from the collection of the New York Public Library The eight high-end residences designed by Little & O'Connor in 1892 of "irregular sizes" wrapped the southeast corner of West End Avenue and 93rd Street.  Their 19th century take on Flemish Renaissance architecture reflected affluence and luxury.  The sumptuous, double-wide home at 270 West 93rd Street just east of the avenue was faced in light-colored brick above a limestone base.  Its entrance above a short stoop was crowned with elaborately carved cresting.  The imposing dormer that fronted the slate-shing ..read more

  Bronx natives, brothers Sidney R. and Arthur W. Diamond both held law degrees from Columbia University.  But they turned their focus to real estate, becoming major players in the erection and management of apartment buildings. In 1939, the Diamonds hired the architectural firm of Boak & Paris to design a 10-story-and-penthouse apartment building on the site of four vintage brownstones at 166 through 172 East 77th Street between Third and Lexington Avenues.  Clad in beige brick, it was completed the following year.  Typical of Boak & Paris's designs, the centr ..read more

  Following his duel with Alexander Hamilton, Aaron Burr was forced to leave New York City and his estate just south of Greenwich Village, Richmond Hill.  In 1837,  John Jacob Astor I, who was 34 years old at the time, purchased the mansion from Burr and took over the land lease of the grounds from Trinity Church.  (The long-term lease would make Astor 103 years old when it expired.) The mansion was moved, the hill on which it stood was leveled, and streets were laid out--one of them named for Dr. John Charlton, the president of the New York Medical Society.  With ..read more

  In 1881 developer William a. Hawkinson completed a row of five high-stooped houses at 50 to 58 East 69th Street.  Each 18-feet wide, they were designed by Lamb & Wheeler.  The first resident of 52 East 69th Street was Anne White Schermerhorn Suydam, whose husband Charles Suydam died on December 31, 1882. In the first years of the 20th century, the outdated brownstones in the neighborhood were being replaced by sumptuous, modern mansions.  Banker Henry P. Davison purchased the southwest corner of Park Avenue and 69th Street in 1916 as the site of his new home.  ..read more

  Linus Scudder was a well-known builder in Greenwich Village in the decades prior to the Civil War.  In 1852, he broke ground for two identical 20-foot-wide, brick-faced homes at 38 and 40 Hammond Street (renumbered 238 and 240 West 11th Street in 1864).  Three stories tall above brownstone English basements, they were completed in 1853.  Trimmed in brownstone, they were capped by wooden bracketed cornices, each of the closely-spaced corbels dripping an onion-shaped finial. No. 38 Hammond Street was first home to Charles Griffith, a merchant at 61 Cedar Street.  He ..read more

  photo by Anthony Bellov In February 1906, the Central Realty Co. announced plans to erect “a 10-story elevator apartment house” on the northeast corner of Broadway and 101st Street.  The firm promised, “The building will have the very latest improvements, and apartments will be arranged in suites for housekeeping purposes.”  (The term “housekeeping” meant the apartments would have kitchens, unlike those in the popular residential hotels.) The Chepstow, as it was called, was completed in 1907.  The architectural firm of Mulliken & Moeller had produced a handsome br ..read more

  image from "Charles Follen McKim, A Study of his Life and Work, 1913 (copyright expired) Born on July 29, 1850, John Innes Kane was the great-grandson of John Jacob Astor I.  His maternal grandmother was Dorothea Astor.  Kane married Annie Cottenet Schermerhorn on December 12, 1878, her wedding gown designed personally by Parisian couturier Charles Frederick Worth.  Kane was among the social class known as "gentlemen," meaning he lived on inherited wealth.  Rather than work, he was interested, according to The New York Times, "in scientific matters, especially thos ..read more

  Russell M. Boak and Hyman F. Paris both worked in the office of architect Emery Roth.  They struck out on their own and in 1927 established the office of Boak & Paris.  Like Roth's, the firm quickly became known for designing apartment buildings. In 1940, developers Sidney and Arthur Diamond hired Boak & Paris to design an 11-story-and-penthouse building on East 77th Street, just west of Third Avenue.  The New York Times noted, "The plot runs through to Seventy-eighth Street, and on that side will be transformed into a large garden for the benefit of the tena ..read more

  In 1887, bricklayer John P. Thorton erected eight brick-faced flats, or apartment houses, on the west side of Fourth Avenue (renamed Park Avenue a year later) between 88th and 89th Streets.  Designed by Frederick T. Camp, they were intended for middle-class residents, predating the thoroughfare's exclusivity by about a decade.    Although it took the address of 1080 Park Avenue, the entrance to the corner building was on 88th Street, allowing Herman Goossen to open his saloon in the Park Avenue end in 1889.  When Prohibition arrived, the saloon made way for the Par ..read more

  In 1928, a year before the Stock Market crash, George Stephenson Brewster and his wife, the former Eleanor Grant Bosher, lived in a handsome mansion on the northwest corner of Park Avenue and 71st Street.  The massively wealthy Brewster was among the largest stockholders of the Standard Oil Company.  That year, the Brewsters' next door neighbor, real estate operator James T. Lee, proposed that they give up their mansions in favor of opulent apartments in a luxury building on the site.  By March 1929 when ground was broken, Lee had acquired a third mansion on Park Avenu ..read more