What was the largest apartment ever built in New York City?
Hi everyone, Ken here, welcome to "ThisHouse"
In the late 1800s, Henry Villard, the President of the Northern Pacific Railway, set out to
build Manhattan’s largest apartment, but no existing buildings could accommodate his
vision.
He purchased a lot along Madison Avenue in Midtown Manhattan and hired the prominent
gilded age architecture firm of McKim, Mead, and White to design a custom, luxury apartment
building.
The renaissance revival style building was designed around a central courtyard with plenty
of space for horse drawn carriages to drop residents off at their front doors.
Each unit consisted of 3 main floors with their own basements and attics, and boasted
unique layouts so that no 2 of the 6 units were the same.
Of course, Henry Villard wanted his to be the largest and the most expensive.
His 35,720 square foot apartment cost a whopping one million dollars just to construct the
interior with an additional 250,000 dollars being spent on furnishings.
All total, that is the modern day equivalent of nearly 40 million dollars just to finish
out the interior.
Shortly after its completion, Henry declared bankruptcy and the apartment changed hands
to the Reid family who purchased it for less than half of what Henry had paid to have it
finished.
They hired Stanford White of the same architecture firm to make it more to their own tastes,
and the results, well, let’s just go inside and see.
Entering the apartment from the courtyard, we arrive in the Vestibule with marble clad
walls and a tile mosaic floor.
Turning around, we can begin making our way up the marble staircase towards the main living
area on the second floor.
At the landing, stained glass windows allow a myriad of colors to reflect from the polished
marble surfaces, in fact, several of the stained glass windows we will see were designed by
Louis Comfort Tiffany.
Above us, the ceiling is coffered with carved marble rosettes in each section, we can pass
through the arcade to arrive in the entrance hall.
Stepping into the entrance hall, we begin to gain a sense of just how large this apartment
is.
Above us, the groin vault is clad in stamped leather with a floral motif and the door surrounds,
arching into the vaults, house an elaborate mosaic of varying tile sizes with the largest
of the tiles being hand carved from marble and creating an ensemble of figurative relief
work.
The door surrounds are no less impressive, once again with artisan relief work carved
from solid marble.
We can make our way through the first set of doors and begin exploring the apartment.
First we will see the Music Room finished out in painted, hand stenciled wood paneling
below damask wallpaper.
The coffered, barrel vaulted ceiling rises nearly 3 stories with a minstrel gallery in
its mezzanine, the balustrade of which is supported by gilded corbels.
We can now turn back around, and make our way through the double doors to continue exploring
the apartment.
The library was finished out with floor to ceiling wood paneling below a gilded, coffered
ceiling.
On its window wall, the bookshelves would have once housed a large collection of rare
and antique literature.
But that’s not all there is to the library, we can continue through an oak door to find
the study.
It was designed in the gothic style with tracery patterns above its bookcases, and on the ceiling,
a clean, geometric pattern is broken up by the most subtle of hand stenciling.
At the end of the entrance hall, we will find the drawing room.
Unfortunately, photos of this space were only taken as the apartment was being stripped
of its artisan details, but more on that in a moment.
Looking at what remains, we can get a pretty good idea of what this room once looked like.
Let’s start by looking down at the parquet wood floors, then, let’s bring our attention
to the ceiling, which would have glistened in golden hues from it’s gold leafed plaster
details.
On the walls, the pilasters once framed elaborate wall murals which were carefully removed.
Here is just one of those hand painted panels which was able to be removed in one piece
without cracking.
The dining room, measuring 60 feet long, could have comfortably accommodated 40 dinner guests
at the same table.
The ceiling was clad in painted leather, appearing dark and dull, just barely hinting at a pattern
above gas powered lamps.
The parquet wood floors are beyond intricate, with tiny wood tiles measuring as small as
a quarter of an inch in width.
Let’s keep looking at pictures of the apartment while we find out what happened to it and
why it was missing so many pieces in all of these photos.
The apartment changed hands many times over the years with each family adding their own
touches, but eventually the real estate just became too valuable to hold onto as a residence.
The entire building was slowly bought out by the Catholic Arch Dioceses and eventually
all 6 of the apartments were converted to offices.
When the building was converted, each apartment was stripped of its artisan and architectural
elements, which were catalogued and auctioned off.
The church sold the building, and its many rooms were further reconfigured to accommodate
business offices, then, most recently, a massive addition was added onto the original building
and it reopened as a hotel.
But in all of this, not all was lost.
There are still a handful of original rooms left intact, including the Music Room which
currently houses a restaurant.
So what do you think, was 451 Madison Avenue the largest apartment to ever be built in
New York City?
Did you have a favorite room?
Let me know your thoughts down below in the comments section.
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