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March 26, igio
RECORD AND GUTDE
645
could be materially lessened and the owner's income corre¬
spondingly enlarged.
About ten years ago there was a revival in the building of
very big apartment houses on the West Side, houses which
sometimes occupied as much as a block front. Among the more
ENTRANCE HALL AND PARLOR IN XWE "MIRA MAR," A
NEW HOUSE ON RIVERSIDE DRIVE.
Gaton Ajello, Architect.
expensive buildings of this description was "Graham Court,"
on 7th av, between 116th and 117th sts; an Astor apartment
hotel at the southwest corner of 7oth st and Broadway, the
12-sty "Dorilton," at 71st 'St and Broadway, the 17-sty Stokes
apartment hotel, the "Ansonia," on the west side of Broadway,
between 73d and 74th sts, and the "Turrets," on Riverside
Drive at 84th st. Of course, these far exceeded the class tbat
was normal in their time, but they are interesting in TRAC¬
ING THE DEVELOPMENT of the apartment house idea in
New York, and in noting the standards of convenience and lux¬
ury which builders have successively been obliged to meet.
AN EXTREME TYPE OF THB LAST DECADE.
An extreme type was that of the "Turrets," in which the
apartments ranged in size from ten rooms and three baths to
twenty rooms and six baths, and among the attractions was
a white marble swimming pool, a fully equipped gymnasium, a
A FLOOR PLAN OF THE YEAR 1010, IN A RIVERSIDE
DRIVE APARTMENT HOUSE,
billiard-room, a large ballroom, a banquet-hall, bowling alleys
and basket-ball court. It was an easy step then to the "fam¬
ily hotel." The "Chelsea," one of the first of the large apart¬
ment houses, was from the flrst equipped with the conveniences
of a hotel. Other similar experiments, such as the hotel "En¬
dicott" and the "Beresford," proved so successful that they had
many imitators, of which the "Majestic" was the most promi¬
nent, but the construction of tlie type has ceased altogether,
since luxurious new hotels usurped many of their functions.
-Four distinct types of houses are being erected on Manhattan
Island in the year 1910. Named in order of their numerical
strength, they are (1) the 6-sty semi-fireproof elevator liouse,
occupying half a block front, which are being erected princi¬
pally on Washington Heights; (2> the 12-sty elevator fireproof
house occupying half a block front, on Riverside Drive, and
middle Broadway; (3) the 12-sty or more cooperative apart¬
ment house, the finest type of houses now being made, and
principally to be found on Madison and Park avs and in Gram¬
ercy Park; <4) the S-sty elevator house, on lateral streets of
the West Side and on Morningside Heights. The construction
of (5-sty non-elevator houses has practically ceased on Manhat¬
tan Island. Tiie prevailing types of construction seem to change
in New York every ten years.
In the normal 12-sty houses, there are vacuum cleaning sys¬
tems, burglar proof storage compartments in the basement for
every apartment, the dining-rooms are waiscoted in oak or
mahogany, and have beamed ceilings; parciuet floors in ithe
principal rooms; the cbamber-s arranged en-suite, separated by
private lialls from the rest of tbe apartment, and having dress¬
ing-room with lavatory and large closets with electroliers, base
plugs for table lights or electric fans; wall safes; Kitchens
A HOUSE IN THE CHARLOTTENBURG SECTION OF BER¬
LIN. SHOWING FORMALJ-LANTING IN FRONT.
large and light, connected %ith dining-room through a butler's
pantry and containing sanitary tile-lined refrigerator, white
porcelain enameled sink and dressers.
It Is difficult to compare apartment houses here with those in
foreign capitals, .because the economic causes and purposes are
not the same in one city as in another. But without consid¬
ering causes, it is interesting to set down beside photographs
of our contemporary houses one of an apartment house in Char-
lottenburg, a section which bears the same relation to the cen¬
ter of Berlin as doea Harlem to the center of New York. Char-
lottenburg is but l^alf an hour by trolley from Unter den Lin¬
den. It is a sect.ion which in the last flve years has grown
into a large apartment-house district.
The roof treatment is always a conspicuous feature of Ger¬
man buildings, and apartment houses are not exceptions. The
irregular shapes of the window openings of the house in the
picture contribute their share to the total effect of pictur-
esqueness. It is the almost â– universal practice in Germany of
flnishing rough brick walls with stucco or cement. A compar¬
ison of Berlin houses with thoi^e in New York will be found in
the Architectural Record Magazine for March, written hy H.
W. Frohne. Among the illustrations there given is the one
liere reproduced. ,
The Charlottenburg house bj;ing on the corner and of the ex¬
pensive sort, every apartmeijt in it has an unusual degree of
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