Alwyn Court

The Alwyn Court is at 180 West 58th Street, on the southeast corner with Seventh Avenue and one block south of Central Park, in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City, United States. The site covers , with a width of on Seventh Avenue and a depth of on 58th Street. The Alwyn Court occupies , or about three-quarters of its lot. The Alwyn Court shares the city block with The Briarcliffe to the south and 165 West 57th Street and One57 to the east; it is cater-corner from 200 Central Park South to the northwest. It is also near the Saint Thomas Choir School and the American Fine Arts Society (also known as the Art Students League of New York building) to the west; the Osborne Apartments and the Rodin Studios to the southwest; Carnegie Hall to the south; Hampshire House to the northeast; and the New York Athletic Club and Essex House to the north. It was one of several luxury buildings developed around Carnegie Hall, on the northernmost end of Seventh Avenue, by the beginning of the 20th century. == Architecture ==

The thirteen-story Alwyn Court is tall, with twelve full stories and a smaller penthouse. The Alwyn Court was erected by the Hedden Construction Company. The building is similar in plan to the Dakota, completed in 1884, and the Apthorp, completed in 1908; all three buildings originally contained large apartments arranged around either a light court or courtyard. Although the interior and main entrance have been altered, almost all of the facade remains intact. in addition to fleurs-de-lis, cameos, and escutcheons. The Alwyn Court uses terracotta because, at the time of its construction, it cost one-third as much as other material such as stone. Since it was possible to reuse the molds that were used to bake the terracotta, the amount of decoration was limited only by the number of unique designs. The Alwyn Court's twelve-story facade is divided into three horizontal sections: a four-story base, a five-story shaft, and a three-story crown. These sections are separated by large decorative bands. The northern facade, on 58th Street, is divided vertically into five bays while the western facade on Seventh Avenue is subdivided into four bays. The northern and western facades are joined by a rounded corner, which contains an ornately detailed, recessed entrance archway. The corner entrance served as the Alwyn Court's main entrance before the building's renovation in 1938, when the ground-floor corner space was reconfigured into retail space. The modern-day main entrance is on Seventh Avenue, closer to the elevators than the original corner elevators. The staircase created a potential fire chimney, being open to the entire building. However, the building did contain fireproof materials such as brick exterior walls, as well as concrete floors, walls, and partitions. Each story has ceilings tall. In addition, the basement contained a wine vault for each tenant. The original design contained two passenger elevators and a service elevator. The staircase and elevators originally opened onto the southeastern corner of the atrium. Lobby and atrium The main lobby on Seventh Avenue, created in 1938, replaces the original lobby at the corner of Seventh Avenue and 58th Street. It contained peppermint-green walls with white plaster ornament, as well as a foyer with glass doors. The lobby contained ornamentation themed to music, including a red-marble mantlepiece in the foyer with carvings of pipes, horns, and violins, as well as lighting fixtures shaped like lyres. The atrium at the center of the building is octagonal, with four longer sides parallel to the main dimensions of the building, as well as four chamfered corners. The atrium was originally an air shaft, with 286 frosted windows overlooking it. Between 1979 and 1981, the air shaft was covered with a skylight. The courtyard was landscaped with a fountain and trees, becoming an enclosed atrium. The mural, painted in several hues of tan, depicts imitation architectural detail resembling the facade of the exterior. One of the units on each floor would occupy the southern and western sides of the floor, while the other unit would occupy the northern and eastern sides. but some units contained up to 34 The apartments had rooms of up to . Originally, a standard apartment had numerous communal rooms such as an entrance gallery, reception room, conservatory, music room, living room, dining room, and salon. Harde and Short were particularly proud of the Alwyn Court's floor layouts, threatening to sue architects who copied their floor plans. The apartments were decorated throughout with carved woodwork and bronze-and-iron light fixtures, as well as ornamental plaster and imitation Caen stone by McNulty Brothers. Other suites included ball-gown closets and dressing closets with mirrors on the doors. In addition, there were wood-burning fireplaces and vacuum-cleaning systems. Each of the apartments originally could function with just three to five servants, in contrast to traditional mansions of the same size that required twice as many staff. During its 1938 renovation, the Alwyn Court was divided into 75 apartments. Each floor typically had six units, and a penthouse story contained three additional apartments. The apartments contained between three and five rooms apiece. Each unit also contained bathrooms and dining galleries, while the penthouses have roof terraces and solariums. Twelve apartments, at the rounded corner, were fitted with large oval living rooms, while some of the units contained large fireplaces. Because the atrium was still an air shaft at the time of the renovation, none of the major rooms of each apartment face the atrium. Following the 1980s renovation, these units were turned into cooperative apartments. The Alwyn Court also contains storage units, a bike room, and a laundry room for residents. ==History==

During the early 19th century, apartment developments in the city were generally associated with the working class, but by the 1870s, apartments were also becoming desirable among the middle and upper classes. Furthermore, by the beginning of the 20th century, there were some housing cooperatives in the city that catered specifically to artists, including at 130 and 140 West 57th Street, as well as on 67th Street near Central Park. The original concept for the Alwyn Court also called for it to be an artists' cooperative. Construction Stuyvesant Co-operative Buildings, a company founded by artist Walter Russell, purchased the lot at the southeast corner of 58th Street and Seventh Avenue for $500,000 in the first week of June 1907. Russell planned to build a twelve-story apartment house on the site in conjunction with developer Alwyn Ball Jr., the building's namesake. By the next month, the Alwyn Court Corporation had been created to construct the building, and Harde and Short had been selected as the architects. According to E. S. Barlow, a leasing agent who was associated with the Alwyn Court for over three decades, Russell and Ball had originally wanted to select Radcliff & Kelly for the building's design, but selected Harde and Short because of their expertise in designing previous apartment houses. The Alwyn Court's construction was delayed slightly by a carpenters' strike against the Hedden Construction Company. By then, Russell was no longer involved with the Alwyn Court, In March 1910, with the building still mostly unrented, a fire broke out in an empty apartment on the tenth floor, causing $150,000 worth of damage when it spread to three other floors. The superstructure was undamaged, and the building was quickly repaired. and the building itself was billed as "an up-to-date 'House of Select Residences'". The Grenell Company acquired the building in January 1920 and promptly resold it to Benjamin Winter. The Alwyn Court was resold in July 1930 to Simon & Hartstein, which almost immediately resold it to Edgar A. Levy for $1.3 million. At the time, the building was still considered one of New York City's "most imposing apartment houses". Christopher Gray of The New York Times, writing in 1997, stated that the building's telephone directory in 1936 only listed six tenants. With the Great Depression ongoing, it was no longer feasible for the building to retain such large apartments. The renovation was designed by Louis S. Weeks and carried out by Ellinger Construction Corporation. Edgar Ellinger of the Ellinger Construction Corporation suggested demolishing the interiors while retaining the facade ornament. The redesign was necessitated by updated building codes, which made a mere alteration impractical, The main entrance had to be relocated as well. and all apartments had been rented by the following October. The building earned about $137,000 a year in rental income at the time, The Alwyn Court's success was attributed to the fact that the rooms were typically larger than in other apartment buildings, and most tenants did not require the large 14-room spaces of the original design. By the 1970s, the building had again become dilapidated, and rent control regulations made it difficult for the building to turn a profit. As part of the cooperative conversion, the central air shaft was converted into an atrium, and a skylight was installed over it. The Petrossian caviar bar opened in the building's base in 1984. The facade was still in poor shape: by 1997, pieces of terracotta were falling from the facade, prompting the owners to install a protective shed over the sidewalk. The New York Landmarks Conservancy awarded the facade's restoration a Lucy G. Moses Preservation Award in 2002. Further facade renovations were conducted in 2005. By the early 21st century, the Alwyn Court had regained a status as a luxury apartment building. It had become part of Billionaires' Row, an area with several residential skyscrapers marketed for the ultra-wealthy. The Alwyn Court's cooperative board attempted to block the forced evacuation, but the crane was eventually hoisted after the board signed an agreement with One57's developer, Extell Development Company. Another renovation was undertaken starting in 2019. == Notable residents ==

Upon the Alwyn Court's opening in late 1909, its first tenants included United Cigar Stores president Jacob Wertheim, as well as Steinway & Sons president Frederick Steinway. Later in the 20th century, residents included actor Darren McGavin,--> In the early 21st century, the Alwyn Court was home to residents including actress Jessica Hecht and her director husband Adam Bernstein, designer Amy Lau, and actor Richard Thomas. == Critical reception ==

The Alwyn Court's facade has generally been positively reviewed throughout the building's history. Shortly after the building's completion, ''Architects' and Builders' Magazine described the facade as "an incrustation of terra cotta, a filigree of fine ornament on every pilaster, soffit and mullion". In a 1976 article, The New York Times'' stated the Alwyn Court's "distinction resides in its extraordinary terra cotta ornamentation". Modern criticism has also been positive. Architectural writer Elizabeth Hawes wrote in 1993 that the structure was a "great architectural pile designed to impress even the affluent and worldly-wise", ==See also==