The Orienta
302 West 79th Street

Architect: Schneider and Herter
Builder: Abraham Morganroth
Built: 1904

The Orienta is an excellent example of an early symmetrical H-plan layout. The two front apartments are mirror images of each other, containing 7 rooms each. False fireplaces were included, along with both electric and gas lighting fixtures. The two rear apartments are almost identical, one having a maid's room and the other not. The advantage of a compact public hall on each floor unfortunately necessitated outside fire escapes, as only one interior stair was provided. Also unfortunate were the long entrance halls provided in the front units. The loss of one advantage of its location touted in a 1910 advertisement for the building is particularly to be lamented: *It is high, has perfect drainage and, because of its proximity to the Hudson, Riverside Drive and Central Park, enjoys the purest air. Also lost is the spaciousness of the front apartments, which were subdivided in 1960.*

The Langham
135 Central Park West

**Architect:** Clinton and Russell
**Builder:** Boehm and Coon
**Built:** 1905
**Remodelled:** 1958-1960
**Architect:** Wechsler and Schimenti
**Builder:** Langham Mansions Company

The Langham, occupying the entire blockfront from 73rd to 74th Streets, originally contained only four apartments to a floor as shown on the plan below, most of which have since been divided into smaller units. The decorative moldings used in each apartment varied from floor to floor, and were exceptionally lavish, utilizing several different *period* styles. The entrance lobby was ornately decorated with bronze, marble, carved Caen stone and crystal chandeliers. Unused now for many years, there was originally an arcaded carriage driveway with access from 73rd Street. Among the amenities once provided were a direct-to-each-apartment mail conveyor system, a central refrigeration plant in lieu of ice-boxes, and built-in vacuum cleaning system connections and wall safes in each apartment. The original rents ranged upward from $4,500 per year.

The Central Park Apartments
7th Avenue, 58th to 59th Streets

Architect: Hubert, Pirsson and Company
Builder: Juan de Navarro
Built: 1883
Razed: 1927

Commonly referred to as The Spanish Flats, this 8-building complex was planned as a cooperative venture. However, the original scheme fell through and the project was completed as a conventional rental structure by J. Jennings McComb, the original mortgagee, at a cost of over $4 million. Each building contained 13 apartments, of which 3 were double size. Additional maids' rooms and storage space was provided in the basement for the larger suites. Of particular interest was the provision for deliveries. A vehicular tunnel was constructed leading from an adjacent private street directly to the basements. Goods could thus be handled under cover and off the street. The buildings were especially notable for the lavishness of their interior decoration, yet all that remains today is the name of the original builder, now gracing a nearby hotel.

960 Fifth Avenue

Architect: Rosario Candela
Warren and Wetmore
Builder: Anthony Campagna
Built: 1929, partially co-op

960 Fifth Avenue, built on the site of the 130-room mansion of Senator William Clark, is a luxurious residence of restrained elegance, containing very large, very expensive apartments. Through a careful dovetailing of the different units, the entertaining rooms were provided with extra-high ceilings while the remainder of each suite was of normal height. One of the original apartments was a 17-room suite sold to Dr. Preston Pope Satterwhite for $450,000, the highest price ever paid up to that time. Recently the building reasserted its financial exclusivity when the apartment shown in plan was sold by the estate of Mrs. Ailsa Mellon Bruce for $900,000. Fronting on 77th Street is a separate section of the building containing rental apartments.

Hotel des Artistes
1 West 67th Street

Architect: George Mort Pollard

Builder: Walter Russell

Built: 1916

The name of this building is deceptive, as 1 West 67th Street has always been a cooperative apartment house rather than a hotel. Nonetheless, it was designed to provide many of the amenities of a hotel, including a communal kitchen, a restaurant, squash courts, a swimming pool, a theater and a ballroom. The kitchen has been converted to small apartments and the theater and ballroom now serve as television studio space, but a grand and gracious ambience still pervades the building. Most of the building's apartments include double-height living rooms and balcony bedrooms, and some are graced with elaborate English tudor gothic detailing and huge stone fireplaces. The exterior detailing is particularly fanciful, with carved stone figures representing the arts.

8th Floor Mezzanine

8th Floor

The Beresford
211 Central Park West
1 and 7 West 81st Street

Architect: Emery Roth

Builder: HRH Construction Company

Built: 1929

Converted to co-op: 1962

Known as much for its distinguished tenants, many from show business, as for its architectural appearance, The Beresford has presented a striking silhouette on the north corner of 81st Street since it replaced an earlier hotel of the same name. It provides large apartments with spacious rooms, extensive storage facilities and elegant appointments. Entrance is provided through several separate lobbies handsomely detailed in marble and bronze. The Beresford, along with the San Remo at 145 Central Park West, was the last of the lavish New York apartment houses designed in the classical manner so favored in the early part of the twentieth century. The high level of maintenance over the years, together with its convenient location and relatively secure co-operative status, assure it of a long life.

The Prasada
50 Central Park West

Architect: Charles W. Romeyn

Henry R. Wynne

Builder: Franklin and Samuel Haines

Built: 1907

The Prasada is a heavy-handed interpretation of the French Second Empire style. Its exterior detailing is crude, but its interiors are lavishly decorated, at least by today's standards. Each floor originally contained three apartments—two with 4 bedrooms and one with 3. The rooms are spacious but, typically for the period, the hallways are long and dark, and the closet space is minimal. In 1919 the original mansard roof was removed and the top floor correspondingly enlarged. The ground floor contains a pleasant extra-height entrance loggia, off of which open two suites, each containing a circular foyer. These have been converted to professional use and, in addition, some of the apartments on the upper floors have been divided into smaller units.

The Apthorp
2207 Broadway
390 West End Avenue

Architect: Clinton and Russell
Builder: John Downey for the Astor family
Built: 1908

Not nearly as large as its stylistic cousin, The Belnord, shown on the previous page, The Apthorp originally contained ten apartments to a floor, opening off four elevator halls. During the thirties and forties many of these were cut into smaller units to accommodate changing patterns of urban living. The apartments are particularly well detailed, with each of the original suites containing a room-sized foyer with a mosaic tile floor. There are glass-panelled French doors throughout, and many of the rooms are ringed with Wedgwood-esque friezes. The exterior of the building, facing both the street and the fountained court, is of limestone, beautifully carved and rusticated. The façades facing the avenues are superb compositions embodying bas relief sculptures, fully carved figures, numerous cherubs, and delicate wrought ironwork.

The Dakota
1 West 72nd Street

Architect: Henry Janeway Hardenbergh

Builder: Edward Severin Clark

Built: 1884

Converted to co-op: 1961

Not the first, but certainly the most famous, The Dakota is the Dowager Queen Mother of apartment houses. It was built in a style that can best be described as Brewery Gothic Eclectic, or as one tenant put it, Middle-European Post Office. As the forerunner of latter day luxury apartment buildings, it originally contained an impressive array of service spaces, including a large wine cellar, extensive kitchens, and a baronial dining hall for private parties, all of which have since been converted to additional apartments. The adjacent great lawn was later made over into tennis courts, which in turn were removed for a newer apartment tower. Master Mason John Banta took four years to complete The Dakota, building it in a manner intended to last for centuries. If the economics of the situation permit, it doubtless will.

The Belnord
225 West 86th Street

Architect: H. Hobart Weekes

Builder: Belnord Realty Company

Built: 1908

The Belnord occupies a full city block and surrounds an interior courtyard of exceptionally ample proportion. From this landscaped garden court, access is gained to the six separate passenger elevator lobbies. These in turn lead to the upper floors, of which there are two distinct types. The majority consist of 16 suites, variously containing from 2 to 4 bedrooms. Some suites include a run-on parlor/library/dining room that spans the 50 feet from the interior court to the avenue. Four of the upper floors provide apartments with double-sized living and dining rooms. Ornamental details throughout the building lend a touch of elegance, although the structure lacks the grace and refinement of the Apthorp, shown on the next page, which was built at the same time, but by a different architect.

### 3.11

Organization of space in row houses with single-loaded corridor plans: a. multiple recesses in the front and single recess in the back; b. no recess in the front and multiple recesses in the back; c. single recess in the front and multiple recesses in the back; d. no recess in the front, light well in the middle, and possible recess in the back.

a

b

c

d

### 3.12

Organization of space in row houses with double-loaded corridor plans: a. no recess in the front and possible recesses in the back; b. single recess in the front and possible recesses in the back; c. possible recess in the front, light well in the middle, and possible recess in the back.

a

b

c

URBAN HOUSING

HIGH-RISE ELEVATION

SECTION

PLAN

PROJECT

CONVENTIONAL

$$ \frac{250}{200} \times 100 = 125 \text{ D.US} $$

250 S.F./R.R.
100 D.US

<table><thead><tr><th rowspan="2">APARTMENT TYPE</th><th rowspan="2">L.R. B.D.S.</th><th rowspan="2">KITCHEN</th><th rowspan="2">1ST BR.</th><th rowspan="2">2ND BR.</th><th rowspan="2">3RD BR.</th><th rowspan="2">4TH BR.</th><th rowspan="2">TOTAL ROOM AREA</th><th rowspan="2">R.R.</th><th colspan="2">GROSS AREA / D.U.</th></tr><tr><th>PROJECT</th><th>CONV.</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>0 BR.</td><td>200 85</td><td>-</td><td>-</td><td>-</td><td>-</td><td>285</td><td>2 1/2</td><td>500</td><td>625</td></tr><tr><td>1 BR</td><td>220 60</td><td>150</td><td>-</td><td>-</td><td>-</td><td>430</td><td>3 1/2</td><td>700</td><td>875</td></tr><tr><td>2 BR</td><td>250 60</td><td>150</td><td>130</td><td>-</td><td>-</td><td>590</td><td>4 1/2</td><td>900</td><td>1125</td></tr><tr><td>3 BR</td><td>270 70</td><td>150</td><td>130</td><td>130</td><td>-</td><td>750</td><td>5 1/2</td><td>1100</td><td>1375</td></tr><tr><td>4 BR</td><td>290 75</td><td>150</td><td>130</td><td>130</td><td>130</td><td>905</td><td>6 1/2</td><td>1300</td><td>1625</td></tr></tbody></table>

LOW-RISE ELEVATION

SECTION (A+A)

PLAN

The two sets of elevations and sections at left illustrate a generalized high-rise building that might be built with this system, and a generalized low-rise building. The shaded areas of the plans marked A, A2, and B, illustrate the three basic and repetitive "clusters" out of which the buildings can be generated. The A2 clusters contain the vertical transportation, either stairs or elevators. The small a-a, b-b, and c-c plan marks on the sections refer to the plans a-a, b-b, and c-c on page 133, showing where those plans are located. The chart is a statistical comparison of a typical urban design group system apartment building with a similar conventional building.

## size of apartments.

Using about 11 different elements per apartment, (an element is a part or group of parts that can be conveniently handled in one crane lift) the Urban Design Group system can generate one-through six-bedroom apartments of unlimited "mix," in either high-rise or low-rise arrangements. And unlike some project housing, the apartments themselves look like they would be fun to live in, and the possible facade expressions look anything but dull.

URBAN DESIGN GROUP SYSTEMS BUILDING, The Urban Design Group of the New York City Planning Department: Jonathan Barnett, A.I.A., director of design; Ajyzk Jagoda, principal urban designer and architect. Structural consultant: Mario Salvatore; mechanical consultant: Joseph R. Loring Associates; John A. Van Deusen, transportation systems. Drawings by Martin Dorf, assistant urban designer, and Paul Wang; rendering by Roy Lordahl.

ISOMETRIC SECTION

copyright © 1971 by Ajyzk Jagoda

ARCHITECTURAL RECORD April 1971

135

Using three basic apartment "clusters"—the A cluster, the A2 cluster and the B cluster, —one- through six-bedroom units can be generated in nearly unlimited ratios. Below is an isometric perspective of an A cluster combined with another A cluster to create efficiency through three-bedroom apartments. Corridors occur every third floor, as shown, and the plans of various apartment types are related to their position in the isometric.

HIGH-RISE ELEVATION

PLAN

LOW-RISE ELEVATION

PLAN

Alwyn Court
180 West 58th Street

Architect: Harde and Short

Builder: Hedden Construction Company

Built: 1908

Remodelled: 1938

Architect: Louis S. Weeks

Builder: Edgar Ellinger

Alwyn Court was named after Alwyn Ball Jr., a director of the company that built it. It originally housed 22 families in an approximation of French Renaissance splendor. The apartments, exceptionally spacious even for pre-World War I buildings, were decorated with carved Caen stone, marble and fine wood panelling. The dressing rooms had storage closets fitted with plate glass shelves and multiple full-length mirrors. A virtually identical structure was designed by the same architect and built at the same time by Charles F. Rogers at Madison Avenue and 66th Street. By 1938, however, the Depression had so dried-up the market for grandiose living accommodations that the apartments of Alwyn Court were going begging. Accordingly, armed with $200,000 from the Drydock Savings Bank, Edgar Ellinger gutted the building, leaving only the exterior walls and the floor beams, and rebuilt it to provide 75 apartments of 3, 4 and 5 rooms. It is in this state that it survives today.

Original Plan

Remodelled Plan

The Majestic
115 Central Park West

Architect: Irwin S. Chanin
Jacques Delamarre
Builder: Chanin Construction Company
Built: 1930
Converted to co-op: 1957

The Majestic, built on the site of Alfred Zucker's 1894 Hotel Majestic, was originally designed with apartments ranging in size from 11 to 24 rooms after a study of apartment accommodations in New York indicated that suites of this size were most in demand. When the steelwork for the building had been partially erected, the stock market crashed and along with it the market for palatial residences. A frantic reworking of the plans resulted in a new assortment of apartment sizes ranging from very small units to ones of 14 rooms. Special features included cantilevered construction at the corners of the Central Park frontage which enabled glass-walled solaria to be placed at these points. In addition to these enclosed porches, a large solarium was provided on the 19th floor for the general use of all tenants in the building. Sculptor Rene Chanbellan's design of the building's futuristic forms, the interior decoration, and the furnishings were originally described as *Modern American* but are now generally referred to as *Moderne*. It was an answer to the European-inspired revival styles then in vogue. The mode was characteristic of the thirties, but looks sadly dated today.

Olympic Tower
641 Fifth Avenue

Architect: Skidmore, Owings & Merrill

Builder: Arlen Realty & Development Corporation
Victory Development Corporation

Built: 1974, condominium

**Olympic Tower** is an unusual apartment house in two respects. First, it combines in one building, retail stores, a park-like public shopping arcade, commercial office space, and apartments. Second, it provides many of the facilities and services one expects of a hotel, augmented with a number of extra ones. Besides a concierge who can make travel and entertainment arrangements for the residents, there is maid and valet service, a restaurant, a barber shop, a hairdressing salon, and an international newsstand. The building is equipped with a wine cellar, a health club, a stock quotation board, an internal telephone system and an auxiliary emergency power generator, as well as a very sophisticated personal and electronic security system. The two highest floors contain several very large duplexes while the rest of the residential portion of the building consists of eight luxurious but basically conventional apartments to a floor. The plan of a typical corner suite is shown below.

1107 Fifth Avenue

Architect: Rouse and Goldstone
Builder: George A. Fuller Company
Built: 1926

The erection of this house was directly related to the willingness of Mrs. E.F. Hutton to agree to sell her townhouse property site, but only if the builder would virtually recreate her house atop the apartment structure. The result was the 54-room triplex shown, which was certainly the largest and very possibly the most luxurious apartment ever created anywhere. It was served by a private carriage driveway on 92nd Street and a private elevator as well as a separate ground floor suite for a concierge. The apartment included a silver room, a wine room and cold-storage rooms for flowers and for furs along with a self-contained suite of rooms for Mrs. Hutton's parents, Mr. and Mrs. Post. The annual rental was $75,000, which was paid for the term of the 15-year lease. Subsequently, after the apartment had remained vacant for ten years, the triplex was converted into six smaller, but still luxurious, 9-room apartments.

London Terrace
9th to 10th Avenues, 23rd to 24th Streets

Architect: Farrar and Watmaugh
Builder: Henry Mandel
Built: 1930

At the time of its completion this 14-building 1700-unit complex was described as *the greatest single residential development the world has ever seen*. Although shorn of some of its glory by the construction of other large projects in later years, it still maintains a massive dignity. The ten mid-block buildings, of which a typical floor plan is shown below, contain studio and one-bedroom apartments while the four corner structures house larger units. Tenants are served by an internal telephone system and share an olympic-sized swimming pool as well as a secluded courtyard garden and a sundeck with a fine view of the Hudson. Prior to 1929, about 400 people—a good many of them artists and writers—lived in the 80-odd houses on the block-square site. The houses formerly on 23rd Street had been built in 1845, patterned on the fashionable London row houses of that time. Collectively they were called London Terrace, from which the present complex took its name.

University Plaza
LaGuardia Place, Bleeker to Houston Streets

Architect: I. M. Pei

Builder: New York University

Built: 1966

One building: co-op

Two buildings: faculty housing

One to four-bedroom units are provided in three 30-story pinwheel-plan reinforced-concrete towers. Built on the site of a proposed-but-never-built triplet to the twin monoliths to the north, this project brings a crisply articulated elegance to an otherwise dreary area. Spacious apartments for middle-income families were provided, with an unusually high level of private and public amenity. All but the smallest units have two exposures and the larger apartments are given extra bathrooms. Closets are spacious as are the lofty ground floor lobbies and the underground garage. Of particular delight are the eyebrows over the windows which alleviate the need for shades or blinds, and are a result of the carefully detailed structural system. A giant sculpture by Pablo Picasso adds to the project's satisfaction of its residents' more-than-merely-basic needs.

a
Unité d'Habitation, site plan.

b
Unité d'Habitation, section and elevation.

Unité d'Habitation

MARSEILLES, 1945-1952

Le Corbusier

In the twenty-three years between the first Immeuble Villas project of 1922 and the beginning of the Unité d'Habitation in 1945, Le Corbusier designed over thirty housing developments. Only a few of these were actually built, and aside from the ill-fated Bordeaux-Pessac project of 1923 and Le Corbusier's own apartment house, the Marseilles block was the first of the important projects to be built in France. It is the culmination of three decades of continuous development, really the first physical manifestation of all of Le Corbusier's ideas about the individual family unit, the grouping of units, and the city itself.

Le Corbusier repeatedly refers to the influence that his 1907 visit to the Carthusian monastery on the Ema near Florence had on the development of the Unité. Stemming from observations about the monastery—how individual units are arranged and then collected together—the Unité evolved from the Immeuble projects of the twenties and still shares many of their essential characteristics. The large courtyard blocks or continuous buildings of the earlier period have given way to a seventeen-story slab set off the ground on pilotis. The slab may occur individually or in multiples but it is always nearly the same. The long sides face east and west, as do the through apartments. Special apartments are on the south side, and the north wall is blank. There is a roof garden, integral brise-soleil and balcony, elevator access from a lobby among the pilotis, and in the Marseilles block, two floors of shopping midway up the building. The well-known section develops from a circulation system of corridors every third floor: access is from the corridor into two-level, through apartments that are L-shaped in section and interlock around the corridor.

The monastery prototype and subsequent examples of the early Immeubles up to the buildings that appear in the Ville Radieuse in 1935 are single-loaded corridor versions of the skip-stop arrangement. There is speculation that the idea of the Unité section was copied from Moses Ginzburg in 1928, when Le Corbusier observed the construction of the Narkomfin apartment building in Moscow. Perhaps his ideas were reinforced by what he saw there, but the notion—spatially—had been around for some time. The section of Villa Carthage of 1928 only needs a central corridor to become the typical Unité section. Any of the double-height Immeuble types including Garche and Meyer are volumetrically very similar to the Unité section, or at least to half of it. The Immeuble Villas of 1922 were a single-loaded, skip-stop arrangement, and the Ginzburg section was, after all, based upon a single-loaded, skip-stop corridor, too. At any rate, the section was fully developed with Ville Radieuse and was only further refined with the typical unit plans of 1937 and the subsequent development of the brise-soleil.

After the Rio de Janeiro experience in 1936 and that of Algiers in 1938 Le Corbusier greatly increased his emphasis on sun control. The purpose of the brise-soleil is to let sun in during the winter and keep it out during the sum-

a

b

120

Chatham Towers
170 Park Row

Architect: Kelly and Gruzen

Builder: Association for Middle Income Housing

Built: 1964, co-op

This 240-unit project was built under Title I of the Federal Housing Act, for upper-middle income families. Two exposed-concrete towers surmount a 125-car garage on a triangular site near City Hall. Studio to 3-bedroom apartments are worked into a particularly compact plan which provides balconies on alternate floors. Two *firsts* for Manhattan are the windows, double-glazed with built-in venetian blinds, and the walls, two 1-inch layers of gypsum board with an air space between for sound control. Hailed by the professional critics for its neo-brutalist elegance, it has also evoked acerbic comments about its apparent incompleteness.

New Century Apartments
401 West End Avenue

Architect: William B. Franke
Builder: William B. Franke
Built: 1900
Remodelled: 1935
Architect: J.M.Berlinger
Builder: Excelsior Savings Bank

This building is distinctive both in plan and in outward appearance. The façade is a curious combination of styles. The entrance porch is Roman and the balconies and quoins Italian renaissance. The corners are rounded in the French manner, while the anthemia above the cornice line are pure Greek. The original floor plan, illustrated, was unusual for a middle-class apartment house in that it provided separate freight and service elevator entrances to each apartment as well as additional master bath facilities. The circulation pattern for each apartment was more straight-forward than most, with an entrance hall, off of which opened the major rooms, and a single straight inner hall leading to the bedrooms. A small garage for the residents' automobiles was provided adjacent to the building on 79th Street. In 1942 this two-story appendage was converted for use as a synagogue, in which capacity it presently serves. Unhappily, the original 10- and 11-room apartments have been cut into smaller units, seven to a floor, and the façade mutilated through the removal of the cornice as well as the entrance porch.

Butterfield House
37 West 12th Street

Architect: Mayer, Whittlesey and Glass
William J. Conklin
James S. Rossant

Builder: Daniel L. Gray

Built: 1962, co-op

Butterfield House is particularly notable for its sensitive and tasteful façade on 12th Street, carefully designed to blend with the surrounding townhouses. Erected prior to the enactment of the Landmarks Preservation Law, it nonetheless conforms admirably to the Law's features relating to Historic Districts, within one of which 37 West 12th Street lies. Actually consisting of a small building on 12th Street connected to a much larger one on 13th, Butterfield House includes predominantly 2- and 3-bedroom apartments, many of which are arranged so that the living rooms face the street while the sleeping quarters overlook the quieter inner courtyard. Balconies and jalousied garden rooms are provided, along with a handsome garden between the two sections of the building.