Full-page photos & text document 20 historic structures-the Dorilton, Gainsborough, San Remo, etc. - most dating from early 20th century. Over 50 photos include many rare views.

Lavishly illustrated volume provides detailed mini-histories of the Gramercy, Ansonia, Hotel des Artistes, Joseph Pulitzer's palatial residence, and many other luxurious lodgings. 175 illustrations — many from private sources — depict interiors and exteriors. Introduction. Index.

"New York's original residential high-rise"--Back cover.

Since its emergence in the mid-nineteenth century as the nation's "metropolis," New York has faced the most challenging housing problems of any American city, but it has also led the nation in innovation and reform. Plunz traces New York's housing development from 1850 to the present, exploring the housing of all classes, discussing the development of types ranging from the single-family house to the high-rise apartment tower.

The supreme addresses of choice in New York are on Park Avenue and on Fifth Avenue, but merely living on either of these famous boulevards is not enough. The ultimate aspiration is to dwell in a suite of rooms designed by one of the two masters of apartm

The Dakota is arguably the best-known residential address in the world, home to dozens of New York City's most famous artists, performers, and successful executives. The rare sale of an apartment there, usually at jaw-dropping prices, is newsworthy, as is the financial and architectural health of the building itself, a landmark in every sense of the word. The first true luxury apartment house built in New York City, more than 130 years ago, the Dakota is still the gold standard against which all other apartment buildings are weighed. Historian Andrew Alpern tells the fascinating story of how the Dakota came to be, how Singer sewing magnate Edward Clark dared to build an apartment building luxurious enough to coax the city's wealthy from their mansions downtown for ultra-modern living on what was then the swamplands of the Upper West Side. Redrawn plans of the entire building, published here for the first time, show how Clark created apartments glamorous enough that they made living under a shared roof as acceptable in Manhattan as it already was in Europe's grand capitals, forever revolutionizing apartment life in New York City. This internationally renowned building is now accessible to us all—at least in print, if not in its ultraprivate and well-guarded reality.

Magnificently illustrated directory of 73 of Manhattan's most splendid addresses includes mini-histories of each building, noting the architect, builder, date of construction, and more. 221 photographs and drawings.

Describes how the apartment building developed in the late nineteenth century and gradually achieved acceptance as middle-class housing in New York City.