Context and construction The
Bavarian-born brothers
Joseph and James Seligman, in conjunction with several other brothers, founded dry-goods businesses across the United States in the 1840s. They opened a New York City clothing store at 5 William Street by 1848. With profits from the creation of other branches worldwide, the family received contracts to create
Union Army soldiers' uniforms during the
American Civil War. After the war ended, the family founded an investment bank called
J. & W. Seligman & Co., with headquarters at 59 Exchange Place. The company also developed branches around the world, each headed by one of the brothers, though these branches later became independent. The five lots purchased by Isaac included the Seligmans' old store, and were two blocks away from
Wall Street, where many of New York City's major financial companies and
commodities exchanges were located. The next year, architectural plans for the building were filed with the
New York City Department of Buildings. The
New York Herald said, "It is to be of the Italian Renaissance type with facades of at the first story and limestone above, with decorative tower." with work on the foundation beginning the next month. The building was completed by July 1907 at a cost of $1 million, at which point J. & W. Seligman & Co. moved into the space. Originally, the front entrance was on South William Street. 1 William Street, like other contemporary tall buildings nearby, rests on concrete piers sunk using
pneumatic caissons and
cofferdams down to the
bedrock (here about below
curb level). The foundations for the walls formed a concrete dam wide and feet deep, which prevented water from entering the cellar dug out within it.
Use In 1919, when Seligman & Co. relocated to nearby 54 Wall Street, 1 William Street was purchased by marine insurers Wilcox, Peck & Hughes (who were already tenants in the building). The same year, a renovation had split the two-story-high banking room into two regular-sized floors. By 1928, two floors of the building were occupied by insurance company
Chubb & Son, which since 1892 had owned the adjacent premises at 5–7 South William Street (rebuilt to a design by
Carrère and Hastings in 1899–1900). The investment bank
Lehman Brothers bought 1 William Street in 1928. At the time, they were located diagonally across the intersection of Beaver, William, and South William Streets. The firm had to move to make way for construction of
20 Exchange Place, and chose 1 William Street because it would provide more space. Lehman Brothers originally took half the floor area in 1 William Street, but then occupied additional space vacated by tenants with expiring leases, By the 1970s, Lehman Brothers was seeing financial losses, and under chairman
Peter G. Petersen, the company merged with
Kuhn, Loeb & Co. in 1977. The combined company moved out of the building at the end of 1980, putting the structure on sale for $10 million and consolidating its operations at another facility on
55 Water Street. The following year, the building was purchased by
Banca Commerciale Italiana, which erected an 11-story addition to the south between 1982 and 1986. In 1988, it received an
Albert S. Bard Award for Excellence in Architecture and Urban Design from the
City Club of New York. Through a series of mergers in the Italian banking industry, the building has been owned since 2008 by
Intesa Sanpaolo, Italy's largest bank. == Description ==