Park Row Building

The Park Row Building, also known as 15 Park Row, is a luxury apartment building and early skyscraper on Park Row in the Financial District of the New York City borough of Manhattan. The , 31-story building was designed by R. H. Robertson, a pioneer in steel skyscraper design, and engineered by the firm of Nathaniel Roberts. The Park Row Building includes 26 full floors, a partial 27th floor, and a pair of four-story cupolas. The architectural detail on the facade includes large columns and pilasters, as well as numerous ornamental overhanging balconies. J. Massey Rhind sculpted several ornamental details on the building, including the balconies and several figures atop the building.

The Park Row Building was developed by the Park Row Construction Company as an office building between 1897 and 1899. It used a steel frame and elevators to make it one of the world's tallest buildings at the time. It was constructed over a period of two years and nine months. Upon completion, about 4,000 people worked at the Park Row Building, with tenants such as the Associated Press and the Interborough Rapid Transit Company.

Until the completion of the Singer Building in 1908, it was the city's tallest building and the world's tallest office building. The Park Row Building was used as an office structure until the early 2000s, when it was converted to residential use. Today, the Park Row Building consists of 339 luxury apartment units, two penthouse apartments, ground floor retail, and office suites located in the building's historic cupola space.

Upon its completion, the Park Row Building received praise from the general public, although architectural critics reviewed the building more harshly. The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission gave city landmark status to the Park Row Building in 1999, and the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2005.

Site

The Park Row Building is in the Financial District of Manhattan, just south of New York City Hall, City Hall Park, and the Civic Center. The Park Row Building's original developers had been unable to acquire the corner lots at Ann Street and Park Row and at Ann Street and Theatre Alley.

The building has a frontage of on Park Row, on Ann Street, and on Theatre Alley. It is immediately adjacent to 25 Park Row to the northeast. Other nearby buildings include 5 Beekman Street to the east, the Woolworth Building to the north, St. Paul's Chapel to the west, and the Bennett Building to the south. In addition, 41 Park Row, 150 Nassau Street, the Morse Building, and the Potter Building are across Beekman Street to the northeast. Roberts's chief draftsman, George Shea Dayton, was also highly involved in the design. John Downey was hired as the general contractor; T. P. Galligan was the foundation contractor; J,B. & J.M. Cornell were the iron contractors; and Dawson and Archer were the masonry contractors. The total cost to build the skyscraper was $2.4–2.75 million (equivalent to $– million in ).

The building has 26 full floors, a partial 27th floor, and a pair of four-story towers on the 28th through 31st floors. The southern and eastern elevations, as well as the light court facing southwest, have single, double, or triple windows set within a bare brick facade. These elevations were originally painted in a cream color, the same color as the Park Row and Ann Street facades. The Park Row Building continued to be New York City's tallest building and the world's tallest office building until 1908, when it was surpassed by the Singer Building. The Park Row Construction Company transferred the building's ownership in 1901 to the Park Row Realty Company, also operated by Belmont.

At the time of the building's completion in 1899, approximately 4,000 people worked there as was the first office of the recently organized Associated Press. a get-rich-quick scheme in 1903, and a gambling ring in 1904. Belmont built an eight-story edifice on 3 Park Row, the lot that he had purchased to preserve the views from the Park Row Building, in 1906.

The Park Row Building and 3 Park Row were sold to Frederick Brown in July 1923 for $5 million. Brown immediately resold the buildings to Kenneth W. McNeil of the McNeil Coal Company in Bridgeport, Connecticut. In October 1924, McNeil sold the buildings to Bernard Dorf in exchange for the Theodore Roosevelt Apartments on the Bronx's Grand Concourse, in a sale worth $12 million. Following the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the building went into receivership, W. Irving Moss bought the building at auction in 1930 for $2.9 million, and it was resold the next year to Charles W. Crosby. Clinton and Russell were hired in August 1930 to renovate the lowest two floors for $300,000, and the project was completed by early 1931. In addition to replacing the facade, Clinton and Russell restored the interior spaces and added commercial space on the first floor.

During the later 20th century, more tenants moved in, representing a variety of fields. These included Patterson Brothers, hardware dealers; Universal National Bank, New York City's second black-controlled bank; and The Legal Aid Society. The building received few modifications throughout the remainder of the century, except for the replacement of windows and refurbishment of the lobby's original ceiling.

Residential use

Joseph and Rachelle Friedman, owners of electronic and music retailer J&R, bought 15 Park Row in the 1990s. At the time, J&R occupied several neighboring low-rise buildings on Park Row, and the Friedmans had demolished and replaced the neighboring building at the corner of Park Row and Ann Street. By 2000, plans were developed for a thorough renovation of the entire structure. The 1st through 10th floors would remain as commercial space, while everything above the 10th floor would be converted into 210 residential units, ranging from studio apartments to two-bedroom suites. The pair of apartments in the cupolas at the 28th through 30th floors were not renovated, and were offered for sale as unfurnished units in 2013.

In the 2000s and early 2010s, J&R took up most of the storefronts along the block of Park Row that included 15 Park Row, with a sales space at the ground floor and mezzanine of the building. By 2013, J&R was planning to expand to five floors and knock down the walls separating 15 Park Row from 1 Park Row. However, J&R closed permanently the following year. The 3rd through 10th floors were subsequently converted for residential use as well. By 2018, the building had 332 apartments, with five more under construction, two of which were planned for the towers atop 15 Park Row. J&R Music Lounge By City Winery was also supposed to open in 15 Park Row's basement in early 2020. These plans were canceled following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Atlas Capital Group bought the Park Row Building from the Friedman family in January 2021 for about $140 million. By early 2022, residents had raised complaints that the building's elevators, heat, water, and gas services sometimes did not work properly. That March, chef Todd English agreed to lease in the building's lower stories and open a restaurant there. Atlas obtained a $136.5 million loan from Berkshire Residential Investments in mid-2022 to fund improvements to the Park Row Building, but the ongoing rent strike meant that the building provided enough income for only 30 percent of the loan payments. A similar climb took place on September 8, 1918, when Steve Peterson climbed the building to raise money for the Free Milk for France Fund.

At 4:20 a.m. on May 3, 1920, anarchist Andrea Salsedo fell from the fourteenth floor of 15 Park Row. He was being held with Roberto Elia by the Justice Department in connection with a series of bombings that had occurred in New York City, Boston, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, Paterson, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh. A leaflet entitled "Plain Words", signed by the "Anarchist Fighters", was found at the sites, and because of an aberrant "S" in the printing, the authorities tracked down the print shop where both Salsedo and Elia worked. They were held at 15 Park Row for eight weeks with limited external communication. When Salsedo fell, the anarchists claimed he was thrown, while the police claimed he jumped.

Impact

Criticism from the architectural community was harsh because of the lack of comparable structures at the time. The unnamed critic described the cupolas as "insignificant terminations which add nothing", in contrast to the top stories of the St. Paul Building, which they felt was well designed. However, the critic also praised Rhind's figures on the Park Row Building as compared with the "impossible 'realism'" of Karl Bitter's figures on the St. Paul Building's facade. Negative criticism highlighted the composition of the facade as well. In 1898, the Engineering News said that the building was influenced by "no established style of architecture".

The Park Row Building also had admirers, including the photographers Charles Sheeler and Alvin Langdon Coburn, who took pictures of the undecorated side walls of the building and the shadows made by its unusual shape. Scientific American, in 1898, praised Robertson's design as having a "very satisfactory effect", in that the facade was able to "clothe the 'skeleton; with a mantle of stone and glass that shall appear diversified, dignified and appropriate". It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on November 16, 2005.

thumb|center|700px|The Manhattan skyline viewed from the [[North River (Hudson River) in 1902. The Park Row Building is at the center]]

Park Row Building

Site

Residential use

Impact

See also

References

Notes

Citations

Sources

External links