Custom House
One Bowling Green, The Alexander Hamilton Custom House, now the National Museum of the American Indian, is a premiere example of the Beaux Arts style of Architecture and the City Beautiful Movement. Designed by noted architect Cass Gilbert the commission was not without controversy. Until 1893 federal office buildings were designed by government architects under the Office of the Supervising Architect of the United States Department of the Treasury. In 1893 the Tarsney Act permitted the Supervising Architect to hire private architects following a competition. Sitting on the federal government’s three person selection committee for the competition were Cass Gilbert’s former partner and also one of his former employees from Minnesota. To make matters worse, Senator Thomas Platt felt Gilbert’s recent arrival from Minnesota, and the fact he was not a member of the Republican organization of New York, should be grounds to exclude him from the commission. In spite of these very controversial points, the New York Chapter of the AIA requested a stop to these accusations and the commission proceeded. We must pay tribute to Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan who was instrumental in saving the building from demolition in 1979. The Customs House was one of the earliest designations of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission, The preservation was completed in 1987.
The City Beautiful Movement was a reform philosophy concerning North American architecture and urban planning that flourished during the 1890s and 1900s with the intent of using beautification and monumental grandeur in cities. The movement, promoted beauty not only for its own sake, but also to create moral and civic virtue among urban populations.
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Art scholars consider French's "Continents" to be perhaps the best examples of architecture sculpture in the United States. Each of the four "Continents" are rich in imagery and detail. Each represent a view of the continents through French's early 20th century lens: Asia and Africa are still cloaked in mystery, Europe is in the waning years of its colonial conquests, and America is emerging as a new, vibrant society.
“Sculpture is the language that the sculptor speaks in and often the introduction of a motif is one of feeling rather than of any literary expression” It is difficult, however, to look at these groupings and not consider the meanings of the many objects and images embedded within them” — attributed to Daniel Chester French, American sculptor
The many races of mankind are depicted on the facade of 1 Bowling Green
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Mercury the Roman God of Commerce adorns 1 Bowling Green
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The statues along the cornice represent twelve different civilizations — great commercial and seafaring powers of world history.
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The New York Times called City Bank Farmers Trust Company Building, a “magnificent building,” and noted that it “has been called one of the handsomest buildings, architecturally, in the city.”
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Twenty Exchange Place City Bank—Farmers Trust
Twenty Exchange Place, known as the City Bank Farmers Trust Building, was designed by the notable architecture firm Cross and Cross. The original intent was to build the tallest building of its time. As luck would have it the plans were filed in October 1929, the month the market crashed. This had significant ramifications on the banks acquisitions and subsequently the building plans changed. Ultimately, it came in as the fourth tallest building nut remained on the top ten tallest list of the tallest buildings until the 1970s. It now holds the distinction of the 27th tallest in New York City, sixth in lower Manhattan. The building itself takes up an entire, odd shaped, block. It straddles several streets; Exchange Place, Beaver, Hanover and William Streets. The architects referred to the design of the building as having no particular style and considered it “modern classic”, in other words, neoclassical. Completed in 1931, today, it is also referred to as an Art Deco influenced building. British sculptor David Evans, created most of the artwork. The imagery is reminiscent of industry, mythology, agriculture and nature, and is most fitting for an international bank of its stature. Of special note are the most illustrious four doors made of nickel silver, a white alloy of nickel, zinc and copper, with bronze trim and depicting the modes and progress of transportation.
Neoclassicism is the name given to Western movements in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that draw inspiration from the “classical” art and culture of Ancient Greece or Ancient Rome.
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Everything in connection with this monumental building expresses beauty, completeness and grandeur....every detail of this colossal structure is right up to the minute. The building throughout is the very last word in all that spells DELUXE.... No one visiting New York should fail to visit the “City Bank Farmers Trust” edifice — this magnificent and beautiful pile of marble, stone, and masonry is one of the sights of the city. — Parker Chase, in his 1932 book New York The Wonder City, wrote:
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Transatlantic flight and cruises across the world’s oceans spoke powerfully of the increasing power to travel to faraway places and engage in international commerce. The decade of the 1920s was the pioneering one for commercial flight.
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Symbols of industry, including scales, hourglasses, sheaves of wheat, and mechanical gears are some of the many images of commerce that adorn the facade of Twenty Exchange Place
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Eleven coins carved in granite adorn the main entrance at 20 Exchange Place. Each coin represents a different country in which the bank had offices and speaks to its presence and ambitions as an international bank.
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Above the doors are two allegorical figures in bronze, one with a cornucopia symbolizing abundance, the other with a lock and key suggesting the prudence of banking. They are surrounded by animal figures and floral forms. Title — 1
Seventy-Four Wall Street Seaman’s bank for Saving
Seventy-Four Wall Street, the Seaman’s Bank for Savings Building, was designed in 1927 by architect Benjamin Wistar Morris (October 25, 1870 – December 4, 1944). Morris studied at the School of Architecture at Columbia University and the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris. Morris was associated with firm Morris & O’Connor, which designed the Cunard Building in New York and the interiors of the S. S. Queen Mary. He was a member of the Architectural League of New York, receiving its gold medal in 1918. As architect of note for the Cunard Lines, Morris had tremendous experience in elaborate displays of nautical themed ornaments and imagery. To enjoy another fine example of his elaborate nautical representation visit the Cunard Building at 25 Broadway near Bowling Green. Opened in 1919, the Cunard Building presents a grand display of marine symbolism, speaking of an era when New York’s ports were the busiest in the world. The Seaman’s Bank for Savings was started in 1839 to encourage sailors to save their money rather than spend it all on women and booze.
Bas reliefs of fish, tall ships, and scenes at sea are carved into the facade of Seventy-Four Wall Street The Seamans Bank for Savings
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Morris was a notable architect known for elaborate display of nautical themed ornaments and imagery.
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New York City prospered as a center for shipping and trade in the 18th and 19th century. So, it’s no surprise that so many office buildings in the Financial District pay visual homage to the city industries that made their fortunes off the sea.
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Seventy Pine Street
The original owner of Seventy Pine Street was the epitome of a self made man. Henry L. Doherty was a grade school drop out who started out t the age of 10 selling newspapers in a saloon. He worked his way up from the office boy to engineer at a gas company. At the age of 40 he came to New York and founded the Cities Service Company, which both explored oil and gas fields and supplied local users. City Service Company later became Citgo. Seventy Pine Street, was Wall Street’s last “jazz age” skyscraper, reaching 60 stories with an extra 6 stories reachable from the 60th floor elevator. The only reason that it could reach these heights was attributed to the newest technology by Otis Elevator, the double decker elevator. The double decker elevator, by the virtue of two cabs using the same shaft solved the economic problem of the cost per floor ratio. As soon as the doors of both cabs closed, the double cab went up, stopping at, for instance, the 29/30th floors, the 31st/32nd floors, and so on. Unless the cab stopped without opening its door — a sign that the other cab was opening on another floor — passengers were not particularly aware of the double-deck operation.
Clinton & Russell and Holton & George built Seventy Pine Street to the height of 952 feet with 66 floors. Seventy Pine Street was started 8 months after the stock market crashed in 1930 and completed in 1932.
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A miniature impression of the building is incorporated above its own entrance. The miniature impression contains its own miniature impression.
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Ornate Silver Flora and Fauna designs decorate the exterior of Seventy Pine Street
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CITY HALL DISTRICT
Harmony of form consists in the proper balancing, and contrast of, the straight, the inclined, and the curved. — The Grammar of Ornament, General Principles Propositon 10
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233 Broadway Woolworth Building
The Woolworth Building was constructed in Neo-Gothic style by architect Cass Gilbert. Gilbert was also commissioned by Frank Woolworth in 1910 to design the tallest building in the world as the Woolworth Company’s new corporate headquarters on Broadway, between Park Place and Barclay Street in Lower Manhattan, opposite City Hall. The construction cost was $13.5 million and Woolworth paid all of it in cash. It opened on April 24, 1913. Although it was maligned by others due to its eclecticism, its resemblance to European Gothic cathedrals, had Reverend S. Parkes dub it the “Cathedral of Commerce” during the opening ceremony. It remained the tallest building in the world until the construction of Forty Wall Street and the Chrysler Building. The entire façade is clad in terra-cotta. It consists of blocks of molded clay hung on a steel frame. Most of the terra-cotta is glazed white to make it look like white limestone. The Woolworth building has subtle polychrome terra-cotta ornaments underneath the windows in blue, green, and other colors, given the facade a little pizzazz when the sun hits the building.
The Woolworth building, with its massive base and slender tower, became a model later in the twentieth century for other skyscrapers.
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Significant details include images of squirrels hiding nuts, wise owls, salamanders (representing the transmutation of lead into gold,) and Phoenixes (as a nod to Woolworth’s initial business failure and turning it around into his dimestore empire.)
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It’s been said that the Gothic style of building was chosen because Woolworth saw himself as being in the tradition of the great medieval merchants with their Gothic houses, and so he saw this style as appropriate for his headquarters building.
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The Woolworth building is one of the most potent images of twentieth century urban America.
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Maternity: depicts a mother with her infant.
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Thirty-One Chambers Street Surrogate Courthouse
Thirty-One Chambers Street, the Surrogate Courthouse, is located on the northwest corner of Chambers and Centre Streets in downtown Manhattan. Originally designed by architect John R. Thomas in 1899 as the Hall of Records. Thomas adapted his prize winning, but never built, plan for city hall to create this Beaux Arts Style building. It was a major representation of the City Beautiful Movement. He died before it was completed and it was finished in 1907 by Tammany Hall architectural firm Horgan & Slattery. Referencing the City Beautiful Movement, it’s clear why there are so many statues and classical motifs. The statues represent allegorical subjects; Maternity, Heritage, Philosophy and Law. As well as many of Philip Martiny’s historically signficant sculptures such as the depiction of New York in Its Infancy and New York in Revolutionary Times along with the statues that line the Chambers Street entrance representing some of most politically powerful figures in New York City at the time.
New York In Revolutionary Times by Philip Martiny. New York wears a helmet, carries a torch, and rests her right hand on a globe. A British soldier stands before a shield bearing the motto of Great Britain. A woman in 18th-century dress holding flowers stands before a shield bearing the Stars and Stripes.
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New York in Its Infancy: New York wears a crown representing royal rule, and carries books and a paper; to the left and right of her are an Indian and a Dutch settler.
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Cadwallader David Colden mayor of New York 1818-1821
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Abram Stevens Hewitt, mayor of New York 1887-1888
David Pietersen De Vries, Dutch mariner, merchant and patron
De Witt Clinton, mayor of New York and Governor ofn New York
Peter Stuyvesant, last directorgeneral of New Netherlands
Philip Hone, mayor of New York 1825-1826
James Duane mayor of New York 1784-1789
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Childhood: Two Children Flanking an Empty Cartouche situated above Chambers Street entrance.
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Beaux Arts architecture expresses the academic neoclassical architectural style taught at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. The organization under the Ancien Régime of the competition for the Grand Prix de Rome in architecture, offering a chance to study in Rome, imprinted its codes and aesthetic on the course of instruction, which culminated during the Second Empire (1850–1870) and the Third Republic that followed. The style of instruction that produced Beaux-Arts architecture continued without major interruption until 1968. The Beaux-Arts style heavily influenced US architecture in the period from 1880 to 1920.
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One Centre Street municipal building
Desiring to cut down the amount of rent paid to private landlords, the City government held several design competitions for a new building that would house many agencies under one roof. Twelve architectural firms entered the last competition, with the winning entry received from William Mitchell Kendall, a young partner of McKim, Mead and White. McKim, Mead was at the time the largest architectural firm in the world. Despite their standing in the architectural community, the Manhattan Municipal Building would be their first skyscraper. First occupied in January 1913, the majority of the offices were opened to the public by 1916. The limestone building incorporates Roman, Italian Renaissance and Classical styles of architecture. A major feature in the design is an open plaza, screened by Corinthian columns, that appears to be carved out of the first three stories of the structure. The plaza flows into a central triumphal arch, inspired by the Arch of Constantine. So grand is the arch that automobile traffic flowed through it before Chambers Street traffic patterns were altered. The building’s soaring classical exterior rises from modern roots: the Municipal Building was the first building in New York City to incorporate a subway station at its base. The subway station entrance at the south end of the building is covered by an arcaded plaza notable for its dramatic vaults of Guastavino tile construction.
Civic Fame sits on top of the Municipal Building Installed in March 1913, the gilded figure was designed by Adolph A. Weinman. The statue holds a crown with five turrets, symbolizing New York City’s five boroughs. It is the second largest statue in all of Manhattan.
Audrey Munson (1891–1996), who posed for the figure of Civic Fame, was also Daniel Chester French’s model for America, which stands in front of the Alexander Hamilton Custom House
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Various types of sculpture and relief were used in the building, but it most closely resembles classic Roman architecture.
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The male winged sculpture (right top), represents Executive Power. Guidance is personified by the female winged sculpture (right, bottom), Civic Pride (opposiue page) shows the female personification of the City receiving tribute from her citizens. Progress is a youth holding a torch and a winged globe.
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Basing the design on their competition entry for Grand Central Station, McKim Mead and White interpreted New York City’s greatest civic skyscraper in an eclectic fashion incorporating elements from from Roman Imperial, Italian Renaissance and French Renaissance architecture.
Sculptural reliefs emphasize virtues of Progress, Guidance and Executive Power, Civic Duty, Pride and Prudence.
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125 Worth Street Health Building
The Health Building occupies the entire block bordered by Worth, Centre, Leonard and Lafayette Streets. In addition to the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene and the Health and Hospitals Corporation, it also houses the Sanitation Department. The beautiful Art Deco building was designed by Charles B. Meyers. Construction began in 1932 and was completed in 1935, at a cost of $5,500,000. Deco architecture was not limited to any one particular kind of building, the style affected all aspects of life, and thus the functions of work, travel, housing, entertainment, shopping, religion, education, health, and incarceration were the subject matter of architecture. The front and side entrances have bronze grillwork and other metal design, including medallions with health themes. They were designed by Oscar Bach whose New York City studios also produced the custom metal work for the Woolworth, Chrysler, and Empire State buildings, as well as Riverside Church and Temple Emanuel-El.
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German born craftsman Oscar Bruno Bach was one of the most technically skilled and commercially successful figures in the field of decorative metalwork during the first half of the twentieth century. His style was as diverse as his use of metals.
Oscar Bach created a series of medallions (above) on the themes of health and sanitation
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FLATIRON DISTRICT
The principles discoverable inthe works of the past belong to us; not so the results. It is taking the end for the means. — The Grammar of Ornament, General Principles propositon 36
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620 Avenue of Americas Siegel—Cooper Building
Located at 620 (616-632) Avenue of the Americas, Sixth Avenue, between West 18th and 19th Streets, the SiegelCooper Dry Goods Store was built in 1895-1897 with an addition in 1899. Designed as the largest store building in the world, by the New York architectural firm of DeLemos & Cordes for Henry Siegel, president of the very successful Chicago department store. It is one of the distinguished department stores which helped to establish the historical and architectural character of the district. It was the first steel-framed department store in NYC, and the biggest store in the world for a time. This six-story Beaux-Arts style department store building is situated on the full eastern block front of Sixth Avenue. It is faced in white brick and terracotta, and ornately detailed above the first story. It features two-story triple arched entrances on West 18th Street and Sixth Avenue; terminating pavilions at the building corners; and a center pavilion, surmounted by a tower, on axis with the Sixth Avenue entrance.
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Siegel–Cooper advertised itself as “The Big Store — A city in Itself,” One entered Siegel–Cooper between towering bronze columns, onto a main floor dominated by a huge magnificent fountain. One did not stay long in the New York of the turn of the century without hearing someone say, “Meet me at the fountain.” — Excerpt take from Architectural Guidebook to New York City
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655 Avenue of Americas Hugh O’Neill Dry goods Store In 1887, O’Neill built his block long store, on a stretch of Sixth that soon became a thoroughfare of giant emporia. His four-story iron front, deeply modeled, ran from 20th to 21st Streets, and The New York Times noted that “the dingy yellow, which for years seemed to be the ruling color for large places on Sixth Avenue, has disappeared, and in its place is dazzling white surface.” The Times called the new building “tasteful and handsome.” There were — and still are — few full blockfront cast iron buildings in New York. The O’Neill store had something unique: a pair of one hundred foot beehive domes at each end set on top of one-story circular rooms. Early photographs show the domes with some sort of ball or finial on top, and the roof looks like metal of some sort, perhaps gold-painted galvanized iron. Even with the elevated tracks obscuring much of Sixth Avenue, it was hard to miss the huge new building, and impossible to avoid the great domes. The building’s architect, Mortimer Merritt, also put raised letters with the founder’s name in a triangular pediment in the center of the building. By the early 1890’s, O’Neill employed 2,500 people, and in 1895 he called back Merritt to add a fifth floor, and rebuild (or perhaps reinstall) the domed turrets, with the circular rooms below them. From the street the addition appears indistinguishable from the original building.
The millinery department, on the second floor at the 21st street corner, was a showpiece, with gilded columns. The ceiling and walls were finished in Japanese paper, and there was a cornice of ebony latticework with colored glass. In the corner, a banquette ran around the circular window – the nook was partly secluded by hangings of silk tapestry.
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675 Avenue of Americas Adams Dry Goods Store
Located at 675 Avenue of the Americas (Sixth Avenue) between West 21st and 22nd Streets the Adams Dry Goods Store, designed by DeLemos & Cordes in the Beaux-Arts style, was built in 1900. Adams Dry Goods was an elegant emporium with display windows on the second and third floors for riders to window shop from 6th Avenue elevated trains. One of the first New York City buildings with automatic elevators, and a central courtyard garden for dining rising to a glass roof, now fully. Adams Dry Goods merged with its neighbor O’Neill Dry Goods Store. They closed in 1907 The architect, Theodore De Lemos was born in Germany, June 13, 1850 and studied architecture at the Berlin Royal Academy of Buildings. He arrived in the United States in 1881. In 1884 he formed a partnership with A. W. Cordes. De Lemos & Cordes, built some of the largest department stores and office buildings in New York City, among them being the Siegel-Cooper, Macy and Adams department stores, the Speyer & Company, Kuhn, Loeb & Company and the New York County National Bank buildings, the Arion Club and the Grand Central Palace.
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6th Avenue between 18th and 23rd street was part of what was known as Ladies’ Mile. It was often considered the “downtown” of turn-of-the-century Manhattan. The 19th century economicexpansion along with the desire, and a newly acquired means from a larger consumer base, brought the existence of the department store to American life.
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175 Fifth Avenue The Flatiron Building
The Flatiron Building, or Fuller Building as it was originally called, is located at 175 Fifth Avenue and is considered to be a ground breaking skyscraper. Upon completion in 1902 it was one of the tallest buildings in the City and the only skyscraper north of 14th Street. The building sits on a triangular island block formed by Fifth Avenue, Broadway and East 22nd Street, with 23rd Street grazing the triangle’s northern (uptown) peak. It anchors the south end of Madison Square, and the north end of the Ladies’ Mile Historic District. The Flatiron Building is one of the most photographed buildings in America. Designed in 1902 by Burnnham & Company it has been called the “Burnham Baroque” and is considered one of successful works of architecture.. The Burnham Baroque exemplifies the integration of the Chicago School with the City Beautiful, in which classic ornament is slathered all over the building, but never in such a way as to conceal the structure — indeed the ornament is applied so as to accentuate structure, and in this sense Burnham Baroque has more than a little in common with the work of the Beaux Arts.
The neighborhood around the building is called the Flatiron District after its signature building. The Flatiron building has become an icon of New York City.
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Wind currents around the building was known to be treacherous. Wind from the north would split around the building, downdrafts from above and updrafts from the vaulted area under the street would combine to make the wind unpredictable. This is said to have given rise to the phrase “23 skidoo”, from what policemen would shout at men who tried to get glimpses of women’s dresses being blown up by the winds swirling around the building due to the strong downdrafts
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The Flatiron attracted the attention of numerous artists. The Flat Iron was the subject of one of Edward Steichen’s most memorable atmospheric photographs, in which Steichen was paying homage to Alfred Stieglitz image from the year before. Stieglitz reflected on the symbolism of the building, noting that it “...appeared to be moving toward [him] like the bow of a monster ocean steamer – a picture of a new America still in the making,” and remarked that what the Parthenon was to Athens, the Flatiron was to New York.
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Acknowledgement
Class: Typography II Semester: Fall 2011 Professor: Tom Dolle Designed and Photographed by: Kelly Cunningham All photographs were taken by Kelly Cunningham except for the two sculptures: Asia and Africa found on page 26. Text was taken form various sources and books, as is, or modified.